“Who are you?” again.
One of the men spoke up: “That’s the major,—Major Greely.”
Colwell crawled in and took him by the hand, saying to him, “Greely, is this you?”
“Yes,” said Greely in a faint broken voice, hesitating and shuffling with his words, “yes—seven of us left—here we are—dying—like men. Did what I came to do—beat the best record.”
The four men in the tent with Greely were two sergeants, Elison and Fredericks; Bierderbick, the hospital steward; and Private Connell, who, with Brainard and Long, were all that remained of the twenty-five members of the Lady Franklin Bay Expedition. The scene, as Colwell looked around, was one of misery and squalor. The rocky floor was covered with cast-off clothes, and among them were huddled together the sleeping-bags in which the party had spent most of their time during the last few months. There was no food left in the tent but two or three cans of a thin, repulsive-looking jelly, made by boiling strips cut from the seal-skin clothing. The bottle on the tent-pole still held a few teaspoonfuls of brandy, but it was their last, and they were sharing it as Colwell entered; it was evident that most of them had not long to live....
As soon as Colwell understood the condition of affairs, he sent Chief-Engineer Lowe back to the cutter to put off to the “Bear” with Long, to report what had happened, and bring off the others with the surgeon and stimulants. Fredericks and Bierderbick presently got up and came out. Colwell gave them, as well as Greely and Elison, a little of the biscuit he had in his pocket, which they munched slowly and deliberately. Then he gave them another bit, while Norman opened one of the cans of pemmican. Scraping off a little with a knife, Colwell fed them slowly by turns. It was a pitiable sight. They could not stand up, and had dropped down on their knees, and held out their hands begging for more. After they had each been fed twice, they were told that they had had enough, that they could not eat more then without danger; but their hunger had now come back with full force, and they begged piteously to be helped again, protesting that it could do them no harm. Colwell was wisely deaf to their entreaties and threw away the can. When Greely found that he was refused he took out a can of the boiled seal-skin, which had been carefully husbanded, and which he said he had a right to eat, as it was his own. This was taken away from him, but while Colwell was at work trying to raise the tent, some one got the half-emptied can of pemmican, and by the time it was discovered had eaten its contents.
The weaker ones were like children, petulant, rambling and fitful in their talk, absent, and sometimes a little incoherent. While they were waiting for the return of the boat, Colwell and the ice-masters did their best to cheer them up by telling them that relief was at hand, and that the others would soon arrive. They could not realize it, and refused to believe it. So they were humored, and by way of taking up their thoughts, Colwell told them something of what had been going on in the world during their three years of exile. Curiously enough, there was much that they knew already. It turned out that among the stores from the “Proteus” were two boxes of lemons, and the fruit had been wrapped up in scraps of English newspapers,—“those lemons which your dear wife put up for us,” as one of them said to Colwell in a moment of wandering fancy. The latter could only disclaim the imaginary obligation to an imaginary person, but the impression had already faded.
As Greely complained of cold, Colwell gave him his gloves, and persuaded him to go back to his sleeping-bag. This was lying under the fallen tent-cloth, which the party had been too weak or too discouraged to raise up and disengage. Where the single remaining pole supported the tent there was a clear space of perhaps six feet, just enough for a man to stand upright, but around it the canvas was lying on the ground. The bag, from which Greely had hardly moved for a month, was found under the canvas, and by the united efforts of the three men the tent was partly raised.
Meanwhile, the “Bear” had arrived and Lowe had gone off in the cutter, taking with him Sergeant Long. Long was too weak to get on board without assistance, and was lifted over the side by some of the crew and taken to a chair in the wardroom. In reply to questions about the party and their condition, Long, in a husky voice, told his story: that all were dead except Greely and five others, who were on shore in “sore distress—sore distress;” that they had had a hard winter, and “the wonder was how in God’s name they had pulled through.” No words can describe the pathos of this man’s broken and enfeebled utterance as he said, over and over, “a hard winter—a hard winter;” and the officers who were gathered about him in the wardroom felt an emotion which most of them were at little pains to conceal. The first sign of the relief expedition which had reached the camp was the sound from the steam whistle of the “Thetis,” recalling the shore parties at Payer Harbor. Lieutenant Greely, lying on the ground in his tent, had heard it, as it was borne faintly over the neck of land, but the others had not noticed it in the roaring wind, and when he told them he had heard a steamer’s whistle, they thought it only the impression of his disturbed imagination. Long crawled out of the tent and, bracing himself against the wind, struggled up to the ridge; but nothing could be seen but the rocky coast, and the ice-foot, and the chopping sea with the pack stretching off in the distance. It was a bitter disappointment. Long went back disheartened, but after waiting uneasily awhile longer, he mounted the ridge a second time. Still there was nothing to be seen but the same hopeless prospect, and he was about to return again when the cutter came into view around the point above. After all these months of waiting it was hard to believe that he was not dreaming, but when he saw the coxswain wave the familiar flag, he knew that relief had come at last.