The Open Polar Sea / A narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States"

by I. I. Hayes

CHAPTER VII.

HANS AND HIS FAMILY.—PETOWAK GLACIER.—A SNOW-STORM.—THE ICE-PACK.—ENTERING SMITH'S SOUND.—A SEVERE GALE.—COLLISION WITH ICEBERGS.—ENCOUNTER WITH THE ICE-FIELDS.—RETREAT FROM THE PACK.—AT ANCHOR IN HARTSTENE BAY.—ENTERING WINTER QUARTERS.

It was five o'clock in the evening when I reached the schooner. The wind had freshened during our absence; and, unwilling to lose so favorable an opportunity for pushing on, I had hastened on board. Otherwise I should gladly have given some time to an examination of the native village which lies a few miles to the eastward of the cape, on the northern side of a conspicuous bay, near a place called Kíkertait,—"The Place of Islands."

In anticipation of a heavy blow and a dirty night, McCormick had, during my absence, taken a reef in the sails, and the little schooner, with her canvas shivering in the wind, seemed impatient as a hound in the leash. When the helm went up, she wheeled round to the north with a graceful toss of her head, and, after steadying herself for an instant, as if for a good start, she shot off before the wind at ten knots an hour. Capes, bays, islands, glaciers, and icebergs sank rapidly behind us; and, rejoicing over their extraordinary fortune, the ship's company were in the best of spirits. As we dashed on through nest after nest of icebergs, it was curious to observe the evidences of reckless daring which inspired their thoughts. Dodge had the deck, and Charley, as dare-devil an old sailor as ever followed the fortunes of the sea, had the helm; and it seemed to me, as I sat upon the fore-yard, that there was some quiet understanding between the two to see how near they could come to the icebergs without hitting them. We passed through many narrow places; but instead of finding the schooner in the middle of the channel, she generally managed to fall off to one side or the other at the critical moment (of course, by mere accident); and when I shouted a remonstrance at the lubberly steering, I was answered with the assurance that the schooner would not obey her helm with so much after-sail on, when running before the wind; so I accordingly hove the schooner to, and close-reefed the mainsail; and now, either from the want of a reasonable excuse for doing otherwise, or from a real difficulty being overcome, the vessel was made to keep somewhat nearer to a straight course; and we dashed on through the waveless waters with a celerity which, in view of our surroundings, fairly made one's head swim.

A HAZARDOUS PASSAGE.

I was once not a little alarmed. Before us lay what appeared to be two icebergs separated by a distance of about twenty fathoms. To go around them was to deviate from our course, and I called to Dodge to know if he could steady the schooner through the narrow passage. Ever ready when there was a spice of danger, he willingly assumed the responsibility of the schooner's behavior, and we approached the entrance; but, when it was too late to turn either to the right or left, I discovered, much to my amazement, that the objects which I had supposed to be two bergs were in fact but portions of the same mass, connected together by a link which was only a few feet below the surface of the water. The depth of water proved, however, to be greater than at first appeared, but the keel actually touched twice as we shot through the opening; and while the schooner was, with some hesitancy and evident reluctance, doing this sledge duty, I must own that I wished myself anywhere else than on her fore-yard.

HANS AND HIS FAMILY.

The officers and men amused themselves with our new allies. Hans was delighted, and he expressed himself with as much enthusiasm as was consistent with his stolid temperament. His wife exhibited a mixture of bewilderment and pride; and, apparently overwhelmed with the novelty of the situation in which she so suddenly found herself, seemed to have contracted a chronic grin; while her baby laughed and crowed and cried as all other babies do.

The sailors set to work at once with tubs of warm water and with soap, scissors, and comb, to prepare them for red shirts and other similar luxuries of civilization. At this latter they were overjoyed, and strutted about the deck with much the same air of exalted consequence as that of a boy who has been freshly promoted from frock and shoes to pantaloons and boots; but it must be owned that the soap-and-water arrangement was not so highly appreciated; and well they might object, for they were not used to it. At first the whole procedure seemed to be great sport, but at length the wife began to cry, and demanded of her husband to know whether this was a white man's religious rite, with an expression of countenance which appeared to indicate that it was regarded by her as a refined method of Christian torture. The family were finally stowed away for the night down among the ropes and sails in the "ship's eyes;" and one of the sailors who played chamberlain on the occasion, and who appeared to be not overly partial to this increase of our family, remarked that, "If good for nothing else, they are at least good lumber for strengthening the schooner's bows against the ice."

PETOWAK GLACIER.