The event which prevented the excursion referred to in the last chapter
was neither more nor less than a snowstorm. "Was that all?" say you,
reader? Nay, that was not all. Independently of the fact that it was a
snowstorm the like of which you have never seen, unless you have
travelled in northern climes, it was a snow-storm that produced results.
Of these, more hereafter.
The storm began with a sigh--a mysterious sigh, that swept over the
mountains of Ungava with a soft, mournful wail, and died slowly away in
the distant glen of the Caniapuscaw, as if the spirit of the north wind
grieved to think of the withering desolation it was about to launch upon
the land.
The gathering clouds that preceded and accompanied this sigh induced
Frank Morton to countermand his orders for the intended journey. In
order to console Edith for the disappointment, he went with her into the
hall, and, drawing a low stool towards the blazing stove, placed a
draught-board upon it. Then he placed another and a lower stool beside
the first, on which he seated Edith. Spreading a deerskin robe upon the
ground, he stretched himself thereon at full length, and began to
arrange the men.
The hall, which was formerly such a comfortless apartment, was now
invested with that degree of comfort which always gathers, more or less,
round a place that is continually occupied. The ceiling was composed of
a carpet of deerskin stretched tightly upon the beams. The walls were
hung all round with the thick heavy coats and robes of leather and fur
belonging to the inmates, and without which they never ventured abroad.
The iron stove in the centre of the apartment, with its pipe to conduct
away the smoke, and its radiant fire of logs, emitted a cheerful glow in
its immediate vicinity; which glow, however, was not intense enough to
melt the thick ice, or rather hoar-frost, an inch deep, with which the
two windows were encrusted, to the almost total exclusion of the view
and the serious diminution of the light. The door was padded all round
its edges with fur, which tended to check the bitter wind that often
blew against it, and tempered the slight draught that did force its way
through. Altogether the hall at Fort Chimo was curious and
comfortable--rather shaggy in its general appearance, but sound and
trustworthy at bottom.
A small rough table, the work of Frank Morton, stood close to the stove;
and beside it was seated Mrs Stanley, with a soft yellow deerskin
before her, which she was carefully transforming into a hunting coat for
her husband. On another and a larger table was spread the tea equipage.
Those who would understand this aright must for _tea_ read _supper_.
Among fur-traders the two are combined. Candles--dips made at the
fort--had been brought some time ago by La Roche, who entered the hall
by a back door which communicated with a passage leading to the kitchen
behind.
"What can have become of papa, I wonder?" Mrs Stanley designated her
husband by this epithet, in consequence of her desire to keep up the
fiction of her being Edith's little sister or playfellow.
Frank looked up from the board. "I know not," said he. "I left him
giving some orders to the men. We have been getting things made snug
about the fort, for we expect a pretty stiff breeze to-night.--Take
care, Eda; your crown's in danger."
"Oh! so it is," cried Edith, snatching back her piece, and looking with
intense earnestness at the board.
Frank might have observed, had he not been too deeply engaged with his
game, that the expected stiff breeze had already come, and was whistling
round the fort with considerable vigour.
"You'll beat me, Eda, if you play so boldly," said Frank, with a smile.
"There, give me another crown."
"And me too," said Edith, pushing up her piece. As she spoke, the door
burst open, and Stanley sprang into the room.
"Whew! what a night!" he cried, shutting the door with a forcible bang,
in order to keep out the snow-drift that sought to enter along with him.
Two moves would have made Frank the conqueror, but the gust of wind
upset the board, and scattered the men upon the floor.
Stanley looked like a man of white marble, but the removal of his cap,
coat, and leggings produced a speedy and entire metamorphosis.
"Ho! La Roche!"
"Oui, monsieur."
"Here, take my coat and shake the snow off it, and let's have supper as
speedily as may be. The draughts without, Frank, are a little too
powerful for the draughts within, I fear.--What, wife, making another
coat? One would think you had vowed to show your affection for me by
the number of coats you made. How many have you perpetrated since we
were married?"
"Never mind; go and put on one now, and come to supper while it is hot."
"I'm glad it is hot," cried Stanley from his bedroom. "One needs
unusual heat within to make up for the cold without. The thermometer is
thirty below."
While the party in the hall were enjoying their evening meal, the men
were similarly employed beside the stove in their own habitation. There
was not much difference in the two apartments, save that the confusion
in that of the men was much greater, in consequence of the miscellaneous
mass of capotes, caps, belts, discarded moccasins, axes, guns, and
seal-spears, with which they saw fit to garnish the walls. The fumes of
tobacco were also more dense, and the conversation more uproarious.
"'Tis a howlin' night," observed Massan, as a gust of more than usual
violence shook the door on its hinges.
"Me t'ink de snow-drift am as t'ick in de sky as on de ground," said
Oolibuck, drawing a live coal from the fire and lighting his pipe
therewith.
"Hould on, boys!" cried Bryan, seizing his chair with both hands, half
in jest and half in earnest, as another blast shook the building to its
foundation.
The two Indians sat like statues of bronze, smoking their calumets in
silence, while Gaspard and Prince rose and went to the window. But the
frozen moisture on the panes effectually prevented their seeing out.
It was indeed an awful night--such a night as had not, until now,
visited the precincts of Fort Chimo. Viewed from the rocky platform on
the hill, the raging of the storm was absolutely sublime. The wind came
sometimes in short, angry gusts, sometimes in prolonged roars, through
the narrows, sweeping up clouds of snow so dense that it seemed as
though the entire mass had been uplifted from the earth, hurling it
upwards and downwards and in circling eddies, past the ravines, and
round the fort, and launching it with a fierce yell into the valley of
the Caniapuscaw. The sky was not altogether covered with clouds, and
the broken masses, as they rolled along, permitted a stray moonbeam to
dart down upon the turmoil beneath, and render darkness visible.
Sometimes the wind lulled for a second or two, as if to breathe; then it
burst forth again, splitting through the mountain gorges with a shriek
of intensity; the columns of snow sprang in thousands from every hollow,
cliff and glen, mingled in wild confusion, swayed, now hither, now
thither, in mad uncertainty, and then, caught by the steady gale, pelted
on, like the charging troops of ice-land, and swept across the frozen
plain.
Could human beings face so wild a storm as this? Ay, they could--at
least they could dare to try!
There was one traveller out upon the hills on that tremendous night.
The giant was in the midst of it; but weak as the bulrush were the
mighty limbs of Maximus before the rushing gale. Several days previous
to this the Esquimau had been sent down to his brethren at False River,
to procure some seal-meat for the dogs, and to ascertain the condition
of the natives and their success in fishing. On arriving, he found that
they had been so far successful, that starvation (their too frequent
guest) had not yet visited their dwellings of snow. But Maximus found
the old woman who had formerly saved his life very ill, and apparently
about to die. Having learned from experience the efficacy of Stanley's
medicines, he resolved to procure some for the old woman, whom he had
tenderly watched over and hunted for ever since the eventful day of the
attack. His dogs were exhausted, and could not return. But the bold
Esquimau was in the prime of life, and animated by the fire of vigorous
youth. The storm was beginning to mutter in the distance. What then?--
Had he not faced the blasts of the frozen regions many a time before?--
Without saying a word, he threw a junk of seal-flesh into his wallet,
and, striding back upon his track at the mountain's base, he disappeared
in the driving snow.
Before reaching the fort, however, the full fury of the storm had burst
upon him. It cast him headlong into the snow; but he rose and staggered
on. Again it burst forth, and again he fell before it like a stately
pine. Rising to his knees, Maximus draw the hood of his hairy garment
close round his head and face, and tried to peer through the driving
snow; but he could not see until a slight lull came; then he observed a
hummock of ice at a short distance, and, rising, made towards it. The
lulls were short-lived, however. The storm threw him down again;
instantly he was drifted over with snow; another blast came, lifted the
drift into the air, and left the Esquimau exposed to all its fury. But
Maximus was not conquered. He rose again, panting, it is true, but
sturdy as ever, and ready to take advantage of the next lull. It came
soon; and he saw a rock, or, it might be, the base of a cliff close at
hand. With a quick run he reached it; and, going down on his knees,
began with his gloved hands to scrape a hollow in the snow. Having made
a hole big enough to contain his body, he lay down in it, and, pulling
the superincumbent snow down upon him, was almost buried in the ruin.
Scarcely had he drawn the hood of his coat well over his face, when
another burst of the storm dashed a column of curling drift upon the
rock, and the place where he lay was covered up; not a wrinkle in the
drift remained to mark the spot where he was buried!
All that night the storm roared among mountains with bitter fury; but
next day the wind was subdued, and the sun shone brightly on the grey
rocks and on the white wreaths of snow. It shone in all the lustre of
an unclouded winter sky. Not only did the sun smile upon the scene, but
two mock suns or parhelia, almost as bright as himself, shone on either
side of him. Yet no ray of light illuminated the dwellings of the
fur-traders. All was darkness there, until Stanley rose from his couch
and lighted a candle, for the purpose of examining his watch.
"Hallo! Frank, Frank!" he cried, entering the hall, while he hastily
threw on his garments; "turn out, man; there's something wrong here.
'Tis past noon, and dark as midnight. Bring your watch; perhaps I'm
wrong."
Frank yawned vociferously, and sprang from his bed. In two seconds more
he made his appearance in his trousers and shirt.
"Past twelve, no doubt of--yea-o-ow! That accounts for my waking three
times and going off again; but--"
"Hey! what have we here?" cried Stanley, as he opened the front door,
and disclosed to view a solid wall of snow.
"Snowed up; dear me! eh! that's odd," said Frank, beginning to
comprehend the state of matters.
Snowed up they were, undoubtedly; so thoroughly snowed up that there was
not a ray of daylight within their dwelling. Had Frank been above the
snow, instead of below it, he would have seen that the whole fort was so
completely buried that nothing was visible above the surface except the
chimneys and the flagstaff. After the first few moments of surprise had
passed, it occurred to Stanley that they might ascend to the regions
above by the chimney, which was wide enough, he thought, to admit a man;
but on looking up, he found that it also was full of drifted snow.
This, however, could have been easily removed; but there was a bar of
iron stretching across, and built into the clay walls, which rendered
escape by that passage impossible.
"There's nothing for it, Frank, but to dig ourselves out, so the sooner
we begin the better."
By this time they were joined by Edith and her mother, who, although
much surprised, were not at all alarmed; for rough travelling in a wild
land had taught them to regard nothing as being dangerous until it was
proved to be so. Besides, Stanley had assured them that they had
nothing to fear, as the only evil he anticipated would be the trouble
they were sure to have in getting rid of the superabundant snow. While
they were talking, the back door was opened violently, and La Roche, in
a state of dishabille, burst into the room.
"O messieurs, c'est fini! Oui, le world him shut up tout togedder. Oh,
misere! Fat shall ye to do?"
"Hold your tongue, La Roche," said Frank, "and bring the kitchen
shovel."
The cook instantly turned to obey, and as he rushed towards the kitchen
his voice was heard exclaiming in the passage--
"Ah, c'est terrible! Mais I ver' moshe fear de shovel be out in de
neige. Ah, non; here it is. C'est bien."
Returning in haste to the hall, he handed a much dilapidated iron shovel
to Frank, who threw off his coat and set to work with vigour. The
tables and chairs, and all the furniture, were removed into the inner
apartments, in order to afford room for the snow which Frank dug from
the open doorway and shovelled into the centre of the room. As only one
at a time could work in the narrow doorway, the three men wrought with
the shovel by turns; and while one was digging the tunnel, the other two
piled the debris in a compact mound beside the stove. As no fire had
yet been kindled, the snow, of course, did not melt, but remained crisp
and dry upon the floor. Meanwhile Edith looked on with deep interest,
and occasionally assisted in piling the snow; while her mother, seeing
that her presence was unnecessary, retired to her own room.
"There," cried Frank, pausing and surveying an immense cavern which he
had dug into the drift, "that's a good spell. Take a turn now, La
Roche, and dig upwards; we should see daylight soon."
"Ah, vraiment, it be time, for it am von o'clock," replied La Roche, as
he plied the shovel.
The tunnel was cut in such a way as that, while it ran outwards, it also
sloped upwards; and, from the angle at which it lay, Stanley calculated
that thirty feet or thereabouts would bring them to the surface. In
this he was correct, for when La Roche had worked for half an hour, the
snow above became slightly luminous. But the labour of conveying it
from the end of the tunnel into the hall became, of course, greater as
the work advanced. At length the light penetrated so clearly that La
Roche was induced to thrust his shovel upwards, in the expectation of
penetrating the mass. The effect of this action was striking and
unexpected. Instantly the roof fell in, and a flood of sunshine poured
into the tunnel, revealing the luckless Frenchman struggling amid the
ruins.
"Oh, pull me hout!" he spluttered, as Frank and Stanley stood laughing
heartily at his misfortune. One of his legs happened to protrude from
the mass as he made this earnest request; so Frank seized it, and
dragged the poor man by main force from his uncomfortable position.
Immediately afterwards they all three scrambled through the aperture,
and stood in open day.
The sight that met their eyes was a curious though not a satisfactory
one. All that remained visible of Fort Chimo were, as we have said, the
chimneys and the flagstaff. In regard to the general aspect of the
neighbourhood, however, there was little alteration; for the change of
position in the drifts among the mountain gorges, and the addition to
their bulk, made no striking alteration in the rugged landscape. In
some places the gale had cleared the sides of the mountains and left
their cliffs exposed to view; in other spots the gorges and ravines were
choked up, and the pine tops nearly covered; and the open water in the
lake was more encumbered than usual with icebergs.
"Now, La Roche," said Stanley, after they had surveyed the desolate
scene for a few minutes in silence, "go fetch the shovel and we'll dig
out the men. I daresay, poor fellows, they're beginning to wonder at
the length of the night by this time."
La Roche prepared to descend into the tunnel, when their attention was
arrested by a strange sound beneath the snow. In a few minutes the
crust began to crack at a spot not more than two yards from where they
stood; then there was a sudden rupture, accompanied by a growl, and
followed by the appearance of the dishevelled head and arms of a man.
"Musha, boys, but I'm out!" Bryan coughed the snow from around his
mouth, and winked it from his eyes, as he spoke. The first sight that
met his bewildered gaze was three pair of expanded eyeballs and three
double rows of grinning teeth, a few feet from his face. Uttering a cry
of terror, he fell back into the hole, the snow closed over him, and he
was gone!
It need scarcely be added that Frank and Stanley commenced to dig into
this hole with as much vigour as their frequent explosions of laughter
would allow. In a few minutes it was re-opened, and the men issued one
by one from durance vile.
"Och, sirs, ye gave me a mortial start!" exclaimed Bryan, as he rose to
view the second time. "I thought for sartin ye were all polar bears.
Faix we've had a job o't down there. I'll be bound to say there's
twinty ton o' snow--bad luck to it--in the middle o' the floor."
"There's work for us here that'll last two weeks, I guess," said Massan,
as he and several of the others stooped down and gazed into the tunnel
leading to the hall, at the end of which Edith's laughing face met their
view.
"When did you awake, and begin to suspect that something was wrong?"
inquired Stanley of Dick Prince.
"Awake!" cried Bryan, answering the question; "we awoke at laste a dozen
times. I suppose it must have bin the time for brikfust; for, ye see,
although we could ha' slept on long enough; our intariors couldn't, be
no manes, forgit their needcessities."
"We shall have to work a bit yet ere these necessities are attended to,
I fear," said Stanley. "Go, Francois, and one or two of you, and open
up the dog-kennel. The rest of you get all the shovels you can lay
hands on, and clear out the houses as fast as you can."
"Clear out de chimbleys fust, mes garcons," cried La Roche, looking up
from the tunnel. "Den ve vill git dejeuner ready toute suite."
"That will we, lad," said Bryan, shouldering a spade and proceeding
towards the chimney of the hall; while the rest of the party, breaking
up into several groups, set to work, with spades, shovels, and such
implements as were suitable, to cut passages through the square of the
fort towards the doors of the several buildings. As Massan had said, it
proved to be no light work. The north-west gale had launched the snow
upon the exposed buildings of Fort Chimo until the drift was fifteen or
sixteen feet deep, so that the mere cutting of passages was a matter of
considerable time and severe labour.
Meanwhile, Maximus awoke, and sought to raise himself from his lair at
the foot of the rock. But his first effort failed. The drift above him
was too heavy. Abandoning, therefore, the idea of freeing himself by
main force, he turned round on his side and began to scrape away the
snow that was directly above his head. The masses that accumulated in
the course of this process he forced down past his chest; and, as his
motions tended to compress and crush the drift around him in all
directions, he soon made room enough to work with ease. In ten minutes
he approached so near to the surface as to be able, with a powerful
effort, to burst it upwards, and step out of his strange dormitory into
the sunshine.
This method of spending the night has been resorted to more than once by
arctic travellers who had lost their way; and it is sad to think that
many who have perished might have saved their lives had they known that
burrowing could be practised with safety. The Esquimaux frequently
spend the night in this manner, but they prefer building a snow-house to
burrowing, if circumstances will permit.
Cutting a slice of seal-meat, and eating as he went, Maximus resumed his
journey, and soon afterwards arrived at the fort, where he found the men
busied in excavating their buried dwellings.
Here he stated the case of the old woman, and received such medicines as
Stanley, in his amateur medical wisdom, saw fit to bestow. With these
he started immediately to retrace his steps, having been directed to
proceed, after administering them, to the lake where Frank meant to try
the fishing under the ice. A family of Esquimaux had been established
on another lake not so far distant from the fort; and having been taught
by the fur-traders how to set nets under the ice, they succeeded in
procuring more than enough for their subsistence. It was hoped,
therefore, that the larger lake would afford a good supply; and, the
weather having become decidedly fine, Frank prepared to set out on the
following day.