I have visited several of these huts, some constructed of logs, others of deals, two inches in thickness. During the stay of the hunters, they employ themselves in killing seals, sea-horses, etc., in the water; and bears, foxes, deer, or whatever else they meet with, on land. They are furnished with provisions for eighteen months by their employers, consisting of rye-flour for bread, oatmeal, barley-meal, peas, salt beef, salt cod, and salt halibut, together with curdled milk, honey, and linseed oil; besides which, they procure for themselves lion-deer in winter, and birds in summer. Their drink chiefly consists of a liquor called nuas, made from rye-flour and water; malt or spirituous liquors being entirely forbidden, to prevent drunkenness, as these persons, when they were allowed it, drank so immoderately, that their work was often altogether neglected. For general purposes, they use spring water when it is to be had, or, in lieu of it, take water from lakes; but, when neither can be got, they use melted snow. Their fuel, for the most part, is brought with them from Russia, and drift-wood is used for the same purpose. The hunters defend themselves from the rigour of the frost by a covering made of skin, over which they wear a garment called kushy, made of the skin of rein-deer, with boots of the same. A warm cap, called a trucchy, defends the whole head and neck, and part of the face; and gloves of sheep-skin, the hands. They seldom travel far in winter, but the short excursions they have occasion to make they perform on foot, on snow-skates, and draw their food after them on hand-sledges, but such as have dogs employ them in this service. Their huts, in stormy weather, are often buried in the snow, and in such cases they are obliged to make their way through the chimney to get out. As an anti-scorbutic, they make use of a herb produced in the country, a stock of which they generally provide themselves with on the approach of winter, but sometimes they are under the necessity of digging through the snow to obtain it. They either eat it without any preparation, or drink the liquor prepared from it by infusion in water. For the same purpose, they use a kind of raspberry, and a decoction of fir-tops.
Spitzbergen does not afford many vegetables. It may be remarked, that vegetation goes on uncommonly quick in this country. Most of the plants spring up, flower, and afford seed in the course of a month or six weeks. They are chiefly of a dwarfish size. Some of the flowers are really pretty, but exhibit few colours, excepting yellow, white, and purple. The only plant I met with partaking of the nature of a tree, (a salix, allied to S. herbacea,) grows but to the height of three or four inches. Although Spitzbergen is probably rich in minerals, yet so partial has been the examination of it that nothing of any value, excepting marble and coal, has yet been met with. The remarks made concerning the appearances and productions of Spitzbergen apply in general to the islands adjacent. The principal of these are Moffen Island, Low Island, Hope Island, and Cherie Island. The last abounds in sea-horses, bears, foxes, and sea-fowl. Lead ore, in veins at the surface, has been found here, and specimens of virgin silver.
Between the latitudes of 70° 49′ and 71° 8′ 20″ north, and between the longitudes 7° 26′ and 8° 44′, lies the island of Jan Mayen, said to have been first seen by a Dutch navigator of this name in the year 1611. The west side, affording the greatest number of anchorages, having the best convenience for landing, and being better sheltered from the most frequent storms, was selected by the Dutch for their boiling stations. I was successful, in my passage homeward, in the year 1817, in effecting a landing. On approaching, the first object which strikes attention is the peak of Beerenberg, which I subsequently saw at a distance (by observation) of ninety-five to a hundred miles. It rears its icy summit to an elevation of 6,780 feet above the level of the sea. After leaving the sea-shore, fragments of lava were seen at every step, and numerous undoubted marks of recent volcanic action. On reaching a summit, estimated at 1,500 feet above the sea, we beheld a beautiful crater, forming a basin of 500 or 600 feet in depth, and 600 or 700 yards in diameter. The bottom of the crater was filled with alluvial matter to such a height that it presented a horizontal flat of an elliptical form, measuring 400 feet by 240. In the spring of the following year, some volcano was, I believe, in action in this neighbourhood, as I observed considerable jets of smoke discharged from the earth at intervals of every three or four minutes.
[CHAPTER III.]
AN ACCOUNT OF THE GREENLAND OR POLAR ICE.
Of the inanimate productions of the Polar Seas, none perhaps excite so much interest and astonishment in a stranger as the ice in its great abundance and variety. The stupendous masses known by the name of icelands or icebergs, common to Davis’s Strait, and sometimes met with in the Spitzbergen Sea, from their height, various forms, and the depth of water in which they ground, are calculated to strike the beholder with wonder; yet the prodigious sheets of ice, called ice-fields, more peculiar to the Spitzbergen Sea, are not less astonishing. Their deficiency in elevation is sufficiently compensated by their amazing extent of surface. Some of them have been observed extending many leagues in length, and covering an area of several hundreds of square miles, each consisting of a single sheet of ice, having its surface raised in general four or six feet above the level of the water, and its base depressed to the depth of ten to twenty feet beneath.
The ice in general is designated by a variety of appellations, distinguishing it according to the size or shape of the pieces, their number or form of aggregation, thickness, transparency, situation, etc. As the different denominations of ice will be frequently referred to in the course of this work, it may be useful to give definitions of the terms in use among the whale-fishers for distinguishing them.
1. An iceberg, or ice-mountain, is a large insulated peak of floating ice, or a glacier, occupying a ravine or valley, generally opening towards the sea in an arctic country.
2. A field is a sheet of ice, so extensive that its limits cannot be discerned from the ship’s mast-head.
3. A floe is similar to a field, but smaller, inasmuch as its extent can be seen. This term, however, is seldom applied to pieces of ice of less diameter than half-a-mile or a mile.