Mr. Sonntag, with Radcliffe, Knorr, and Starr to assist him, took general charge of such scientific work as we found ourselves able to manage; and Jensen, with Hans and Peter, were detailed as an organized hunting force. Mr. Dodge, with the body of the crew, discharged the cargo, and, carrying it to the shore, swung it with a derrick up on the lower terrace, which was thirty feet above the tide, and there deposited it in a store-house made of stones and roofed with our old sails. This was a very laborious operation. The beach was shallow, the bank sloping, and the ice not being strong enough to bear a sledge, a channel had to be kept open for the boats between the ship and the shore. The duty of preparing the schooner for our winter home devolved upon Mr. McCormick, with the carpenter and such other assistance as he required. After the sails had been unbent, the yards sent down, and the topmasts housed, the upper deck was roofed in,—making a house eight feet high at the ridge and six and a half at the side. A coating of tarred paper closed the cracks, and four windows let in the light while it lasted, and ventilated our quarters. Between decks there was much to do. The hold, after being floored, scrubbed, and whitewashed, was converted into a room for the crew; the cook-stove was brought down from the galley and placed in the centre of it under the main hatch, in which hung our simple apparatus for melting water from the snow or ice. This was a funnel-shaped double cylinder of galvanized iron connecting with the stove-pipe, and was called the "snow melter." A constant stream poured from it into a large cask, and we had always a supply of the purest water, fully ample for every purpose.
Into these quarters the crew moved on the first of October, and the out-door work of preparation being mainly completed, we entered then, with the ceremony of a holiday dinner, upon our winter life. And the dinner was by no means to be despised. Our soup was followed by an Upernavik salmon, and the table groaned under a mammoth haunch of venison, which was flanked by a ragout of rabbit and a venison pasty.
OUR COMMISSARIAT.
Indeed, we went into the winter with a most encouraging prospect for an abundant commissariat. The carcasses of more than a dozen reindeer were hanging in the shrouds, rabbits and foxes were suspended in clusters from the rigging, and the hearty appetites and vigorous digestions which a bracing air and hard work had given us, were not only amply provided for in the present, but seemed likely to be supplied in the future. The hunters rarely came home empty-handed. Reindeer in herds of tens and fifties were reported upon every return of the sportsmen. Jensen, who had camped out several days on the hunting-grounds, had already cached the flesh of about twenty animals, besides those which had been brought on board. In a single hour I had killed three with my own hands. Both men and dogs were well provided. The dogs, which, according to Esquimau custom, were only fed every second day, often received an entire reindeer at a single meal. They were very ravenous, and, having been much reduced by their hard life at sea, they caused an immense drain upon our resources.
My journal mentions, with daily increasing impatience, the almost constant prevalence of strong northeast winds, which embarrassed us during this period; but at length the wind set in from the opposite direction, and, breaking up the young ice about us, jammed us upon the rocks. If there was little consolation in the circumstance of our situation being thus altered for the worse, there was at least novelty in the caprice of the weather. For once, at least, the uniform "N. E." had been changed in the proper column of the log-book. It was not without difficulty that we succeeded in relieving the schooner from the unpleasant predicament.
While these preparations for the winter were being made, I must not forget the astronomer and his little corps. Between him and the executive officer there sprung up quite a rivalry of interest. While the one desired a clean ship moored in safety and a well-fed crew, he was naturally jealous of any detail of men for the other; and it must be owned that the men worked with much greater alacrity for the follower of Epicurus than the disciple of Copernicus. An appeal to head-quarters, however, speedily settled the question as to where the work was most needed; and, by a judicious discrimination as to what was due to science and what to personal convenience, we managed, while the daylight lasted, to lay the foundation of a very clever series of observations, while at the same time our comfort was secured.
THE OBSERVATORY.
A neat little observatory was erected on the lower terrace, not far from the store-house, and it was promptly put to use; and an accurate survey of the harbor and bay, with soundings, was made as soon as the ice was strong enough to bear our weight. The observatory was a frame structure eight feet square and seven high, covered first with canvas and then with snow, and was lined throughout with bear and reindeer skins. In it our fine pendulum apparatus was first mounted, and Sonntag and Radcliffe were engaged for nearly a month in counting its vibrations. It was found to work admirably. Upon removing this instrument, the magnetometer was substituted in its place, upon a pedestal which was not less simple than original. It was made of two headless kegs, placed end to end upon the solid rock beneath the floor, and the cylinder thus formed was filled with the only materials upon which the frost had not laid hold, namely, beans. Water being poured over these, we had soon, at ten degrees below zero, a neat and perfectly solid column; and it remained serviceable throughout the winter, as no fire of any kind was allowed in this abode of science.[2]
[2] It is proper to mention here that the pendulum and magnetic observations, as well indeed as all others in physical science, were, upon my return, sent to the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, and were placed in the very competent hands of Mr. Charles A. Schott, Assistant in the United States Coast Survey, to whom I am indebted for most able and efficient coöperation, in the elaboration and discussion of my materials, preparatory to their publication in the "Smithsonian Contributions," to which source I beg to refer the reader for details.
