The legitimate sphere for the employment of our canine friends for the purposes of draught is undoubtedly to be found over the frozen wastes of northern latitudes, where the summer shows too brief a sun for the growth of much fodder, and the yielding snow is incapable of supporting heavier animals. Endowed with remarkable intelligence, with great powers of endurance, and with the capability of adaptation to extreme conditions of climate and various kinds of food, they seem peculiarly fitted to aid man where his existence is attended by the severest hardship. Dogs will exist and labour where other quadrupeds would perish, and their marvellous instinct often proves the means of saving life amidst the dangers which beset the inhabitants of those inhospitable regions. In Northern Siberia, Kamtchatka, Greenland, and countries of a similarly rigorous climate, they are essential alike for the transport of articles of commerce and for procuring the necessary means of subsistence. As early as 1577, Frobisher recorded the fact that Eskimo sledges were drawn by teams of dogs, and they have repeatedly proved the indispensable reliance of modern explorers.
Both the Eskimo and the Siberian sledge-dogs are large and powerful animals, and, while differing sufficiently to constitute separate varieties, they agree in bearing a close resemblance in their aspect, the tone of their howling, and in other characteristics to the wolves of the arctic circle. They stand from thirty to thirty-one and a half inches in height at the shoulder, possess a pointed muzzle, sharp and erect ears, and a bushy tail. Their compact and shaggy coat forms an admirable protection against the cold, and is therefore much prized among the Eskimo for clothing. Their colour is variable, the Eskimo dog presenting almost all shades; but the predominating hue of this and also of the Siberian variety is gray or a dingy white.
They subsist principally on fish, walrus-hide, the flesh or the refuse of seal, and all kinds of offal. On the arctic shores of Asia, small fish, cleaned and dried in the open air, are reserved for the dogs, and form an excellent spring diet. During winter journeys, the food is usually served on alternate days, and consists of fresh frozen fish, or about two pounds of seals’ flesh, or its equivalent in walrus-hide, which is often frozen like plates of iron, and has to be chopped or sawn to pieces. They are never permitted to eat salt junk, except through dire necessity, and then only sparingly, for a full meal of it would in many cases be fatal. In summer, they are turned loose to shift for themselves, and live partly on field-mice.
Before entering on long expeditions, sledge-dogs require a careful preparation, very similar to that which the plundering Turcomans give their horses. For some time beforehand, their food, exercise, and rest are strictly regulated. In the last fortnight, they are driven from seven to twenty miles daily, halting at stated intervals, until, like the Turcoman steeds, they are capable of running from seventy to a hundred English miles in a day, if the cold be not very intense and the strain of brief duration. Wrangell states that when the dogs are pursuing game, they will cover fifteen versts, and even more, in an hour, a verst equalling two-thirds of an English mile. This is confirmed by the experience of Dr Hayes, who occasionally amused an enforced leisure by taking an excursion with a team of a dozen dogs, which would traverse six miles in twenty-eight to thirty minutes. Their performances over long distances are even more surprising. On one of his return journeys, Wrangell sometimes accomplished a hundred versts per day, and maintained a mean daily speed of thirty-four miles over a distance of two hundred and fifty leagues, despite the fact that the dogs went several days without food, the stone-foxes and wolverines having destroyed the provision depôts. Dr Kane’s team, although worn by previous travel, carried him, with a fully burdened sledge, between seven and eight hundred miles in a fortnight, at the astonishing average rate of fifty-seven miles per day!
When subjected to severe and protracted exertion, the dogs are liable to become footsore. They should then be protected by fur-boots, the paws being washed frequently in strong brandy, and if the weather be sufficiently mild, bathed in sea-water. A similar foot-covering is necessary when the snow is frozen into hard crystals, which cut the feet; or when a team is driven rapidly over sea-ice formed at a low temperature, which, besides cutting the paws, occasions acute pain from the brine expressed, sometimes even causing the animals to fall down in fits. When the cold is unusually severe, the dogs require clothing for the body.
Living almost entirely in the open air, these useful assistants give their masters little trouble in the provision of kennels. During summer, they scratch holes in the ground for coolness, or lie in water to escape mosquitoes. In winter, when the thermometer is exceptionally low, they are occasionally sheltered in an outhouse adjoining the cabin; but even then are more frequently tethered outside, and curl themselves up in their burrows in the snow. For the comfort of the dogs attached to the Fox, while engaged in the search for Sir John Franklin, some twenty-five holes were excavated in the face of a snow-bank alongside the vessel, and ‘in them they spent most of their time. Under the lee of the ship, they could, when their fur was thick, lie out on the snow without apparent inconvenience, although the temperature was minus forty degrees, and the mists gave a raw and keen edge to the cutting blasts.’ Dr Kane erected a doghouse on Butler’s Island; but the animals would not sleep away from the vessel, preferring the bare snow within sound of human voices to a warm kennel on the rocks. Wrangell says that they relieve their solitary watches and interrupt the arctic silence with periodical howling, which is audible at a long distance, and recurs as a rule at intervals of six or eight hours, but far more frequently when the moon shines.
The narti or sledge of Northern Siberia is nearly two yards long, about twenty-one inches broad, and ten high. The best are built of seasoned birchwood, free from knots, except the bed, which is formed of woven shoots of the sand-willow. No iron is used in the construction, all the parts being bound together by thongs cut from the skin of the elk, ox, or walrus, of which a great number are required. Eskimo sledges vary considerably both in form and material, and are from four to fourteen feet in length; an ordinary specimen measures ten or twelve feet, and weighs upwards of two hundred pounds. A large party of Eskimo who once visited Dr Kane arrived in sledges ‘made of small fragments of porous bone, very skilfully fastened together by thongs of hide; the runners, which shone like silver, were of highly polished ivory, obtained from the tusks of the walrus.’ One of Dr Kane’s sledges, named ‘Little Willie,’ was constructed of American hickory, thoroughly seasoned, and well adapted for strength, lightness, and a minimum amount of friction. Another, styled the ‘Faith,’ which was built in a stronger fashion, after models furnished by the British Admiralty, measured thirteen feet long, and four broad, and would carry fourteen hundredweight of mixed stores. The natives moisten the soles of the runners with water, often obtained by dissolving snow in the mouth, which insures a thin shield of ice that glides over a frozen surface with incredible ease.
When the sledge is laden, the whole is covered by thin sheets of deerskin, so as to prevent displacement of the load by the rapid speed or the frequent overthrows. Under favourable circumstances, a team will draw from a thousand to twelve hundred and sixty pounds, or from nine to eleven and a quarter hundredweight, in addition to the driver, at the rate of seven or eight miles an hour; but during intense frost, when the snow is rendered granular, and ‘almost as gritty as sand,’ the load may have to be limited to three hundred and sixty pounds.
A good team consists of about twelve dogs. Their harness is composed of bearskin, and when tethered, it is by bear or seal skin traces fastened to spears plunged into the ice. The foremost sledge is furnished with an additional dog to act as leader, which receives a careful training, for on him the safety of the whole party frequently depends. If reliable, no difficulty turns him aside, but he selects the track which presents the least danger. On dark nights, or when the wild waste is obscured by a tempest, an impenetrable mist, or a blinding snowstorm, and the sheltering powarna is scarcely discoverable by man, a good leader will be sure to find it, if he has ever crossed the plain before, or once rested at the habitation; while, if the hut be buried in snow, he will indicate the spot where his master must dig. When successfully trained, he rarely runs astray on scenting game; and often excites the admiration of travellers by his persistent efforts to keep the rest of the team to their work, barking and wheeling round at intervals, as if he had come upon a new scent, in order to induce them to follow him. If the leader swerves from duty, the driver not unfrequently finds himself powerless on such occasions to prevent them from rushing madly off in pursuit of prey.
At all times, the task of driving these half-tamed wolfish dogs is one of considerable difficulty, requiring both skill and determination. The sleighman seats himself on one side of the sledge, with his feet on the runner, and must be ready to spring off at any moment when his safety may be imperilled, or to dig his heels into the snow, if the fierce and unruly animals refuse to stop when they are required. A long staff, furnished with iron at one end and bells at the other, serves the double purpose of assisting him to maintain his precarious seat on the rocking sledge, and aids his voice in giving animation to the team by the tintinnabulation of the bells. A far more formidable instrument is the driver’s whip. The lash measures twenty feet in length, or four feet more than the traces, and is made of raw seal or walrus hide, tipped with a ‘cracker’ of hard sinew. Attached to a light stock only two and a half feet long, no little practice is necessary to roll such a lash out to its full length, and when blown in all directions by an arctic gale, will tax the powers of the most experienced hand.