Round About the North Pole

by W. J. Gordon

The Siberian Islands, lying north of the delta of the Lena, answer to the Parry Islands on the American side, the two groups being separated by that wide stretch of the Arctic Ocean communicating with the Pacific through Bering Strait. At first the Asiatic group was officially named after Liakhoff, then it was called after the unwisely named New Siberia, but, under any designation, it took half a century to find the different islands, and considerably more to land on them.

THE LENA DELTA

When Liakhoff discovered the one named after him by the Empress Catherine, he also went north to Moloi, and he seems to have visited Kotelnoi to the north-west. In 1775 Chvoinof was sent to survey these three, but he devoted most of his attention to Liakhoff Island—fifty miles across—which he found to consist, as reported, of hills of granite rising from a mass of mammoth bones, sand, and ice, some of the ice ancient enough to carry a deep covering of moss. Though he stated that other islands could be made out in the distance, nothing was done to verify his discoveries, real or imaginary, until thirty years had passed, when Thaddeus and Stolbovoi were reached. Next year (1806) New Siberia, to the eastward, was discovered by Sirovatskof, and two years afterwards Bjelkof was added to the southerly portion of the archipelago.

In 1809 Hedenström, assisted by Sannikof, began his series of surveys extending over all these, and cleared up much of the mystery concerning them. From Thaddeus, Sannikof sighted, away to the northward, what is now known as Bennett Island; and, from New Siberia, Hedenström sighted Henrietta and Jeannette Islands, and set out for them, and would have reached them had his sledges not been stopped by open water. Like his predecessors he was astonished at the mammoth remains on Liakhoff Island.

According to his account, "these bones or tusks are less large and heavy the further we advance towards the north, so that it is a rare occurrence on the islands to meet with a tusk of more than 108 lbs. in weight, whereas on the continent they are said often to weigh as much as 432 lbs. In quantity, however, these bones increase wonderfully to the northward, and as Sannikof expresses himself, the whole soil of the first of the Liakhoff Islands appears to consist of them. For about eighty years the fur-hunters have every year brought large cargoes from this island, but as yet there is no sensible diminution of the stock. The tusks on the islands are also much more fresh and white than those on the continent. A sandbank on the western side was most productive of all, and the fur-hunters maintain that when the sea recedes after a long continuance of easterly winds, a fresh supply of mammoth bones is always found to have been washed from this bank, proceeding apparently from some vast store at the bottom of the sea." Besides these multitudinous remains of the mammoth Hedenström found numerous remains of rhinoceros, the horn of which was then thought to be a bird's claw three feet long.

To clear up the wide discrepancies in the maps the Emperor Alexander, in 1820, equipped two expeditions to proceed by land to the northern coast of Siberia and properly survey it, the work to be carried as far east as Cape Chelagskoi, whence a sledge party was to start for the north in search of the inhabited country reported to exist in the Polar Sea in that direction. One of these expeditions, under Lieutenant P. F. Anjou, was to commence its operations from the mouth of the Yana; the other, under Lieutenant Ferdinand Vrangel' (or, as he is generally known amongst us, Wrangell or Von Wrangell), was to start from the mouth of the Kolyma, his chief assistant being Midshipman Matiuschkin. Both parties did good survey work, but neither made any striking discovery. Anjou reached 76° 36´ to the north of Kotelnoi; Wrangell reached 72° 2´ (north-east of the Bear Islands, one hundred and seventy-four miles out on the sea from the great Baranoff rock), beyond which progress was impossible owing to the thinness of the ice, which was covered with salt water.

Wrangell had many perilous experiences. In his fourth journey over the sea the ice broke up around him and he found himself on a floe with a labyrinth of water lanes hemming him in on every side and a storm coming on from the westward. The storm rapidly increased in fury, and the masses of ice around him were soon dashing against each other and breaking in all directions. On the floe, which was tossing to and fro on the waves, he gazed in painful inactivity on the conflict, expecting every moment to be swallowed up. For three long hours he had remained unable to move, the mass of ice beneath him holding together, when it was caught by the storm and hurled against a large field of ice. The crash was terrific, as it was shattered into little pieces. At that dreadful moment, when escape seemed impossible, he was saved by the impulse of self-preservation. Instinctively the party sprang on to the sledges and urged the dogs to full speed, and as hard as they could gallop they skimmed across the yielding fragments to the field on which they had been stranded, and safely reached a stretch of firmer ice, where the dogs ceased running among the hummocks, conscious that the danger was past.

But it is not so much for adventures like this that his account of his work is of continuing interest as for the abundance of its notes and reflections on the country and its life and climate. Once, for instance, when on the Baranicha he was fortunate enough to witness a migration of reindeer. "I had hardly finished the observation," he says, "when my whole attention was called to a highly interesting, and to me a perfectly novel, spectacle. Two large migrating bodies of reindeer passed us at no great distance. They were descending the hills from the north-west and crossing the plain on their way to the forests, where they spend the winter. Both bodies of deer extended further than the eye could reach, and formed a compact mass, narrowing towards the front. They moved slowly and majestically along, their broad antlers resembling a moving wood of leafless trees. Each body was led by a deer of unusual size, which my guides assured me was always a female. One of the herds was stealthily followed by a wolf, who was apparently watching for an opportunity of seizing any one of the younger and weaker deer which might fall behind the rest, but on seeing us he made off in another direction. The other column was followed at some distance by a large black bear, who, however, appeared only intent on digging out a mouse's nest every now and then, so much so that he took no notice of us. We had great difficulty in restraining our two dogs, but happily succeeded in doing so; their barking, or any sound or motion on our part, might have alarmed the deer, and by turning them from their course, have proved a terrible misfortune to the hunters, who were awaiting their passage, on which they are entirely dependent for support. We remained for two hours whilst the herds of deer were passing by, and then resumed our march."

The way in which the deer are dealt with by the hunters was seen by Matiuschkin when despatched by Wrangell to survey the Anyui. "The true harvest, which we arrived just in time to see, is in August or September, when the reindeer are returning from the plains to the forests. They are then healthy and well fed, the venison is excellent, and as they have just acquired their winter coats the fur is thick and warm. The difference of the quality of the skins at the two seasons is such, that whilst an autumn skin is valued at five or six roubles, a spring one will only fetch one or one and a half roubles. In good years the migrating body of reindeer consists of many thousands; and though they are divided into herds of two or three hundred each, yet the herds keep so near together as to form only one immense mass, which is sometimes from thirty to seventy miles in breadth. They always follow the same route, and in crossing the river near Plotbischtsche, they choose a place where a dry valley leads down to the stream on one side, and a flat sandy shore facilitates their landing on the other side. As each separate herd approaches the river, the deer draw more closely together, and the largest and strongest takes the lead. He advances, closely followed by a few of the others, with head erect, and apparently intent on examining the locality. When he has satisfied himself, he enters the river, the rest of the herd crowd after him, and in a few minutes the surface is covered with them. Then the hunters, who have been concealed to leeward, rush in their light canoes from their hiding-places, surround the deer, and delay their passage, whilst two or three chosen men armed with short spears dash into the middle of the herd and despatch large numbers in an incredibly short time; or at least wound them so, that, if they reach the bank, it is only to fall into the hands of the women and children. The office of the spearman is a very dangerous one. It is no easy thing to keep the light boat afloat among the dense crowd of swimming deer, which, moreover, make considerable resistance; the males with their horns, teeth, and hind legs, whilst the females try to overset the boat by getting their fore-feet over the gunwale; if they succeed in this the hunter is lost, for it is hardly possible that he should extricate himself from the throng; but the skill of these people is so great that accidents very rarely occur. A good hunter may kill a hundred or more in less than half an hour. When the herd is large, and gets into disorder, it often happens that their antlers become entangled with each other; they are then unable to defend themselves, and the business is much easier. Meanwhile the rest of the boats pick up the slain and fasten them together with thongs, and every one is allowed to keep what he lays hold of in this manner. It might seem that in this way nothing would be left to requite the spearmen for their skill, and the danger they have encountered; but whilst everything taken in the river is the property of whoever secures it, the wounded animals which reach the bank before they fall, belong to the spearman who wounded them. The skill and experience of these men are such that in the thickest of the conflict, when every energy is taxed to the uttermost, and their life is every moment at stake, they have sufficient presence of mind to contrive to measure the force of their blows so as to kill the smallest animals outright, but only to wound the larger and finer ones, so that they may be just able to reach the bank. Such proceeding is not sanctioned by the general voice, but it seems nevertheless to be almost always practised. The whole scene is of a most singular and curious character, and quite indescribable. The throng of thousands of swimming reindeer, the sound produced by the striking together of their antlers, the swift canoes dashing in amongst them, the terror of the frightened animals, the danger of the hunters, the shouts of warning advice or applause from their friends, the blood-stained water, and all the accompanying circumstances, form a whole which no one can picture to himself without having witnessed the scene."