ACROSS TO JONES SOUND
We dropped all our hunters at Karnah after a day there, during which we
visited around and settled up what we owed the Eskimos for the work
they had done for us. Of course all the walrus meat went to them, and
also the meat from two more narwhal which had been captured while we
were away, thanks to Dr. Rasmussen, who saw to it that everyone did all
they could to get the specimens we wanted.
There really were three more narwhal, but one of them was a little one
which Harry Raven preserved whole, embalming it. The skeletons and
skulls of the others were taken. Also Kellerman made some interesting
movies showing the work of landing the dead narwhal on the beach and
cutting them up. This was at night, when it was cloudy and not bright
enough for pictures. So some of the men lit bright flares which
Kellerman had, which lit up the beach with a queer bright light that
was almost blinding.
When the narwhal were landed Kudluktoo and the others cut off great
strips of the skin which they all love. These were handed around and
all hands gobbled up the stuff in great shape. The way they eat this
sort of thing is to put a big sliver in their mouth until it is stuffed
full, and then cut off the end outside their lips with a knife. Why
they don’t sometimes cut their noses or lips I don’t know. Anyway, it
looked awfully funny and ought to be good in the picture.
I tried narwhal skin myself and don’t like it much. It’s sort of tough
and seems to be swallowed without chewing. I think an auto tire inner
tube would be about the same, only it would smell better.
Pooadloona and another hunter we took over to Northumberland Island.
That afternoon we got some more walrus but while we were fooling around
taking some movies we lost two of the animals. I think this discouraged
the Eskimos who couldn’t understand why the foolish white men would let
good meat get away when they really had it killed, instead of trying
crazy stunts for a man who looked into a machine and turned a crank.
Anyway, there was one big walrus whose meat we took to Keate, the
little town where we left these hunters. It was only a little way from
the place where we had been wrecked.
In the evening we started across Baffin Bay to go to Jones Sound on the
Canadian side. We had intended to go further north to Etah, which was
only about sixty miles away. But it was getting pretty late in the
season and the Morrissey was giving Cap’n Bob a good deal of worry.
While she was well patched up, she still leaked a bit and lots of
places were sprung. For instance, the forward deck leaked so badly that
when the walrus meat was piled on deck the blood dripped right down
into our cabin and got on the table and especially into Bob Peary’s
bunk. It just wasn’t possible to fix the deck, which had to be
recaulked all over, until the vessel got to a shipyard.
Anyway, it seemed better not to go much further north. Also, we had to
go back to Holsteinsborg on the Greenland side to get the Hobbs party.
If it wasn’t for that Captain Bob would have gone to Etah.
After a day of fine going with some hours of a pretty stiff wind and
rather rough sea, we arrived at the mouth of Jones Sound where we were
greeted with a thick fog that put ice on all the rigging. After going
quite a way up Jones Sound, hoping to get to the lower land where there
might be musk-oxen, we were stopped by thick pan ice. Also new ice was
forming in the night. Evidently winter was just around the corner.
We turned around and went out again toward the mouth and then waited
for the fog to clear up. There was lots of pan ice all around us and of
course it wasn’t safe to risk getting caught by the ice too far in. A
sudden change in the wind, for instance, might jam it all around us and
keep us from getting out at all.
In the early afternoon the fog disappeared and we went in to Craig
Harbor, on the north shore of the sound on Ellesmere Land. Dad,
Rasmussen, Doc and Joe the sailor went ashore and reported that the
station was closed. This is the most northerly police post in the
world, occupied most of the time by the famous Northwest Mounted
Police.
Much to our disappointment there was nobody at the station. We learned
later they had moved to a new station further north on Ellesmere Land.
We left a note saying that we had been there. There were two main
buildings, a barracks and a store house, with oil barrels and sacks of
coal piled up around. It all looked very neat. The buildings themselves
were locked.
When we left Craig Harbor we saw two big bearded seal on the ice quite
a distance away. When the Morrissey got quite close to one Art Young
shot him dead with a rifle with a beautiful shot right through the
neck, and then he turned around and shot at the other. He hit him all
right but he wriggled off the ice pan and most likely sank.
When they were getting the first seal Jim, the sailor, who is used to
killing seal on the spring Newfoundland seal hunts, jumped on the pan
and cracked the seal over the head with a heavy seal hook. This broke
the skull and injured the specimen for scientific use. So I was told to
keep a watch out for more as we very much wanted to get a perfect
specimen.
We were not sure that there were any walrus in Jones Sound. But soon
Doc and I saw what we supposed were three big seals on pans of ice
about a mile ahead of us. We were in the lookout with glasses. And our
seal turned out to be walrus, and big ones, too.
We headed right for them and Carl and Doc and Cal and Dad got in the
bow with their guns. When they were pretty near they shot and hit the
walrus, but they didn’t kill him. It is pretty hard to kill one, and if
they have any life left they slide off the ice into the water. The poor
big walrus lifted himself on his flippers and looked around to see
where the noise came from and what it was all about.
In the water they seem pretty fierce and getting at them is quite a
job. But on the ice they seem very stupid and sort of pitiful and
lumbering, like a huge big sleepy cow. Only of course those tusks are
mighty dangerous, and I believe there isn’t an animal that can fight
with a walrus, even a polar bear. But they certainly can’t hear or see
very well. And when they are asleep on the ice in the sun, if the water
is quiet so the ice doesn’t rock and disturb them, it’s very easy
indeed to get awfully close to them.
This big walrus, although hit three times, started to get off the ice.
Then Carl finished him with Dan’s heavy rifle. So we left him dead on
that pan and moved over to the other pan where two more were asleep.
Both of them were hit with the first shots, but both managed to get
into the water. Carl drove my harpoon, from the ship, into one of them,
but the other sank, although Nielsen, Rasmussen’s man with us on this
part of the trip almost got his harpoon into that one. It was a shame
to lose him.
We all hate to kill anything and have it wasted. As a matter of fact I
thought I was going to be awfully excited about killing things, but
while it’s exciting all right I don’t think I care an awful lot about
it. Getting animals for food or for museums is all right. But I don’t
believe I want any trophies just to look at. It seems fairer to get the
fun of seeing them alive and to let them keep on up here. From what Dad
says, and Cap’n Bob and the others, there must have been a great deal
more game up here some years ago than there is now, and certainly other
expeditions killed an awful lot. Also of course the Eskimos, now that
they have rifles, kill a lot. And after a while, I suppose, the game
will be all gone just as it is in most of our own west.
We saw another walrus not far off. The Morrissey got very close to him
and Art put two arrows in his neck, shooting from the bowsprit so that
a picture could be taken. The arrows might have killed him, for they
certainly got in a long way and caused a lot of bleeding. But that
would have taken some time, so the walrus was shot.
None of these animals was wasted. Harry Raven took the brains for the
Museum and the heads were kept by members of the expedition. While our
crowd, I think, have had a pretty good time and certainly plenty of
excitement, they have not had much real hunting. I know that Dad had
hoped that the men who volunteered and came and have done lots of work
would be able to get more fun out of it. So he is glad when there is a
chance for them to get something to take back with them. The meat was
saved for the Eskimos at Pond’s Inlet, where we were going.