MAKING PEARY SLEDGES--HUNTING IN THE ARCTIC NIGHT--THE EXCITABLE DOGS
AND THEIR HABITS
I have been busy making sledges, sledges of a different pattern from
those used heretofore, and it is expected that they will answer better
than the Esquimo type of open-work sledge, of the earlier expeditions.
These sledges have been designed by Commander Peary and I have done the
work.
The runners are longer, and are curved upwards at each end, so that they
resemble the profile of a canoe, and are expected to rise over the
inequalities of the ice much better than the old style. Lashed together
with sealskin thongs, about twelve feet long, by two feet wide and seven
inches high, the load can be spread along their entire length instead of
being piled up, and a more even distribution of the weights is made. The
Esquimos, used to their style of sledge, are of the opinion that the
new style will prove too much for one man and an ordinary team to
handle, but we have given both kinds a fair trial and it looks as if the
new type has the old beaten by a good margin.
The hunting is not going along as successfully as is desired. The sun is
sinking lower and lower, and the different hunting parties return with
poor luck, bringing to the ship nothing in some cases, and in others
only a few hares and some fish.
The Commander has told me that it is imperative that fresh meat be
secured, and now that I have done all that it is positively necessary
for me to do here at the ship, I am to take a couple of the Esquimo boys
and try my luck for musk-oxen or reindeer, so to-morrow, early in the
morning, it is off on the hunt.
This from my diary: Eight days out and not a shot, not a sight of game,
nothing. The night is coming quickly, the long months of darkness, of
quiet and cold, that, in spite of my years of experience, I can never
get used to; and up here at Sheridan it comes sooner and lasts longer
than it does down at Etah and Bowdoin Bay. Only a few days' difference,
but it _is_ longer, and I do not welcome it. Not a sound, except the
report of a glacier, broken off by its weight, and causing a new iceberg
to be born. The black darkness of the sky, the stars twinkling above,
and hour after hour going by with no sunlight. Every now and then a moon
when storms do not come, and always the cold, getting colder and colder,
and me out on the hunt for fresh meat. I know it; the same old story, a
man's work and a dog's life, and what does it amount to? What good is to
be done? I am tired, sick, sore, and discouraged.
The main thing was game, but I had a much livelier time with some
members of the Peary Arctic Club's expedition known as "our four-footed
friends"--the dogs.
The dogs are ever interesting. They never bark, and often bite, but
there is no danger from their bites. To get together a team that has not
been tied down the night before is a job. You take a piece of meat,
frozen as stiff as a piece of sheet-iron, in one hand, and the harness
in the other, you single out the cur you are after, make proper
advances, and when he comes sniffling and snuffling and all the time
keeping at a safe distance, you drop the sheet-iron on the snow, the
brute makes a dive, and you make a flop, you grab the nearest thing
grabable--ear, leg, or bunch of hair--and do your best to catch his
throat, after which, everything is easy. Slip the harness over the head,
push the fore-paws through, and there you are, one dog hooked up and
harnessed. After licking the bites and sucking the blood, you tie said
dog to a rock and start for the next one. It is only a question of time
before you have your team. When you have them, leave them alone; they
must now decide who is fit to be the king of the team, and so they
fight, they fight and fight; and once they have decided, the king is
king. A growl from him, or only a look, is enough, all obey, except the
females, and the females have their way, for, true to type, the males
never harm the females, and it is always the females who start the
trouble.
The dogs when not hitched to the sledges were kept together in teams and
tied up, both at the ship and while we were hunting. They were not
allowed to roam at large, for past experience with these customers had
taught us that nothing in the way of food was safe from the attack of
Esquimo dogs. I have seen tin boxes that had been chewed open by dogs in
order to get at the contents, tin cans of condensed milk being gnawed
like a bone, and skin clothing being chewed up like so much gravy. Dog
fights were hourly occurrences, and we lost a great many by the ravages
of the mysterious Arctic disease, piblokto, which affects all dog life
and frequently human life. Indeed, it looked for a time as if we should
lose the whole pack, so rapidly did they die, but constant care and
attention permitted us to save most of them, and the fittest survived.
Next to the Esquimos, the dogs are the most interesting subjects in the
Arctic regions, and I could tell lots of tales to prove their
intelligence and sagacity. These animals, more wolf than dog, have
associated themselves with the human beings of this country as have
their kin in more congenial places of the earth. Wide head, sharp nose,
and pointed ears, thick wiry hair, and, in some of the males, a heavy
mane; thick bushy tail, curved up over the back; deep chest and fore
legs wide apart; a typical Esquimo dog is the picture of alert
attention. They are as intelligent as any dog in civilization, and a
thousand times more useful. They earn their own livings and disdain any
of the comforts of life. Indeed it seems that when life is made pleasant
for them they get sick, lie down and die; and when out on the march,
with no food for days, thin, gaunt skeletons of their former selves,
they will drag at the traces of the sledges and by their uncomplaining
conduct, inspire their human companions to keep on.
Without the Esquimo dog, the story of the North Pole, would remain
untold; for human ingenuity has not yet devised any other means to
overcome the obstacles of cold, storm, and ice that nature has placed in
the way than those that were utilized on this expedition.