sand; "behold the first human footprints ever impressed upon this soil."
And stepping rapidly forward until he had passed beyond the high-water
mark, he unfurled a small union-jack which he carried in his hand, and,
forcing the butt-end of the staff into the yielding sand, exclaimed:
"In the name of her most gracious majesty Victoria, Queen of Great
Britain and Ireland, I annex this land as a dependency of the British
crown!"
Then they all took off their hats and gave three cheers for the queen;
after which Colonel Lethbridge proposed that the newly-discovered
country be called "Elphinstone Land," a proposition which was carried
with acclamation by a majority of three to one, the dissenting voice
being that of the baronet, who modestly disclaimed the honour of having
the country named after himself.
But _were_ theirs, after all, the first human footprints which had ever
been impressed upon that soil? A decided answer in the negative awaited
them; for they had not advanced very many yards from the shore when they
came upon an object which, upon examination, proved to be an ancient and
much-rusted spear-head broken short off but with some six inches of the
haft still attached to it. The travellers felt, greatly disconcerted at
this discovery; it robbed them at once irretrievably of the honour of
being the first discoverers of the North Pole, and showed them that, at
some unknown period in the remote past, there must have existed a man,
or more probably a body of men, who, not only without the exceptional
facilities offered by the possession of such a ship as the _Flying
Fish_, but with, in all probability, ships infinitely inferior to the
worst of those used by modern explorers, had actually achieved the
hitherto deemed impossible feat of piercing the great ice-barrier and
actually reaching the northern pole of the earth.
Who were they? Of what country could they possibly have been natives?
And why was the fact of their important discovery suffered to sink into
oblivion? Such were the questions which at once rose to the minds of
the baronet and his companions, and to which their lips spontaneously
gave utterance.
"I think there can be little doubt as to who and what they were,"
remarked the professor. "They were _Vikings_; and their leader it must
unquestionably have been who drew the chart found by us in the Viking
ship buried in the ice of the paleocrystic sea. It is his ship which we
see delineated upon the chart; this is the land from which she is
represented as sailing triumphantly away; and it was doubtless this land
which the Viking ship, discovered by us, was making so desperate an
effort to reach when death claimed her crew as its prey. The other
question, as to why the discovery of this land was suffered to remain an
unknown fact, is not by any means so easy to answer. Perhaps the man
before whose dead body the chart lay spread open upon the table may have
been its author and the original discoverer of this land; perhaps the
ship represented on the chart and the ship discovered by us may have
been one and the same; she may have been on her homeward voyage; and,
finding the channels to the southward completely blocked with ice, may
have been attempting to force her way back into the open Polar Sea when
her fate overtook her."
"But, admitting for the moment that such may possibly have been the
case," remarked the baronet, "how do you account for the fact that,
whilst she must necessarily have forced her way twice through the
ancient ice, she should have failed in her third attempt?"
"Her third attempt may have been made late in the season," answered the
professor. "But it is just possible that her final attempt may have
been to force not a _third_ but a _second_ passage through the ice. She
may have been attempting to return _southward_ instead of northward, as
I just now suggested. My impression, with respect to the vast field of
paleocrystic ice, is that at certain seasons--as when, for instance, two
or three very mild winters have occurred in succession in the Arctic
circle, followed possibly by exceptionally hot summers--it undergoes
partial disruption, splitting up, in fact, into several lesser fields
which drift for longer or shorter distances out into the open Polar Sea.
The fact that Scoresby, Penny, and Kane all beheld, at different
periods, an open Polar sea, tends to confirm this impression; and the
circumstance that the bows of the galley discovered by us were pointing
to the northward may be due, not to the fact that she was actually
making her way north when finally frozen in, but to the accident of that
portion of the field by which she was surrounded being subsequently
turned completely round whilst adrift. But what object do I see yonder?
Surely it is not a human habitation?"
It was, however, or at least had been, at some more or less distant
period. It was the roofless ruin of a once most substantially built
log-hut, measuring some twenty-five feet long by sixteen feet broad.
The roof had fallen in; the log sides were decayed and moss-grown; and
the interior was overgrown with long grass and brambles, with a stately
pine springing to a height of some ninety feet from the very centre of
the structure--all of which incontestably proved its antiquity; but that
it was the work of man--most probably those who had left behind them the
rusty spear-head--there could be no possible doubt.
The party minutely inspected this interesting ruin, but without making
any further discovery, and then pressed forward through the heart of a
belt of pine forest which they had by this time reached.
The walking was not difficult and they made tolerably rapid progress.
That the country was not absolutely tenantless they soon had abundant
proof, for they had not advanced more than half a mile before an Arctic
fox was discovered gliding rapidly away before them. A little further
on they came unexpectedly upon a herd of moose-deer. The behaviour of
these animals--naturally extremely shy--conclusively proved that they
had never before met such an enemy as man, for, instead of bounding
rapidly away, as is their wont, they merely ceased feeding for a moment
to stand and gaze curiously upon the new-comers, and then went on
browsing again with the utmost composure. Their fearlessness offered a
strong temptation to such inveterate sportsmen as Sir Reginald and the
colonel; but not being in actual need of their flesh, and being,
moreover, anxious not to disturb them just then, the party passed
quietly on without firing a shot. A huge brown bear was the next animal
encountered, and this time the baronet's love of sport overcame his
humanity, bruin falling an easy victim to the noiseless but deadly
percussion shell of Sir Reginald's large-bore rifle. A solitary
prowling wolf next fell before the equally deadly weapon of the colonel;
and then the explorers emerged on the other side of the forest-belt, and
found themselves on the borders of an extensive tract of tolerably level
country intersected here and there by low hills, with occasional patches
of marshy land, the high flat table-land, which had been the first
object sighted by them when approaching these shores from the southward,
looming up, still misty and grey, at a long distance in the extreme
background of the landscape.
Heading directly for this mountain, as a conspicuous landmark, the party
again pressed forward, and were speedily delighted to observe several
flocks of ptarmigan busily feeding on the crests of the low hills which
here and there crossed the route. These birds proved rather shy, though
not so much so as to have prevented the sportsmen making a very decent
bag had they been provided with fowling-pieces. As it was, however, the
birds were, of course, permitted to go free and undisturbed. A mile
further on a small drove of musk-oxen were seen grazing in the distance,
and, whilst some of the party were watching the animals and discussing
the possibility of stalking them, Mildmay, who had been intently gazing
through his binocular in another direction, startled his companions by
exclaiming, in an almost horrified tone of voice:
"What on earth are those immense creatures moving slowly about in the
valley away yonder? Surely they _can't_ be elephants?"
"Elephants! my dear fellow, don't be absurd," remonstrated the baronet.
"Where are they? Oh, ah! now I have them," as he brought his glass to
bear in the right direction. "By George, they _are_ elephants, though,
and monsters into the bargain. And, I declare, it seems to me that they
are covered with a thick coat of shaggy hair. Why, I never saw such a
thing in my life."
"_Elephants? Covered with hair_?" exclaimed the professor in a voice so
eager that it almost amounted to a scream. "Lend me a binocular,
somebody; with my usual luck I have left mine at home--on board, I mean.
A thousand thanks, Mildmay, my dear fellow. Now, where are these
elephants of yours? Quick, show me where to look for them. Good
heavens! if it should really be so. Ah! now I see them. Yes--yes--they
are--they _must_ be--Gentlemen, as I am a man of science, I solemnly
declare to you the stupendous fact that those extraordinary animals are
neither more nor less than living Mammoths. I congratulate you,
gentlemen--I congratulate myself. Ach, himmel! to think that it should
ever be my good fortune to actually behold, not only one, but a whole
herd of living mammoths! I cannot believe it--yet--yes, there they are;
it is no freak of a disordered imagination, but an actual, positive,
undeniable reality."
The worthy professor was so excited that he could scarcely hold the
binocular firmly enough to look through it, and it was really
laughable--to his companions--to hear his "Ach's" and "Pish's" of
impatience as he vainly strove to steady his trembling hands and get
another good look at the herd of hitherto believed extinct monsters,
which were quietly feeding at a distance of about two miles away. At
length he, with a comical gesture of despair, restored the borrowed
binocular to Mildmay, and, turning to his companions, exclaimed in a
voice of feverish earnestness:
"Come, my dear friends, why do we stand idly gaping here and wasting
valuable time, when we really have not a moment to lose? We may never
have such a priceless opportunity again. Let us press forward, then,
and at all risks secure a specimen of so unique an animal as the
mammoth. If we were to achieve this and nothing more our success would
be ample repayment for all the anxious thought devoted to the designing
of our vessel, and all the money spent in her construction."
His excitement was contagious, and the baronet, after briefly arranging
with the colonel a plan of operations, invited von Schalckenberg to
follow him; Lethbridge and Mildmay going off in another direction, with
the object of getting on the other side of the animals, and, in co-
operation with the other party, driving them, if possible, within easy
distance of the harbour in which the _Flying Fish_ lay at anchor.
To do this a wide detour was necessary, and it was nearly an hour and a
half later when the four men found themselves in a proper position to
commence the operation of "driving." They had arranged themselves in
the form of a semicircle round the herd, at a distance of about a
quarter of a mile away, and, at a signal from the baronet, all hands
advanced toward the huge creatures, shouting and gesticulating to the
utmost extent of their several powers.
The mammoths, utterly unsuspicious of danger, had been quietly feeding
among the long grass during the approach of their enemies; but on the
baronet's first signal shout they paused, and, facing rapidly round in
the direction of the noise, raised their trunks in the air and waved
them slowly from side to side as though scenting the air. The hunters
now redoubled their exertions, fully expecting that, on seeing them, the
animals would wheel about and shamble off in the required direction.
But, to their dismay, the creatures, instead of doing this, no sooner
caught sight of the party than, with upraised trunks and harsh trumpet-
like screams of rage and defiance, they charged furiously straight down
upon them. The herd numbered ten individuals, four of which appeared to
instantly constitute themselves the defenders of the party; and each of
these promptly selected his own particular enemy, occupying his
attention so fully that the remaining members of the herd were afforded
every facility for escape.
It was a nervous moment for the hunters, who, never having faced such a
creature before, had not the most remote idea of its fighting tactics;
moreover, the aspect of the monsters, with their towering stature of
fully fifteen feet, their thick shaggy coats of rusty brown hair, their
enormous spirally curving tusks, and their small eyes blazing with fury
as they rushed forward to the attack, all combined to produce such a
hideous _tout ensemble_ as might well strike terror to the boldest
heart. But neither Sir Reginald nor the colonel were the men to shrink
from an encounter when game was before them; Mildmay possessed all the
cool daring and recklessness of the British seaman; and as for the
professor, he would willingly have faced a thousand deaths to secure so
new and rare a specimen of natural history as the creature before him.
The four sportsmen pulled trigger almost simultaneously. The baronet
and the colonel had each selected the same spot, the eye, as the object
of their aim, and both had been equally successful, the shell in each
case passing upward through the eyeball into the brain, exploding there
and causing instant death. The professor's fascinated gaze being
riveted upon the wide-open mouth of his own particular adversary, he
seemed to think that the yawning cavern thus revealed would be as good a
place as any to empty his rifle into; and he did so--just in bare time
to bring down his game and save himself from being trampled to a jelly.
Mildmay, however, was not so fortunate. He seemed to think that it
mattered very little where he directed his aim, so long as he made sure
of hitting the brute _somewhere_, and he therefore fired point-blank at
the chest of the mammoth which was menacing him. The shell sped true,
but, encountering the thick shaggy coat and the enormously tough hide of
the creature, failed to penetrate the body, and, exploding outside, only
inflicted such wounds as further excited the already angry monster to a
perfect frenzy of rage. Even at this critical moment there was time for
another shot; but Mildmay most unfortunately forgot that he had nine
loaded chambers still available, and instead of firing again he flung
away his piece and ran for his life. The race was a disastrously short
one, however; he had not run more than twenty yards when the huge
creature was upon him. The great uplifted trunk gave one whirl in the
air and descended with force enough to slay an ox. It struck poor
Mildmay on his right side, and, but for the fortunate accident of his
having at that moment tripped and fallen forward, the lieutenant would
there and then have lost the number of his mess. As it was, he was sent
whirling through the air like a cricket-ball, to fall senseless, and
bleeding from the nose and mouth, fully forty feet away. The vindictive
brute instantly turned short off with the evident intention of trampling
his victim to death; but before he could reach the prostrate body a
shell from the colonel's rifle sent him crashing lifeless to the ground.
The remainder of the herd, evidently dismayed at the slaughter of their
companions, now abandoned a half-formed intention which they had at
first manifested to stay and fight it out, and went off in full retreat
with horrible trumpetings of anger and alarm.
The colonel was the first to reach the side of his unfortunate friend,
the professor and the baronet joining him as speedily as their legs
could convey them to the spot. Very fortunately von Schalckenberg,
among his other multitudinous acquirements, possessed a very fair
knowledge of medicine and surgery; and his skilful fingers were soon at
work removing the lieutenant's clothing so far as was necessary to
investigate the nature and extent of his injuries. Singularly enough
these were found to be comparatively trifling, a fractured rib and
several very severe bruises being the sum of them. A little brandy
forced between the lips of the sufferer soon restored him to
consciousness, and he was able to sit up.
On attempting to rise to his feet, however, he experienced such severe
pain that it was then and there resolved to let him remain where he was,
two of his companions also remaining to mount guard over him and see
that he came to no harm; whilst the third was to hurry back with all
speed to the ship and bring her out on to the plain close by the spot
where the accident occurred, when it would be a comparatively easy
matter to convey the lieutenant from the spot where he then lay to his
own bed on board the _Flying Fish_.
The professor, having first made Mildmay as easy and comfortable as
circumstances permitted, volunteered for the service of moving the ship,
explaining to his companions that, in the event of an attack of any
kind, they, as seasoned sportsmen, would be able to far more effectually
defend the wounded man than he could possibly hope to do; and then, Sir
Reginald and the colonel quite concurring in this view, he set off for
the bay, shouting back an assurance as he went that he would not be
absent one moment longer than should prove absolutely necessary.
The worthy scientist was as good as his word; for in less than an hour
from the moment of his departure the immense bulk of the _Flying Fish_
was seen to rise into the air beyond the tops of the distant pine-trees,
and, with her polished hull gleaming and flashing in the rays of the
sun, to sweep gracefully round until she was heading straight in the
direction of the anxious watchers. Under the professor's able pilotage
she was soon brought to the ground and secured within a dozen yards of
the spot occupied by them, when it was the work of a few minutes only to
convey the injured man to his own stateroom, where his hurts were at
once properly attended to and himself made thoroughly comfortable.
As soon as luncheon was over Sir Reginald and the colonel set out for
the spot were they had shot the bear in the morning, one of them being
armed with a large-bore rifle and the other carrying a fowling-piece;
and on their return somewhat late in the afternoon they bore not only
the skin, skull, and claws of the defunct bruin, but also a goodly bag
of ptarmigan. During their absence the professor had also been very
busy, dividing his attention pretty evenly between Mildmay and the
finest specimen of the slain mammoths, the latter of which he had
succeeded in nearly half-denuding of its skin. With the assistance of
his two able-bodied friends this task was completed by dinner-time; and
by the corresponding hour next evening not only was the enormous hide
undergoing the first stage of preparation for the taxidermist, but the
indefatigable labourers had also succeeded in hewing out the tusks of
the other slaughtered mammoths. For health's sake the ship was then
moved about a mile further inland, and the carcasses were left to the
wolves, which had already gathered in large numbers in the vicinity.
Under the skilful treatment of the professor Mildmay made steady and
rapid progress toward recovery from the very first; the baronet and the
colonel had therefore no hesitation about carrying out a project which
had been under discussion between them for the last two or three days,
and which was neither more nor less than a pedestrian excursion to the
far distant table-land which they had first sighted from the sea. They
estimated that this goal of their journey, upon which they expected to
find the actual site of the Northern Pole of the earth, must be about
sixty miles distant from the ship; and they considered that the trip
there and back would occupy them about six days. It would of course
have been very much easier, and more convenient in every way, to have
made the journey on board the _Flying Fish_; but the professor was busy
with the preparation of his mammoth, the skin of which he had carefully
stretched and pegged out on the ground alongside the ship, and was so
averse to the losing sight of it, even for a few hours, that it was soon
decided the _Flying Fish_ must not be moved for the present. After all,
the journey would probably not involve any very great amount of
hardship; it simply meant camping out for five or six nights, or at
least those hours of the twenty-four which did duty for night. And this
the two seasoned hunters looked forward to as rather a pleasant change
than otherwise.
The necessary preparations were all made on the previous evening, and
after breakfast on the appointed day the two adventurers set out, taking
leave of Mildmay--who was already out of bed again--and of the
professor, who, to tell the truth, was heartily glad to be left to the
uninterrupted prosecution of his task.
They were in light marching order, having resolved to carry nothing
which they could possibly do without; their previous experience of the
country had taught them that game was pretty plentiful, and that they
might safely depend upon their guns for the supply of their larder; and
their stock of provisions consisted solely, therefore, of a few biscuits
and a substantial flask of brandy each. The temperature was decidedly
mild, and had been so ever since their arrival at "Elphinstone Land,"
with settled fine weather, and they therefore carried nothing in the
shape of extra clothing save a light macintosh each, which they bore
securely strapped on the top of their knapsacks. The remainder of their
_impedimenta_ consisted of a double-barrelled gun for each man--one
barrel being rifled and the other a smooth bore--two cartridge belts,
one for the waist and the other for the shoulder, fully stocked; a
formidable double-edged hunting knife each; a capacious waterproof bag
containing a reserve supply of cartridges, and a small stock of matches
and tobacco.
Their road for the first five or six miles led up a gentle acclivity,
just sufficient to make itself felt, but not steep enough to render
walking difficult or fatiguing. Then came a stretch of flat country,
bounded on each side by the projecting spurs of a range of rugged hills
of fantastic outline which stretched immediately across their path at a
distance of some three or four miles or so. The pedestrians had not
progressed very far across this plain before their attention became
arrested by a curious phenomenon. The atmosphere immediately behind the
range of hills last mentioned was thick with fleecy vapour, now so thin
that the distant table-land could be dimly seen through it as through a
veil, and anon so dense that it assumed a decided cloud-like shape upon
which the unsetting sun shone with dazzling brilliancy. This thickening
of the vapour seemed to occur at tolerably regular intervals of about
twenty minutes each, and was immediately preceded by a sudden silvery
gleam succeeded by a most brilliant and perfectly formed rainbow. The
periodical recurrence of this singular phenomenon under a perfectly
cloudless sky of course greatly excited the curiosity of the
pedestrians, and they pushed rapidly forward, eager to ascertain the
cause.