KANE’S EXPEDITION (_continued_).
Arrival of Esquimaux at the Brig—A Treaty Concluded—Hospitality on
Board—Arctic Appetites—Sledge Journeys—A Break-down—Morton’s
Trip—The Open Sea—The Brig hopelessly Beset—A Council Called—Eight
Men stand by the _Advance_—Departure of the Rest—Their
Return—Terrible Sufferings—A Characteristic Entry—Raw Meat for
Food—Fruitless Journeys for Fresh Meat—A Scurvied Crew—Starving
Esquimaux—Attempted Desertion—A Deserter brought back from the
Esquimaux Settlements.
The arrival and visit of a number of Esquimaux at the brig caused some
little excitement. They were fine specimens of the race, and evidently
inclined for friendship. At first only one of them was admitted on board.
His dress is described as a kind of hooded capôte or jumper of mixed blue
and white fox-skins arranged with some taste, and booted trousers of white
bear-skin, which at the end of the foot were made to terminate with the
claws of the animal. Kane soon came to an understanding with this
individual, and the rest were admitted to the brig, where they were
hospitably treated. When offered, however, good fresh wheaten bread and
corned pork, and large lumps of white sugar, they could not be induced to
touch them, but much preferred gorging on walrus meat. They were greatly
amazed at the coal on board—too hard for blubber, and so unlike wood. They
were allowed to sleep in the hold. Next morning a treaty was made whereby
they pledged themselves, before departing, to return in a few days with
more meat, and to allow Kane to use their dogs and sledges in the proposed
excursions.
Kane with a party attempted in the spring of 1854 a journey to the great
glacier of Humboldt, from which point he had hoped “to cross the ice to
the American side.” They had made some progress when the winter’s scurvy
reappeared painfully among the party. The now soft snow made travelling
very difficult for both men and dogs; indeed, the former sank to their
waists, and the latter were nearly buried. Three of the men were taken
with snow blindness; one was utterly, and another partially disabled. Kane
was, while taking an observation for latitude, seized with a sudden pain,
and fainted. His limbs became rigid, and he had to be strapped on the
sledge. On May 5th he became delirious, and fainted every time he was
taken from the tent to the sledge. The last man to give in, he owns that
on this occasion he succumbed entirely, and that to five brave men—Morton,
Riley, Hickey, Stephenson, and Hans—themselves scarcely able to travel, he
owed his preservation. They carried him back to the brig by forced
marches, and he long lay there in a very critical state. A few days after
the return of the party, Schubert, one of the merriest and best liked of
the little band, died. Dr. Hayes, the surgeon of the ship, worked
zealously in the discharge of his duties, and with the better diet
obtained in the summer—fresh seal-meat, reindeer, ptarmigan, and
rabbits—the invalids gradually recovered strength, and set about their
duties.
The most important sledge journey undertaken at this time was that made by
Morton. After travelling a considerable distance, “due north over a solid
area choked with bergs and frozen fields, he was startled by the growing
weakness of the ice; its surface became rotten, and the snow wet and
pulpy. His dogs, seized with terror, refused to advance. Then for the
first time the fact broke upon him that a long dark band seen to the north
beyond a protruding cape, Cape Andrew Jackson, was water.” He retraced his
steps, and leaving Hans and his dogs, passed between Sir John Franklin
Island and the narrow beach line, the coast becoming more wall-like and
dark masses of porphyritic rock abutting into the sea. With growing
difficulty he managed to climb from rock to rock in hopes of doubling the
promontory and sighting the coasts beyond, but the water kept encroaching
more and more on his track.
“It must have been an imposing sight as he stood at this termination of
his journey looking out upon the great waste of waters before him. Not ‘a
speck of ice,’ to use his own words, could be seen. There, from a height
of 480 feet, which commanded a horizon of almost forty miles, his ears
were gladdened with the novel music of dashing waves; and a surf breaking
in among the rocks at his feet, stayed his further progress.... The high
ridges to the north-west dwindled off into low blue knobs, which blended
finally with the air. Morton called the cape which baffled his labours
after his commander, but I have given it the more enduring name of ‘Cape
Constitution.’ I do not believe there was a man among us who did not long
for the means of embarking upon its bright and lonely waters. But he who
may be content to follow our story for the next few months will feel as we
did, that a controlling necessity made the desire a fruitless one.”
Morton had undoubtedly seen an open sea, but the water which he described
we now know to be simply Kennedy Channel, a continuation of Smith Sound.
He had reached a latitude (about 80° 30’) further north than any previous
explorer of the Greenland coast.
[Illustration: MORTON DISCOVERS THE OPEN SEA.]
A year and three months had passed since the starting of the expedition,
and still the little brig was fast in the ice. The men were, as Kane calls
it, “scurvy riddled” and utterly prostrated, their supplies were rapidly
becoming exhausted, and Kane determined to hold a council of both officers
and crew. At noon of August 26th all hands were called, and the situation
fully explained to them, the doctor, however, counselling them to stay by
the brig, although he gave them full permission to make any attempt at
escape they might deem feasible. Eight out of seventeen resolved to stand
by the vessel. Dr. Hayes and eight others determined to make an effort to
reach the settlements. Kane divided their remaining resources, and they
left on the 28th. One of them, George Riley, returned a few days
afterwards, and, three and a half months later, the rest were only too
glad to rejoin the vessel, after enduring many sufferings. On December
12th, says Kane, “Brooks awoke me with the cry of ‘Esquimaux again!’ I
dressed hastily, and groping my way over the pile of boxes that leads up
from the hold to the darkness above, made out a group of human figures,
masked by the hooded jumpers of the natives. They stopped at the gangway,
and, as I was about to challenge, one of them sprang forward and grasped
my hand. It was Dr. Hayes. A few words, dictated by suffering, certainly
not by any anxiety as to his reception, and at his bidding the whole party
came upon deck. Poor fellows! I could only grasp their hands, and give
them a brother’s welcome.” The thermometer stood at -50° (82° below
freezing); they were covered with rime and snow, and were fainting with
hunger. It was necessary to use caution in taking them in to the warm
cabin, or it would have prostrated them completely. “Poor fellows,” says
Kane, “as they threw open their Esquimaux garments by the stove, how they
relished the scanty luxuries which we had to offer them! The coffee and
the meat biscuit soup, and the molasses and the wheat bread, even the salt
pork which our scurvy forbade the rest of us to touch—how they relished it
all! For more than two months they had lived on frozen seal and walrus
meat.” They were all in danger of collapse, and had long to be nursed very
carefully. Dr. Hayes was much prostrated, and three of his frost-bitten
toes had to suffer amputation.
Their hope at starting was that they might reach Upernavik, the nearest
Danish settlement in Greenland, a distance of about one thousand miles,
and that they might, at all events next spring, send succour to the party
left behind. Dr. Kane furnished them with such necessaries as could be
properly spared, with sledges: they were to take a life-boat previously
deposited near Lyttelton Island, and a whale-boat which had been left at
the Six-mile Ravine—a spot so called from being that distance from the
brig. Before leaving Dr. Kane called them into the cabin, where in some
nook or corner of the aft locker the careful steward had stowed a couple
of bottles of champagne, the existence of which was only known to the
commander and himself. One of these was drawn from its hiding-place, and
in broken-handled tea-cups they exchanged mutual pledges.
Their hopes had been to reach open water at about ten miles from the brig,
but in this they were entirely disappointed, and they had to drag their
boats, sledges, and provisions, over ice so rough and broken, that in one
place it took them three days to make six miles. Little wonder if some of
them thought of returning almost as soon as they started!
The reader would not thank us were we to record the long series of weary
marches over the ice which form the bulk of Dr. Hayes’ narrative. Winter
was fast approaching, their provisions were nearly exhausted, and it
behoved them to erect some place of shelter. A hut was constructed of
boulders, a sail doing duty for roof, and a piece of greased linen—part of
an old shirt—for window-glass. Like Franklin and Richardson, they tried to
eke out their supplies by eating _tripe de roche_, the rock lichen, which,
as it most commonly does, produced diarrhœa, and weakened them still more.
Esquimaux visitors arrived at the hut, and brought them some limited
supplies of blubber, but declined altogether to sell their dogs or help
them to Upernavik. Whether or no Hayes was mistaken, he did not trust much
to that innocence and simplicity which are supposed to be the prevailing
characteristics of the Esquimaux; and on one or two occasions he seems to
have had very good reason for his doubts. Petersen and Godfrey, on the
way, during November, to the brig for succour, overheard some natives
plotting their destruction, and immediately started from the settlement
with their sledge. The Esquimaux followed them with savage cries, but the
determined front shown to them seemed to have altered their minds.
“I now,” says Hayes, “repeated to Kalutunah a request which had been made
on previous occasions, viz., that his people should take us upon their
sledges and carry us northward to the Oomeaksoak. His answer was the same
as it had been hitherto. It was then proposed to him and his companions
that we should hire from them their teams; but this they also declined to
do. No offers which we could make seemed to produce the slightest
impression upon them, and it was clear that nothing would induce them to
comply with our wishes, nor even give us any reason for their refusal. In
fact, they thoroughly understood our situation; and we now entertained no
doubt that they had made up their minds, with a unanimity which at an
earlier period seemed improbable, to abandon us to our fate and to profit
by it.
“The question to be decided became a very plain one. Here were six
civilised men, who had no resort for the preservation of their lives,
their usefulness, and the happiness of their families, except in the aid
of sledges and teams which the savage owners obstinately refused to sell
or to hire. The expectation of seizing, after we should have starved or
frozen to death, our remaining effects, was the only motive of the
refusal. The savages were within easy reach of their friends, and could
suffer little by a short delay of their return. For their property
compensation could be made after our arrival at the brig. For my own part,
before attempting to negotiate with Kalutunah I had determined that his
party should not escape us in case of failure in our application to them
for aid.
“My comrades were not behind me in their inclinations; indeed, it is to
their credit that in so desperate an extremity they were willing to
restrain themselves from measures of a kind to give us at the time far
less trouble than those which I suggested. Being unwilling that any
unnecessary harm should come to the Esquimaux, I proposed to put them to
sleep with opium; then taking possession of their dogs and sledges, to
push northward as rapidly as possible, and leaving them to awaken at their
leisure; to stop for a few hours of rest among our friends at
Northumberland Island; then to make directly for Cape Alexander, with the
hope of getting so far the start of Kalutunah and his companions that
before they could arrive at Netlik and spread the alarm we should be
beyond their reach.
“This plan met with the unanimous sanction of the party, and we prepared
to put it into immediate execution. In the way of this were some
difficulties. Our guests were manifesting great uneasiness, and a decided
disinclination to remain. Many threatening glances and very few kind words
had been bestowed upon them, and they were evidently beginning to feel
that they were not in a safe place. It became now our first duty to
reassure them, and accordingly the angry looks gave place to friendly
smiles. The old, familiar habits of our people were resumed. Many presents
were given to them. I tore the remaining pictures from my ‘Anatomy,’ and
the picture of the poor footsore boy who wanted washing from
‘Copperfield,’ and gave them to Kalutunah for his children. Such pieces of
wood as remained to us were distributed amongst them. Each received a
comb. This last they had sometimes seen us use, and they proceeded
immediately to comb out their matted hair, or rather to attempt that work;
but forty years of neglect, blubber, and filth, had so glued their locks
together that there was no possibility of getting a comb through them. The
jests excited by these attempts to imitate our practices did more to
restore confidence than anything else.
“At length was reached the climax of our hospitalities. The stew which we
had been preparing for our guests was ready and was placed before them,
and they were soon greedily devouring it. This proceeding was watched by
us with mingled anxiety and satisfaction, for while the pot was over the
fire I had turned into it unobserved the contents of a small vial of
laudanum. The soup, of course, contained the larger part of the opium, but
being small in quantity it had been made so bitter that they would not eat
more than the half of it. In order to prevent either of them from getting
an over-dose we divided the fluid into three equal portions, and then with
intense interest awaited the result, apprehensive that the narcotic had
not been administered in sufficiently large quantity to ensure the desired
effect.
“After an interval of painful watchfulness on the part of my companions
the hunters began to droop their eyelids, and asked to be allowed to lie
down and sleep. We were not long in granting their wish, and never before
had we manifested more kindly dispositions towards them. We assisted them
in taking off their coats and boots, and then wrapped them up in our
blankets, about which we were no longer fastidious.
“Our guests were in a few minutes asleep, but I did not know how much of
their drowsiness was due to fatigue (for they had been hunting), and how
much to the opium; nor were we by any means assured that their sleep was
sound, for they exhibited signs of restlessness which greatly alarmed us.
Every movement had, therefore, to be conducted with the utmost
circumspection.
“To prepare for starting was the work of a few minutes. We were in full
travelling dress—coats, boots, and mittens, and some of us wore masks; the
hunters’ whips were in our hands, and nothing remained to be done but to
get a cup from the shelf. The moment was a critical one, for if the
sleepers should awake our scheme must be revealed. Godfrey reached up for
the desired cup, and down came the whole contents of the shelf, rattling
to the ground. I saw the sleepers start, and, anticipating the result,
instantly sprang to the light and extinguished it with a blow of my
mittened hand. As was to be expected, the hunters were aroused. Kalutunah
gave a grunt, and inquired what was the matter. I answered him by throwing
myself upon the breck, and, crawling to his side, hugged him close, and
cried ‘Singikpok’ (sleep). He laughed, muttered something which I could
not understand, and, without having suspected that anything was wrong,
again fell asleep.” Dr. Hayes and his companions made their escape.
[Illustration: KALUTUNAH.]
The dogs, however, gave them a great deal of trouble; and they were not
surprised when, after a halt for coffee, and to make some necessary
repairs, they saw the prisoners left in the snow hut coming after them in
full pursuit. There was nothing for it but a determined front. Hayes and
his companions got their rifles ready, and on the approach of the natives,
levelled them, ready to fire. This brought the Esquimaux to their senses,
and with many deprecatory gestures they promised to do all that was asked
of them. The affair ended, happily, without bloodshed, and the natives
accompanied Hayes to the brig, which he reached safely, as before
recorded, after many adventures.
Kane makes the following characteristic entry for January 6th, 1855:—“If
this journal ever gets to be inspected by other eyes, the colour of its
pages will tell of the atmosphere it is written in. We have been emulating
the Esquimaux for some time in everything else; and now, last of all, this
intolerable temperature and our want of fuel have driven us to rely on our
lamps for heat. Counting those which I have added since the wanderers came
back, we have twelve constantly going, with the grease and soot everywhere
in proportion. I can hardly keep my charts and registers in anything like
decent trim. Our beds and bedding are absolutely black, and our faces
begrimed with fatty carbon like the Esquimaux of South Greenland.”
Still the scurvy kept a number of the men in an unserviceable condition.
Some of Kane’s remarks on the use of raw meats _àpropos_ of their value in
a medicinal sense, are interesting:—“I do not know,” says he, “that my
journal anywhere mentions our habituation to raw meats, nor does it dwell
upon their strange adaptation to scorbutic disease. Our journeys have
taught us the wisdom of the Esquimaux appetite, and there are few amongst
us who do not relish a slice of raw blubber or a chunk of frozen
walrus-beef. The liver of a walrus (awuktanuk) eaten with little slices of
his fat, of a verity it is a delicious morsel! Fire would ruin the curt,
pithy expression of vitality which belongs to its uncooked pieces. Charles
Lamb’s roast pig was nothing to awuktanuk. I wonder that raw beef is not
eaten at home. Deprived of extraneous fibre, it is neither indigestible
nor difficult to masticate. With acids and condiments it makes a salad
which an educated palate cannot help relishing; and as a powerful and
condensed heat-making and anti-scorbutic food it has no rival....
“My plans for sledging, simple as I once thought them, and simple
certainly as compared with those of the English parties, have completely
changed. Give me an eight-pound reindeer-fur bag to sleep in, an Esquimaux
lamp with a lump of moss, a sheet-iron snow-melter or a copper soup-pot,
with a tin cylinder to slip over it and defend it from the wind, a good
_pièce de résistance_ of raw walrus-beef, and I want nothing more for a
long journey, if the thermometer will keep itself as high as minus 30°.
Give me a bear-skin bag, and coffee to boot, and with the clothes on my
back I am ready for minus 60°, but no wind.
[Illustration: ESQUIMAUX SNOW HOUSES.]
“The programme runs after this fashion:—Keep the blood in motion, without
loitering on the march; and for the halt raise a snow-house; or, if the
snow lies scant or impracticable, ensconce yourself in a burrow or under
the hospitable lee of an inclined hummock-slab. The outside fat of your
walrus sustains your little moss fire; its frozen slices give you bread,
its frozen blubber gives you butter, other parts make the soup. The snow
supplies you with water; and when you are ambitious of coffee there is a
bagful stowed away in your boot. Spread out your bear-bag, your only heavy
movable; stuff your reindeer-bag inside, hang your boots up outside, take
a blade of bone and scrape off all the ice from your furs. Now crawl in,
the whole party of you, feet foremost, draw the top of your dormitory
close headlong to leeward. Fancy yourself in Sybaris, and, if you are only
tired enough, you may sleep—like St. Lawrence on his gridiron, or even a
trifle better.”
On January 17th Kane sadly admits that the “present state of things cannot
last.” They required meat above all things, and he determined to make a
sledge journey to the Esquimaux huts at Etah in search of it. The
preparations made, he started on the 22nd, Hans Christian being the only
available man to accompany him, the rest being nearly all prostrated with
scurvy, and some in a most dangerous condition. His journal gives a
graphic account of the attempt, which was a failure.
“Washington’s birthday, February 22nd, was, however, a day of better omen.
Hans had had a shot—a long shot—at a deer, but he had wounded him, and the
injured animal, they knew, would not run far. Next morning Hans was out
early on the trail of the wounded deer. Rhina, the least barbarous of the
sledge dogs, assisted him. He was back by noon with the joyful news, ‘The
tukkuk dead only two miles up big fiord!’ The cry found its way through
the hatch, and came back in a broken huzza from the sick men.
“We are so badly off for strong arms that our reindeer threatened to be a
great embarrassment to us. We had hard work with our dogs carrying him to
the brig, and still harder, worn down as we were, in getting him over the
ship’s side. But we succeeded, and were tumbling him down the hold, when
we found ourselves in a dilemma like the Vicar of Wakefield with his
family picture. It was impossible to drag the prize into our little
moss-lined dormitory; the _tossut_ was not half big enough to let him
pass; and it was equally impossible to skin him anywhere else without
freezing our fingers in the operation.
“It was a happy escape from the embarrassments of our hungry little
council to determine that the animal might be carved before skinning as
well as he could be afterwards; and, in a very few minutes we proved our
united wisdom by a feast on his quartered remains.
“It was a glorious meal, such as the compensations of Providence reserve
for starving men alone. We ate, forgetful of the past, and almost heedless
of the morrow; cleared away the offal wearily, and now, at 10 P.M., all
hands have turned in to sleep, leaving to their commanding officer the
solitary honour of an eight hours’ vigil.
“The deer was among the largest of all the northern specimens I have seen.
He measured five feet one inch in girth, and six feet two inches in
length, and stood as large as a two years’ heifer. We estimated his weight
at three hundred pounds.”
But such a happy experience was quite exceptional at this time. Other
expeditions to the Esquimaux at this time demonstrated that they
themselves were in a starving condition. On March 20th two of the men
attempted to desert, but Kane had learned of their intentions, and
confronted them as they were about to leave the vessel. One man, Godfrey,
however, did succeed, his intention being apparently to reach the
settlement at Etah Bay, and robbing Hans, their hunter, of sledge and
dogs, proceed south to Netlik. He afterwards returned to the brig with
this very sledge, reporting that Hans was lying sick at Etah, and that he
himself intended to settle down among the Esquimaux. Both Bonsall and Kane
were at this time hardly able to walk, while the rest, thirteen in all,
were down with the scurvy. Shots were fired at him to make him change his
mind, but he again escaped, and this circumstance, with Hans’ continued
absence, naturally caused the commander much anxiety. Kane, though weak
and dispirited, determined to go in search of both. The sequel was, that
disguising himself as an Esquimaux, he succeeded in deceiving the deserter
when he arrived at the village, and handcuffing him made him yield
unconditionally; he returned to the brig as a prisoner. Hans, however, had
been really ill.