CHAPTER III.

THE POLAR SEAS: ICEBERGS--ICE-FLOES--THE SEAL--THE WALRUS THE

NARWHAL--THE WHALE--SUNDRY FORMS OF MARINE LIFE.

Those masses of ice which, towering to a considerable elevation

above the surface of the water, are carried hither and thither by

the currents of the Polar Sea, are known as _Icebergs_. They

are fresh-water formations, originating in the great glaciers of the

northern highlands. For as the rivers continuously pour their waters

into the ocean, so do the glaciers incessantly glide downward from the

head of the valleys which they occupy, until, arriving on the coast,

they throw off their terminal projections, to be carried afar by the

action of the tidal waves.

These bergs, or floating mountains, are sometimes 250 to 300 feet above

the level of the sea, and their capacity or bulk is invariably equal

to their height. From their specific gravity it has been calculated

that the volume of an iceberg _below_ the water is eight times

that of the portion rising above it. They are frequently of the most

imposing magnitude. Ross, in his first expedition, fell in with one

in Baffin Bay, at a distance of seven leagues from land, which had

gone aground in sixty-one fathoms water. Its dimensions, according to

Lieutenant Parry, were 4,169 yards in length, 3,869 yards in breadth,

and 51 feet in height. Its configuration is described as resembling

that of the back of the Isle of Wight, while its cliffs recalled those

chalky ramparts which stretch their glittering line to the west of

Dover. Its weight was computed at 1,292,397,673 tons. Captain Graab

examined a mass, on the west coast of Greenland, which rose 120 feet

out of the water, measured 4,000 feet in circumference at the base,

and was calculated to be equal in bulk to upwards of 900,000,000 cubic

feet. Dr. Hayes took the measurements of a berg which had stranded off

the little harbour of Tessuissak, to the north of Melville Bay. The

square wall which faced towards his base of triangulation was somewhat

more than three-quarters of a mile in length, and 315 feet in height.

As it was nearly square-sided above the sea, it would be of the same

shape beneath it; and, according to the ratio already given, must have

drifted aground in a depth of fully half a mile. In other words, from

base to summit it must have stood as high as the peak of Snowdon. Its

cubical contents cannot have been less than about 27,000,000,000 feet,

nor its weight than 2,000,000,000 tons!

When seen from a distance, the spectacle of any considerable number

of these slowly-moving mountains is very impressive, and it becomes

particularly magnificent if it should be lit up by the splendour of

the midnight sun. They are not only majestic in size, but sublime in

appearance, at one time assuming the likeness of a grand cathedral

church, at another, of a lofty obelisk; now of a dazzling pyramid, and

now of a cluster of lofty towers. Nature would seem to have lavished

upon them all her architectural fancy; and as they are grandly swept

along, one might be pardoned for supposing them to be the sea-washed

palaces of a race of ocean Titans.

[Illustration: ARCHED ICEBERG OFF THE GREENLAND COAST.]

In Melville Bay, Dr. Kane’s ship anchored to an iceberg, which

protected it from the fury of a violent gale. But he had not long

enjoyed the tranquil shelter it afforded, when a din of loud crackling

sounds was heard above; and small fragments of ice, not larger

than a walnut, began to dot the water, like the first big drops

of a thunder-shower. Dr. Kane and his crew did not neglect these

indications; they had barely time to cast off, however, before the face

of the icy cliff fell in ruins, crashing like near artillery.

Afterwards he made fast to a larger berg, which he describes as a

moving breakwater, and of gigantic proportions; it kept its course

steadily towards the north.

When he got under weigh, and made for the north-east, through a

labyrinth of ice-floes, he was favoured with a gorgeous spectacle,

which hardly any excitement of peril could have induced him to

overlook. The midnight sun came out over the northern crest of the huge

berg, kindling variously-coloured fires on every part of its surface,

and making the ice around one sublime transparency of illuminated

gem-work, blazing carbuncles, and rubies and molten gold.

[Illustration: AMONG THE BERGS--A NARROW ESCAPE.]

Dr. Hayes describes an immense berg which resembled in its general

aspect the Westminster Palace of Sir Charles Barry’s creation. It went

to ruin before his eyes. First one tall tower tumbled headlong into

the water, starting from its surface an innumerable swarm of gulls;

then another followed; and at length, after five hours of terrible

disruption and crashing, not a fragment that rose fifty feet above the

water remained of this architectural colossus of ice.

These floating isles of ice are carried southward fully two thousand

miles from their parent glaciers to melt in the Atlantic, where they

communicate a perceptible coldness to the water for thirty or forty

miles around, while their influence on the atmospheric temperature may

be recognized at a greater distance. Their number is extraordinary. As

many as seven hundred bergs, each loftier than the dome of St. Paul’s,

some than the cross of St. Peter’s, have been seen at once in the

Polar basin; as if the Frost King had despatched an armada to oppose

the rash enterprise of man in penetrating within his dominions. The

waves break against them as against an iron-bound coast, and often the

spray is flung over their very summits, like the spray of the rolling

waters of the Channel over the crest of the Eddystone Lighthouse. The

ice crumbles from their face, and tumbles down into the sea with a roar

like that of artillery; and as they waste away, through the combined

action of air and water, they occasionally lose their equilibrium and

topple over, producing a swell and a violent commotion which break

up the neighbouring ice-fields: the tumult spreads far and wide, and

thunder seems to peal around.

The fractures or rents frequently visible in the glittering cliffs

of the icebergs are of an emerald green, and look like patches of

beautiful fresh sward on cliffs of chalk; while pools of water of the

most exquisite sapphirine blue shine resplendent on their surface, or

leap down their craggy sides in luminous cascades. Even in the night

they are readily distinguished from afar by their effulgence; and in

foggy, hazy weather, by a peculiar blackness in the atmosphere. As the

Greenland Current frequently drifts them to the south of Newfoundland,

and even to the 40th or 39th parallel of latitude, the ships and

steamers crossing between Europe and America sometimes meet them on

their track. To come into collision with them is certain destruction;

and it is probable that some of those ill-fated vessels which have left

their harbours in safety, but have never since been heard of,--as, for

example, the steamer _President_,--have perished through this

cause.

But if they are sometimes dangerous to the mariner, they often prove

his security. As most of their bulk lies below the water-surface, they

are either carried along by under-currents against the wind, or else

from their colossal size they are able to defy the strongest gale, and

to move along with majestic slowness when every other kind of ice is

driven swiftly past them. And hence it happens that, when the wind is

contrary, the whaler is glad to bring his ship into smooth water under

their lee. In describing the difficulties of his passage through the

loose and drifting ice near Cape York, and the broken ice-fields, Dr.

Kane records the assistance he derived from the large icebergs, to

which he moored his vessel, and thus was enabled, he says, to hold his

own, however rapidly the surface-floes were passing by him to the south.

Yet anchoring to a berg brings with it an occasional peril. As we have

already said, large pieces frequently loosen themselves from the summit

or sides, and fall into the sea with a far-resounding crash. When

this operation, “calving,” as it is called, takes place, woe to the

unfortunate ship which lies beneath!

All ice becomes excessively brittle under the influence of the sun or

of a temperate atmosphere, and a single blow from an axe will suffice

to split a huge berg asunder, burying the heedless adventurer beneath

the ruins, or hurling him into the yawning chasm.

Dr. Scoresby records the adventure of two sailors who had been sent to

attach an anchor to a berg. They set to work to hew a hole in the ice,

but scarcely had the first blow been struck, when the colossal mass

rent from top to bottom and fell asunder, the two halves falling in

opposite directions with a tremendous uproar. One of the sailors, with

remarkable presence of mind, instantly clambered up the huge fragment

on which he was sitting, and remained rocking to and fro on the dizzy

summit until its equilibrium was restored; the other, falling between

the masses, would probably have been crushed to death if the current

caused by their commotion had not swept him within reach of the boat

that was waiting for them.

Fastening to a berg, says Sherard Osborn, has its risks and dangers.

Sometimes the first stroke of the man setting the ice-anchor, by its

concussion, causes the iceberg to break up, and the people so employed

run great risk of being injured; at another time, vessels obliged to

make fast under the steep side of a berg have been seriously damaged by

pieces detaching themselves from overhead; and, again, the projecting

masses, called tongues, which form under water the base of the berg,

have been known to break off, and strike a vessel so severely as to

sink her. All these perils are duly detailed by every Arctic navigator,

who is always mindful, in mooring to an iceberg, to look for a side

which is low and sloping, without any tongues under water.

Captain Parry was once witness of that sublime spectacle, which, though

of frequent occurrence, is seldom seen by human eyes, the entire

dissolution of an enormous iceberg.

Its huge size and massiveness had been specially remarked, and men

thought that it might well resist “a century of sun and thaw.” It

looked as large as Westminster Abbey. All on board Captain Parry’s

ship described as a most wonderful spectacle this iceberg, without any

warning, completely breaking up. The sea around it became a seething

caldron, from the violent plunging of the masses, as they broke and

re-broke in a thousand pieces. The floes, torn up for a distance of

two miles around it, by the violent action of the rolling waters,

threatened, from the agitation of the ice, to destroy any vessel that

had been amongst them; and Captain Parry and his crew congratulated

themselves that they were sufficiently far from the scene to witness

its sublimity without being involved in its danger.

[Illustration: ICEBERG AND ICE-FIELD, MELVILLE BAY, GREENLAND]

Icebergs chiefly abound in Baffin Bay, and in the gulfs and inlets

connected with it. They are particularly numerous in the great

indentation known as Melville Bay, the whole interior of the country

bordering upon it being the seat of immense glaciers, and these are

constantly “shedding off” icebergs of the largest dimensions. The

greater bulk of these is, as we have explained, below the water-line;

and the consequent depth to which they sink when floating subjects them

to the action of the deeper ocean-currents, while their broad surface

above the water is, of course, acted on by the wind. It happens,

therefore, as Dr. Kane remarks, that they are found not infrequently

moving in different directions from the floes around them, and

preventing them for a time from freezing into a united mass. Still,

in the late winter, when the cold has thoroughly set in, Melville

Bay becomes a continuous mass of ice, from Cape York to the Devil’s

Thumb. At other times, this region justifies the name the whalers have

bestowed upon it of “Bergy Hole.”

Captain Beechey, in his voyage with Buchan, in 1818, had an opportunity

of witnessing the formation of a “berg,” or rather of two of these

immense masses. In Magdalena Bay he had taken the ship’s launch near

the shore to examine a magnificent glacier, when the discharge of a

gun caused an instantaneous disruption of its bulk. A noise resembling

thunder was heard in the direction of the glacier, and in a few seconds

more an immense piece broke away, and fell headlong into the sea.

The crew of the launch, supposing themselves beyond the reach of its

influence, quietly looked upon the scene, when a sea arose and rolled

towards the shore with such rapidity that the boat was washed upon the

beach and filled. As soon as their astonishment had subsided, they

examined the boat, and found her so badly stove that it was necessary

to repair her before they could return to their ship. They had also

the curiosity to measure the distance the boat had been carried by the

wave, and ascertained that it was ninety-six feet.

A short time afterwards, when Captain Beechey and Lieutenant Franklin

had approached one of these stupendous walls of ice, and were

endeavouring to search into the innermost recess of a deep cavern that

lay near the foot of the glacier, they suddenly heard a report, as of

a cannon, and turning to the quarter whence it proceeded, perceived

an immense section of the front of the glacier sliding down from the

height of two hundred feet at least into the sea, and dispersing the

water in every direction, accompanied by a loud grinding noise, and

followed by an outflow of water, which, being previously lodged in the

fissures, now made its escape in innumerable tiny flashing rills and

cataracts.

The mass thus disengaged at first disappeared wholly under water, and

nothing could be seen but a violent seething of the sea, and the ascent

of clouds of glittering spray, such as that which occurs at the foot of

a great waterfall. But after a short time it reappeared, raising its

head fully a hundred feet above the surface, with water streaming down

on every side; and then labouring, as if doubtful which way it should

fall, it rolled over, rocked to and fro for a few minutes, and finally

became settled.

On approaching and measuring it, Beechey found it to be nearly a

quarter of a mile in circumference, and sixty feet out of the water.

Knowing its specific gravity, and making a fair allowance for its

inequalities, he computed its weight at 421,660 tons.

In Parry’s first voyage he passed in one day fifty icebergs of large

dimensions, just after crossing the Arctic Circle; and on the following

day a still more extended chain of ice-peaks of still larger size,

against which a heavy southerly swell was violently driven, dashing the

loose ice with tremendous force, sometimes flinging a white spray over

them to the height of more than one hundred feet, and accompanied by a

loud noise “exactly resembling the roar of distant thunder.”

Between one of these bergs and a detached floe the _Hecla_,

Parry’s ship, had nearly, as the whalers say, been “nipped,” or

crushed. The berg was about one hundred and forty feet high, and

aground in one hundred and twenty fathoms, so that its whole height

must have exceeded eight hundred feet; that is, it was of a bulk equal

to St. Catherine’s Down in the Isle of Wight.

In his second voyage Parry speaks of fifty-four icebergs visible at one

time, some of which were not less than two hundred feet above the sea;

and again of thirty of these huge masses, many of them whirled about by

the tides like straws on a mill-stream.

Icebergs can originate only in regions where glaciers abound: the

former are the offspring of the latter, and where land unsuitable to

the production of the latter does not exist, the former are never

found. Hence, in Baffin Bay, where steep cliffs of cold granite frown

over almost fathomless waters, the “monarch of glacial formations”

floats slowly from the ravine which has been its birthplace, until

fairly launched into the depths of ocean, and, “after long years,”

drifts into the warmer regions of the Atlantic to assist in the

preservation of Nature’s laws of equilibrium of temperature of the air

and water.

There was a time when men of science, and, amongst others, the French

philosopher St. Pierre, believed that icebergs were the snow and ice

of ages accumulated upon an Arctic sea, which, forming at the Poles,

detached themselves from the parent mass. Such an hypothesis naturally

gave rise to many theories, not less ingenious than startling, as to

the effect an incessant accumulation of ice must produce on the globe

itself; and St. Pierre hinted at the possibility of the huge “domes

of ice”--which, as he supposed, rose to an immense height in the keen

frosty heavens of the Poles--suddenly launching towards the Equator,

dissolving under a tropical sun, and resulting in a second deluge!

In simple language Professor Tyndall furnishes an explanation of

the origin of icebergs, which we may transfer to these pages as

supplementary to the preceding remarks.

[Illustration: ORIGIN of ICEBERGS--EXTENSION OF A GLACIER

SEAWARDS.]

What is their origin? he asks; and he replies, as we have done, the

Arctic glaciers. From the mountains in the interior the indurated snows

slide into the valleys, and fill them with ice. The glaciers thus

created move, like the Swiss ones, incessantly downward. But the Arctic

glaciers descend to the sea, and even enter it, frequently ploughing up

its bottom into submarine moraines. Undermined by the continuous action

of the waves, and unable to resist the pressure of their own weight,

they break across, and discharge enormous masses into the ocean. Some

of these drift on the adjacent shores, and often maintain themselves

for years. Others float away to the southward, and pass into the broad

Atlantic, where they are finally dissolved. But a vast amount of heat

is demanded for the simple liquefaction of ice, and the melting of

icebergs is on this account so slow that, when large, they sometimes

maintain themselves till they have been drifted two thousand miles from

their place of birth.

Icebergs, then, are fresh-water formations, and though they are found

on a colossal scale only in the Polar seas, yet they are by no means

uncommon among the lofty Alpine lakes.

The monarch of European ice-rivers is the great Aletsch glacier, at

the head of the valley of the Rhone. It is about twenty miles in

length, and collects its materials from the snow-drifts of the grandest

mountains of the Bernese Oberland--the Jungfrau, the Mönch, the

Trugberg, the Aletschhorn, the Breithorn, and the Gletscherhorn.

From the peak of the Æggischhorn the Alpine traveller obtains a fine

view of its river-like course, and he sees beneath him, on the right

hand, and surrounded by sheltering mountains, an object of almost

startling beauty. “Yonder,” says Tyndall,[6] “we see the naked side of

the glacier, exposing glistening ice-cliffs sixty or seventy feet high.

It would seem as if the Aletsch here were engaged in the vain attempt

to thrust an arm through a lateral valley. It once did so; but the

arm is now incessantly broken off close to the body of the glacier, a

great space formerly covered by the ice being occupied by its water of

liquefaction. In this way a lake of the loveliest blue is formed, which

reaches quite to the base of the ice-cliffs, saps them, as the Arctic

waves sap the Greenland glaciers, and receives from them the broken

masses which it has undermined. As we look down upon the lake, small

icebergs sail over the tranquil surface, each resembling a snowy swan

accompanied by its shadow.”

This lake is the Märjelen Sea of the Swiss.

[Illustration: THE ALETSCH GLACIER, SWITZERLAND, FROM THE

ÆGGISCHHORN, SHOWING ITS MORAINES.]

[Illustration: THE MÄRJELEN SEA, SWITZERLAND.]

Professor Tyndall goes on to describe a spectacle which he witnessed,

and which, as we have seen, is of frequent occurrence in the Arctic

Seas. A large and lonely iceberg was floating in the middle of the

lake. Suddenly he heard a sound like that of a cataract, and on

looking towards the iceberg could see the water teeming from its

sides. Whence came the water? The berg had become top-heavy through

the melting underneath; it was in the act of performing a somersault,

and in rolling over carried with it a vast quantity of water, which

rushed like a waterfall down its sides. And the iceberg, which, but a

moment before, was snowy white, now exhibited the delicate blue colour

characteristic of compact ice. It would soon, however, be rendered

white again by the action of the sun.

We may contrast this picture of the solitary iceberg in the centre

of the dark-blue lake with one which Dr. Hayes describes in his

picturesque voyage in the open Polar Sea.

After passing Upernavik he saw a heavy line of icebergs lying across

his course, and having no alternative, shot in among them. Some of

them proved to be of immense size--upwards of two hundred feet in

height, and a mile in length; others were not larger than the schooner

which wound her way amongst them. Their forms were as various as their

dimensions, from solid wall-sided masses of dead whiteness, with

waterfalls tumbling from them, to an old weather-worn accumulation

of Gothic spires, whose crystal peaks and sharp angles melted into

the blue sky. They seemed to be endless and innumerable, and so close

together that at a little distance they appeared to form upon the sea

an unbroken canopy of ice.

Dr. Hayes records an adventure which may serve to give the reader an

idea of the nature of the perils encountered by the Arctic explorer.

The ocean-current was carrying his schooner towards a labyrinth of

icebergs at an uncomfortably rapid rate. A boat was therefore lowered,

to moor a cable to a berg which lay grounded at about a hundred yards

distant. While this was being done the schooner absolutely grazed the

side of a berg which rose a hundred feet above her topmasts, and then

slipped past another of smaller dimensions. But a strong eddy at this

moment carried her against a huge floating mass, and though the shock

was slight, it proved sufficient to disengage some fragments of ice

large enough to have crushed the vessel had they struck her. The berg

then began to revolve, slowly and ponderously, and to settle slowly

over the threatened ship, whose destruction seemed a thing of certainty.

Fortunately, she was saved by the action of the berg. An immense mass

broke off from that part which lay beneath the water-surface, and this

colossal fragment, a dozen times larger than the schooner, came rushing

up within a few yards of them, sending a vast volume of foam and water

flying from its sides. This rupture arrested the rotatory motion of the

berg, which then began to settle in another direction, and the schooner

was able to sheer off.

At this moment the crew were startled by a loud report. Another and

another followed in quick succession, until the din grew deafening,

and the whole air seemed a reservoir of chaotic sounds. The opposite

side of the berg had split off, piece after piece, toppling a vast

volume of ice into the sea, and sending the berg revolving back upon

the ship. Then the side nearest to them underwent the same singular

process of disruption, and came plunging wildly down into the sea,

sending over them a shower of spray, and raising a swell which rocked

the ship to and fro as in a gale of wind, and left her grinding in the

_débris_ of the crumbling ruin.

“The ice was here,

The ice was there,

The ice was all around;

It creaked and growled,

And roared and howled,

Like demons in a swound.”

It is impossible, we should say, for any one who has not had actual

experience of the conditions of the Arctic world, to comprehend

or imagine the immense quantity of ice upborne on its cold bleak

waters. The mere enumeration of the floating bergs at times defies the

navigator. Dr. Hayes once counted as far as five hundred, and then

gave up in despair. Near by they stood out, he says, in all the rugged

harshness of their sharp outlines; and from this, softening with the

distance, they melted away into the clear gray sky; and there, far

off upon the sea of liquid silver, the imagination conjured up the

strangest and most wonderful groups and objects. Birds and beasts and

human forms and architectural designs took shape in the distant masses

of blue and white. The dome of St. Peter’s was recognizable here; then

the spire of a village church rose sharp and distinct; and under the

shadow of the Pyramids nestled a Byzantine tower and a Grecian temple.

“To the eastward,” says Dr. Hayes, describing a similar scene, “the

sea was dotted with little islets--dark specks upon a brilliant

surface. Icebergs, great and small, crowded through the channels which

divided them, until in the far distance they appeared massed together,

terminating against a snow-covered plain that sloped upward until it

was lost in a dim line of bluish whiteness. This line could be traced

behind the serrated coast as far to the north and south as the eye

could carry. It was the great _Mer de Glace_[7] which covers the

length and breadth of the Greenland continent. The snow-covered slope

was a glacier descending therefrom--the parent stem from which had been

discharged, at irregular intervals, many of the icebergs which troubled

us so much.”

We have now brought together a sufficient number of data to assist

the reader in forming a vivid conception of those monsters of the

Polar Seas, the icebergs; and to enable him, unless he is very slow

of imagination, to realize to himself what they _are_, and what

their general aspect _is_. But we may add one interesting detail,

noticed by Mr. Lament, the persevering seal-hunter, which is very

generally overlooked.

In the course of the brief Arctic summer the increased solar warmth

has a perceptible effect upon the solid ice, and it becomes undermined

and honeycombed, or, as the sailors call it, “rotten,” like a chalk

cliff. It decays fastest, apparently, “between wind and water,” so that

enormous caverns are excavated in the sides of the bergs.

Poets never dreamed of anything more beautiful than these crystal

vaults, which sometimes appear of a deep ultramarine blue, and at

others of an emerald-green tint. One could fancy them the favourite

haunts of mermaids and mermen, and of every kind of sea monster;

but, in truth, no animal ever enters them; the water dashing in and

out through their icy caves and tunnels makes a sonorous but rather

monotonous and melancholy sound. In moderately calm weather many of

these excavated bergs assume the form of gigantic mushrooms, and all

kinds of fantastic outlines; but as soon as a breeze of wind arises

they break up into little pieces with great rapidity.

Icebergs are met with on every side of the Southern Pole, and on every

meridian of the great Antarctic Ocean. But such is not the case in the

North. In the 360th meridian of longitude which intersects the parallel

of 70° N., icebergs spread over an extent only of about fifty-five

degrees, and this is immediately in and about Greenland and Baffin Bay.

Or, as Admiral Osborn puts it, for 1,375 miles of longitude we have

icebergs, and then for 7,635 geographical miles none are met with. This

fact is, as the same writer calls it, most interesting, and points

strongly to the probability that no extensive area of land exists about

the North Pole; a supposition strengthened by another fact, that the

vast ice-fields off Spitzbergen show no signs of ever having been in

contact with land or gravel.

[Illustration: FALL OF AN ICEBERG.]

Another difficulty which besets the Arctic navigator is the “pack-ice.”

In winter, the ice from the North Pole descends so far south as to

render the coast of Newfoundland inaccessible; it envelops Greenland,

sometimes even Iceland, and always surrounds and blocks up Spitzbergen

and Novaia Zemlaia. But as the sun comes north this vast frozen

expanse, which stretches over several thousands of square miles,

breaks up into enormous masses. When these extend horizontally for a

considerable distance they are called _ice-fields_. A _floe_

is a detached portion of a field; a large area of floes, closely

compact together, is known as _pack-ice_; while _drift-ice_

is loose ice in motion, and not so firmly welded as to prevent a ship

from forcing her way through the yielding fragments.

[Illustration: IN AN ICE-PACK, MELVILLE BAY.]

This “pack-ice,” however, is the great obstacle to Arctic exploration;

and frequently it presents a barrier which no human enterprise or skill

can overpass. At times, it has been found possible to cut a channel

through it, or it breaks up and opens a water-way through which the

bold adventurer steers. In 1806, Captain Scoresby forced his ship

through two hundred and fifty miles of pack-ice, in imminent peril,

until he reached the parallel of 81° 50’,--his nearest approach to the

Pole. In 1827, Sir Edward Parry gained the latitude of 82° 45’, by

dragging a boat over the ice-fields, but was then compelled to abandon

his daring and hazardous attempt, because the current carried the ice

southward more rapidly than he could traverse it to the north.

In warm summers this mass of ice will suddenly clear away and leave an

open streak of silver sea along the west coast of Spitzbergen, varying

in width from sixty to one hundred and fifty miles, and reaching as

high as 80° or 80° 30’ N. latitude. It was through this channel that

Scoresby bore his ship on the expedition to which we have just alluded.

A direct course from the Thames, across the Pole, to Behring Strait is

3,570 geographical miles; by Lancaster Sound it is 4,660 miles. The

Russians would be saved a voyage of 18,000 geographical miles could

they strike across the Pole and through Behring Strait to British

Columbia, instead of going by Cape Horn.

[Illustration: CHANNEL IN AN ICE-FIELD.]

Ice-fields, twenty to thirty miles across, are of frequent occurrence

in the great Northern Ocean; sometimes they extend fully one hundred

miles, so closely and solidly packed that no opening, even for a boat,

intervenes between them; they vary in thickness from ten to forty

or even fifty feet. At times these fields, which are many thousand

millions of tons in weight, acquire a rapid rotatory motion, and dash

against one another with a fury of which no words can give an accurate

idea. The reader knows what awful results are produced by the collision

of two railway trains, and may succeed, perhaps, in forming some feeble

conception of this still more appalling scene when he remembers the

huge dimensions and solidity of the opposing forces. The waters seethe

and foam, as if lashed by a tremendous tempest; the air is smitten

into stillness by the chaos of sounds, the creaking, and rending, and

cracking, and heaving, as the two ice-fields are hurled against each

other.

[Illustration: “NIPPED” IN AN ICE-FIELD.]

Woe to the ship caught between these grinding masses! No vessel ever

built by human hands could resist their pressure; and many a whaler,

navigating amid the floating fields, especially in foggy weather, has

thus been doomed to destruction. Some have been caught up like reeds,

and flung helplessly upon the ice; others have been overrun by the ice,

and buried beneath the accumulated fragments; others have been dashed

to pieces, and have gone down suddenly with all on board.

The records of Arctic exploration are full of stories of “hairbreadth

escapes” from the perils of the ice-field and the ice-floe. Here is

one which we borrow from the voyage of the _Dorothea_ and the

_Trent_, under Captain Buchan and Lieutenant Franklin.

The two vessels were making for Magdalena Bay, when they were caught in

a violent storm, and compelled to heave-to under storm stay-sails. Next

morning (June 30) the ice was seen along the lee, with a furious sea

breaking upon it. Close-reefed sails were out in the hope of weathering

the danger. When Buchan found that this could not be effected by his

ship, a slow and heavy sailer, he resolved on the desperate expedient

of “taking the pack,” in preference to falling, broadside on, among

the roaring breakers and crashing ice. “Heaven help them!” was the

involuntary cry of those on board the _Trent_, and the prayer was

all the more earnest from the conviction that a similar fate would soon

be their own.

The _Dorothea_ wore, and, impelled by wind and sea, rushed towards

what seemed inevitable destruction; those in the _Trent_ held

their breath while they watched the perilous exploit. The suspense

lasted but a moment, for the vessel, like a snow-flake before the

storm, drove into the awful scene of foam, and spray, and broken ice,

which formed a wall impenetrable to mortal eyesight. Whether she was

lost or saved, the gallant hearts on board the _Trent_ would

never know until they too were forced into a manœuvre which appeared

like rushing into the jaws of death. But it was inevitable; and when

Franklin had made all his preparations, he gave, in firm, decisive

tones, the order to “put up the helm.”

No language, says Admiral Beechey, who was then serving as a lieutenant

on board the _Trent_, can convey an adequate idea of the terrific

grandeur of the effects produced by the collision of the ice and the

tempestuous ocean. No language, on the other hand, can convey an idea

of the heroic calmness and resolution of Franklin and his crew. As

they approached the terrible scene, Franklin watched for one opening

less hazardous than another; but there was none. Before them stretched

one long line of frightful breakers, immense blocks of ice heaving,

rearing, and hurtling against one another with a din which rendered the

loud voice of the gallant commander almost inaudible. On the crest of a

huge billow the little _Trent_ rushed into the horrible turmoil; a

shock, which quivered through the ship from stem to stern, and the crew

were flung upon the deck, and the masts bent like willow wands.

“Hold on, for your lives, and stand to the helm, lads!” shouted

Franklin. “Ay, ay, sir,” was the steady response from many a heroic

heart. A billow came thundering against the stern of the brig; would

the brig be engulfed, or would she drive before it? Happily, she

forged ahead, though shaking like a spent race-horse, and with every

timber straining and creaking. Now, thrown broadside on, her side was

remorselessly battered by the floe pieces; then, tossed by the sea over

ice-block after ice-block, she seemed like a plaything in the grasp of

an irresistible power. For some hours this severe trial of strength and

fortitude endured; then the storm subsided as rapidly as it had arisen,

and their gratitude for their own escape was mingled with joy at the

safety of the _Dorothea_, which they could see in the distance,

still afloat, and with her crew in safety.

On Captain Parry’s second expedition, in 1822, his ships, the

_Hecla_ and the _Fury_, were placed in a position of scarcely

less danger.

Thus we read of the _Hecla_, which at the time had been made fast

by means of cables to the land-ice, that a very heavy and extensive

floe caught her on her broadside, and, being backed by another large

body of ice, gradually lifted her stern as if by the action of a wedge.

The weight every moment increasing, her crew were obliged to veer on

the hawsers, whose friction was so great as nearly to cut through

the bitt-heads, and ultimately set them on fire, so that it became

requisite to pour upon them buckets of water. At length the pressure

proved irresistible; the cables snapped; but as the sea was too full of

ice to allow the ship to drive, the only way in which she could yield

to the enormous burden brought to bear upon her was by leaning over the

land-ice, while her stern at the same time was lifted clean out of the

water for fully five feet.

Had another floe backed the one which lifted her, the ship must

inevitably have rolled broadside over, or been rent in twain. But the

pressure which had been so dangerous eventually proved its safety; for,

owing to its increasing weight, the floe on which she was carried burst

upwards, unable to resist its force. The _Hecla_ then righted, and

a small channel opening up amid the driving ice, she was soon got into

comparatively smooth water.

On the following day, shortly before noon, a heavy floe, measuring

some miles in length, came down towards the _Fury_, exciting the

gravest apprehensions for her safety. In a few minutes it came in

contact, at the rate of a mile and a half an hour, with a point of the

land-ice, breaking it up with a tremendous roar, and forcing numberless

immense masses, perhaps many tons in weight, to the height of fifty or

sixty feet; whence they again rolled down on the inner or land side,

and were quickly succeeded by a fresh supply. While they were compelled

to remain passive spectators of this grand but terrific sight, being

within five or six hundred yards of the point, the danger they incurred

was twofold: first, lest the floe should swing in and serve the ship in

the same unceremonious manner; and, secondly, lest its pressure should

detach the land-ice to which they were secured, and cast them adrift

at the mercy of the tides. Fortunately, neither of these terrible

alternatives occurred, the floe remaining stationary for the rest of

the tide, and setting off with the ebb when the tide soon afterwards

turned.

The reader must not imagine that an ice-field is a smooth and uniform

plain, as level as an English meadow; it is, on the contrary, a

rugged succession of hollows, and of protuberances called “hummocks,”

interspersed with pools of water, and occasionally intersected by

deep fissures. In many parts it can be compared only to a promiscuous

accumulation of rocks closely packed together, and piled up over the

extensive dreary space in great heaps and endless ridges, leaving

scarcely a foot of level surface, and compelling the traveller to

thread his way as best he can among the perplexing inequalities;

sometimes mounting unavoidable obstructions to an elevation of ten, and

again more than a hundred feet, above the general level.

The interspaces between these closely accumulated ice-masses are filled

up to some extent with drifted snow.

Now, let the reader endeavour to form a definite idea of the scene

presented by an ice-field. Let him watch the slow progress of the

sledges as they wind through the labyrinth of broken ice-tables,

the men and dogs pulling and pushing up their respective loads, as

Napoleon’s soldiers may have done when drawing their artillery through

the rugged Alpine passes, or Lord Napier’s heroes when they scaled

the steep Abyssinian heights. He will see them clambering over the

very summit of lofty ridges, where no gap occurs, and again descending

on the other side, the sledge frequently toppling over a precipice,

sometimes capsizing, and sometimes breaking.

[Illustration: AMONG THE ICE-HUMMOCKS.]

Again: he will see the adventurous party, when baffled in their attempt

to cross or find a pass, breaking a track with shovel and handspike;

or, again, unable even with these appliances to accomplish their end,

they retreat to seek an easier route. Perhaps they are fortunate enough

to discover a kind of gap or gateway, and upon its winding and uneven

surface accomplish a mile or so with comparative ease. The snow-drifts

sometimes prove an assistance, but more frequently an obstruction;

for though their surface is always hard, it is not always firm to the

foot. Then the crust gives way, and the foot sinks at the very moment

when the other is lifted. But, worse than this, the chasms between the

hummocks may be overarched with snow in such a manner as to leave a

considerable space at the bottom void and empty; then, when everything

looks auspicious, down sinks one of the hapless explorers to his waist,

another to the neck, a third is “lost to sight,” the sledge gives way,

and all is confusion worse confounded! To educe order out of the chaos

is probably the work of hours; especially if the sledge, as is often

the case, must be unloaded. Not unfrequently it is necessary to carry

the cargo in two or three loads; the sledges are coming and going

continually; and the day is one “endless pull and haul.”

Dr. Hayes speaks of an ice-floe, crested with hummocks, and covered

with crusted snow, the solid contents of which lie estimated, in round

numbers, at 6,000,000,000 of tons, its depth being about one hundred

and sixty feet. All around its border was banked up a kind of rampart

of last year’s ice, the loftiest pinnacle of which rose fully one

hundred and twenty feet above the sea-level. This ice-tower consisted

of blocks of ice of every shape and size, piled one upon another in the

greatest disorder. Numerous other towers, or bastions, equally rugged,

though of less elevation, sprang from the same ridge, and from every

part of this desolate area; and “if a thousand Lisbons were crowded

together and tumbled to pieces by the shock of an earthquake, the scene

could hardly be more rugged, nor to cross the ruins a severer task.”

We must date the origin of a floe like this back to a very remote

period. Probably it was cradled, at the outset, in some deep recess of

the land, where it remained until it had accumulated to a thickness

which defied the summer’s sun and the winter’s winds. Then it would

grow, as the glacier grows, from above; for, like the glacier, it is

wholly composed of fresh ice--that is, of frozen snow. Thus it will be

seen, to quote Dr. Hayes once more, that the accumulation of ice upon

the mountain-tops is in nowise different from the accumulation which

takes place upon these floating fields, where every recurring year

marks an addition to their depth. Vast as they are to the sight, and

pigmies as they are compared with the inland Mer de Glace, yet, in all

that concerns their growth, they are truly glaciers, dwarf floating

glaciers. That only in this manner can they grow to so great a depth

will at once be conceded by the reader, if he recollects that ice soon

reaches a maximum thickness by direct freezing, and that its growth

is arrested by a natural law. Necessarily, this maximum thickness

varies according to the temperature of the locality: but the ice is

in itself the sea’s protection. The cold air cannot absorb the warmth

of the water through more than a certain thickness of ice, and that

thickness attains a final limit long before the winter has reached its

close. The depth of ice formed on the first night is greater than that

formed on the second; on the second is greater than on the third; on

the third greater than on the fourth; and so it continues, until the

increase no longer takes place. In other words, the ratio of increase

of the thickness of ice is in inverse proportion to the duration of the

period of freezing. There comes a time when the water beneath the ice

no longer congeals, because the ice-crust above it protects it from the

action of the atmosphere. Dr. Hayes asserts that he never saw an Arctic

ice-table _formed by direct freezing_ that exceeded eighteen

feet; and he justly adds, that were it not for this all-wise provision

of the Deity,--this natural law, as our men of science term it,--the

Arctic waters would, ages ago, have been solid seas of ice to their

profoundest depths.

Having said thus much about the various forms which the ice assumes

in the Polar seas,--about their icebergs and ice-fields, pack-ice and

drift-ice, and the thick belt of ice which surrounds their shores,--we

may now direct the reader’s attention to their Animal Life; to the

creatures which inhabit them, walrus and seal and whale, the fishes,

the molluscs, and even minuter organisms.

And first we shall begin with the Walrus, which finds a congenial home

in the Arctic wildernesses.

Walrus-hunting is the principal, or at all events the most lucrative,

occupation of the Norse fishermen, who annually betake themselves to

the cheerless shores oi Spitzbergen in search of booty. Their life is

a terribly hard and dangerous one; and Mr. Lamont, who has had much

experience of them, observes that they all have a restless, weary

look about the eyes,--a look as if contracted by being perpetually in

the presence of peril. They are wild, rough, and reckless; but they

are also bold, hardy, and enduring of cold, hunger, fatigue; active

and energetic while at sea, though sadly intemperate during their

winter-holiday.

The vessels engaged in the seal-fishery and walrus-hunting are fitted

out by the merchants of Tromsöe and Hammerfest, who have, of late

years, adopted the system of sharing their proceeds with their crews,

thus giving them a direct interest in the prosperity of the expedition.

The ship is fitted out and provisioned by the owners, who also advance

to the men what money they may require to purchase clothing and to make

provision for their families during their absence. Then they allot

one-third of the gross receipts of the adventure to the crew, dividing

it into shares, three for the captain, two for the harpooneer, and one

each for the common men. So that if a fairly successful voyage should

realize in skins, blubber, and ivory a sum of two thousand dollars, and

the number of hands amounts to ten, the usual strength of a seal-ship’s

crew, each will receive forty-seven and a half dollars, or about

£10,--a very considerable sum for a Norwegian.

Each ship carries a couple of boats, and a walrus-boat, capable of

holding five men, which measures twenty-one feet in length by five feet

beam, having her main breadth at about seven feet from the bow. She

is bow-shaped at both ends, and so built as to turn easily on her own

centre, besides being strong, light, and easy to row. Each man plies

a pair of oars hung in “grummets” to stout thole-pins; the steersman

directs the boat by also rowing a pair of oars, but with his face to

the bow; and as there are six thwarts, he can, if necessary, sit and

row like the others. By this arrangement the strength of the men is

economized, and the boat is more swiftly turned when in pursuit of the

walrus.

The steersman also acts as harpooneer, and, of course, sits in the bow.

The strongest man in the boat is usually placed next to him, to hold

and haul in the line when a walrus is struck, and it is his duty to

hand the harpoons and lances to the harpooneer as required.

[Illustration: HUNTING THE WALRUS.]

Each boat--which, by the way, is painted white, so as to resemble

the ice amongst which it moves--is usually provided with three

harpoon-heads inside the bow, on each side: these fit into little racks

of painted canvas, so that their keen points and edges may not be

blunted, and to prevent them from injuring the men. The harpoons serve

equally well for seal and walrus, and, simple as they seem and are,

answer admirably the purpose for which they are designed. The weapon

is thrust into the animal; its struggles tighten the line; the large

outer barb then catches up a loop of its tenacious hide, or the tough

reticulated fibres containing its blubber; while the small inner barb,

like that of a fish-hook, prevents it from being detached or loosened.

When a walrus has been properly struck, and the line hauled taut, it

rarely escapes. To each harpoon a line of twelve or fifteen fathoms

long is attached: a sufficient length, as the walrus is seldom found

in water more than fifteen fathoms deep; and even if the water should

exceed that depth, it cannot drag the boat under, because it is unable

to exert its full strength when subjected to the pressure of twelve or

fifteen fathoms of water.

Besides the harpoons, each boat is provided with four or five enormous

lances; the shaft being made of pine-wood, nine feet long, and one

inch and a half thick at the handle, increasing upwards to a thickness

of two inches and a half where it enters the iron socket. This would

seem a formidable weapon, and formidable it is in the stout hands of

a Norse harpooneer; yet, frequently, the iron shank is bent double,

or the strong shaft snapped like a reed, in the violent resistance of

the sea-horse; and, therefore, to prevent the head being lost, it is

fastened to the shaft by a double thong of raw seal-skin, tied round

the shank and nailed to the handle for about three feet up. The shaft

may seem of disproportionate length, but it is necessary to give the

buoyancy sufficient for floating the heavy iron spear if it should fall

into the water. This spear, or lance, is not used for seals, because it

would spoil the skins.

Notwithstanding the destruction effected by the yearly expeditions

of the walrus-hunters, the sea-horses are still found in large herds

in many parts of the Polar world. Mr. Lamont describes a curious and

exciting spectacle, where four large flat icebergs were seen to be so

closely packed with these animals that they were sunk almost level with

the water, and presented the appearance of “solid islands of walrus!”

The walrus lay with their heads reclining on one another’s backs and

hind-quarters, just as rhinoceroses lie asleep in the dense shade

of the African forests, or, to use a more commonplace but familiar

comparison, as hogs slumber and wallow in a British farmyard.

Such a sight was a temptation not to be withstood by a walrus-hunter,

and Mr. Lamont and his harpooneer speedily disturbed the repose of

the monsters, which chiefly consisted of cows and young bulls. After

slaying their victims, and getting them on board, came the disagreeable

but necessary task of separating the blubber from the skins to stow it

in the barrels; a process which is performed in the following manner:--

Across the ship’s deck, immediately aft the hatchway, is erected a

kind of framework or stage of stout timber, about four feet in height,

but sloping down at an angle of about sixty degrees, with the deck at

the forward side: on the other side it is perpendicular, and there the

two _specksioneers_ (or “blubber-cutters”) post themselves, clad,

not in armour, but in oil-skin from top to toe, and armed with large

keen knives, curved on the edge. Then the skins are hoisted out of the

hold, and, two at a time, are suspended across the frame, with the

blubber side uppermost: the fat, or blubber, is next removed by a kind

of _mowing_ motion of the knife, which is held in both hands, and

swayed from left to right. Only long practice, and great steadiness of

wrist, can give the dexterity requisite for the due performance of this

difficult operation. Even in skinning a walrus, skill is imperative.

As the blubber is mown off, it is divided into slabs, weighing twenty

or thirty pounds each, and flung down the hatchway, where two men are

stationed to receive it, and pack it into the casks, which when full

are securely fastened up.

The skin, which is taken off the animal in two longitudinal halves, is

a valuable commodity, and sells at the rate of from two to four dollars

per half skin. The principal purchasers are the Russian and Swedish

merchants, and its principal uses are for harness and sole leather. It

is also twisted into tiller ropes, and employed to protect the rigging

of ships from friction. The blubber is valued on account of the oil;

but neither has the walrus so much blubber, in proportion to its size,

as the seal, nor does the blubber afford so good an oil. A seal of 600

lbs. will carry 200 to 250 lbs. weight of fat; an ordinary walrus,

weighing 2000 lbs., will not carry any more.

The most profitable portion of the unfortunate sea-horse is its tusks,

which are composed of very hard, dense, and white ivory. This ivory

is not so good, and consequently does not command so high a price,

as elephant ivory, but is in high repute for the manufacture of false

teeth, chessmen, umbrella handles, whistles, and other small articles.

The tusks are not an extra pair of teeth, but a development and

modification of the canines. For about six or seven inches of their

length they are solidly set in the mass of hard bone which forms the

animal’s upper jaw. So far as they are imbedded in the head they

are hollow, but mostly filled up with a cellular osseous substance

containing much oil; the remainder of the tusk is hard and solid

throughout.

The young walrus, or calf, has no tusks in its first year of existence;

but in its second, when it is about the size of a large seal, it has a

pair of much the same size as the canines of a lion. In the third year

the tusks measure about six inches in length.

In size and shape they vary greatly, according to the animal’s age and

sex. A good pair of bull’s tusks, says Mr. Lamont, will be twenty-four

inches each in length, and four pounds each in weight; but larger

and heavier specimens are of frequent occurrence. Cows’ tusks, it is

said, will average fully as long as those of the bulls, because less

liable to be broken, but seldom weigh more than three pounds. They are

generally set much closer together than the bull’s tusks, sometimes

even overlapping one another at the points; while those of the bull

will often diverge as much as fifteen inches.

In scientific language the walrus, morse, or sea-horse (_Trichecus_),

belongs to a genus of amphibious mammals of the family _Phocidæ_,

a family including the well-known seals. It agrees with the other

members of that family in the general configuration of the body

and limbs, but distinctly differs from them in the head, which is

remarkable,--as we have seen,--for the extraordinary development of

the canine teeth of the upper jaw, as also for the protuberant or

swollen appearance of the muzzle,--due to the size of their sockets

and the thickness of the upper lip. This upper lip is thickly set with

strong, transparent, bristly hairs, which measure about six inches in

length, and are as thick as a crow-quill. The terrific moustache, with

the long white curving tusks, the thick projecting muzzle, and the

fierce and bloodshot eyes, give _Rosmarus trichecus_ a weird and almost

demoniacal aspect as it rears its head above the waves, and goes far

to account for some of the legends of sea-monsters which embellish the

Scandinavian mythology.

[Illustration: THE WALRUS, OR MORSE.]

The walrus has no canine teeth in the lower jaw. Its incisors are

small, and ten in number; six in the upper and four in the lower jaw.

The molars, at first five on each side in each jaw, but fewer in the

adult, are simple and not large; their crowns are obliquely worn. The

nostrils would seem to be displaced by the sockets of the tusks; at

least they both open almost directly upwards at some distance from the

muzzle. The eyes are small, but savage; there are no external ears.

The Arctic walrus is the sole known species of the genus. It is a

gregarious animal, always assembling in large herds, which occasionally

leave the water to take their rest upon the shore or on the ice; and it

is at such times the hunters chiefly attack them, since their movements

_out_ of the water are very laborious and awkward.

[Illustration: A WALRUS FAMILY.]

They defend themselves against their enemies, of which the Polar bear

is chief, with their formidable tusks; and these they also use in their

fierce combats with one another. They fight with great determination

and ferocity, using their tusks much in the same manner as game-cocks

use their beaks. From the unwieldy appearance of the animal, and the

position of its tusks, an inexperienced spectator would suppose that

the latter could be employed only in a _downward_ stroke; but, on

the contrary, it turns its neck with so much ease and rapidity that it

can strike in all directions with equal force...

[Illustration: FIGHT BETWEEN WALRUS AND A POLAR BEAR.]

Old bulls very frequently have one or both of their tusks broken;

which may arise either from fighting or from using them to assist in

scaling the rocks and ice-floes. But these broken tusks are soon worn

down again and sharpened to a point by the action of the sand, as the

walrus, like the elephant, employs its tusks in digging its food out

of the ground,--that is, out of the ocean-bed. Its food principally

consists of starfish, shrimps, sandworms, clams, cockles, and algæ; and

Scoresby relates that he has found the remains of young seals in its

stomach.

[Illustration: BOAT ATTACKED BY WALRUS.]

In reference to the gradual decay, or, more correctly speaking,

extermination of the walrus, the following particulars seem to be

authentic.

When the pursuit of the walrus was first systematically organized from

Tromsöe and Hammerfest, much larger vessels were employed than are

now in vogue; and it was usual for them to obtain their first cargo

about Bear Island early in the season, and two additional cargoes at

Spitzbergen before the summer passed away. This regular and wholesale

slaughter drove away the sea-horse herds from their haunts about Bear

Island; but even afterwards it was not a rare occurrence to procure

three cargoes in a season at Spitzbergen, and less than two full

cargoes was regarded as a lamentable mishap. Now, however, more than

one cargo in a season is very seldom obtained, and many vessels return,

after four months’ absence, only half full.

It is estimated that about one thousand walrus and twice that number of

bearded seals (_Phoca barbata_) are annually captured in the seas

about Spitzbergen, exclusive of those which sink or may die of their

wounds. Some idea, therefore, may be formed of the number of sea-horses

which still ride the waves of the Polar seas. But it is quite clear

that they are undergoing a rapid diminution of numbers, and also that

they are gradually withdrawing into the inaccessible solitudes of the

remotest North.

We learn from the voyage of Ohthere, which was undertaken ten centuries

ago, that the walrus then abounded even on the very coast of Finmarken.

They have abandoned that region, however, for some centuries, though

individual stragglers were captured up to within the last forty years.

After their desertion of Finmarken, they retreated to Bear Island;

thence they were driven to the Thousand Islands, Hope Island, and

Ryk-Yse Island; and thence, again, to the banks and skerries to the

north of Spitzbergen. It is fortunate for the persecuted walrus that

the latter districts are accessible only in open seasons, or perhaps

once in every three or four summers; so that they obtain a respite and

time to breed and replenish their numbers. Otherwise the end of the

present century would mark also the total extinction of the walrus on

the island-shores of Northern Europe.

We agree with Dr. Kane that the resemblance of the walrus to man has

been absurdly overstated. Yet the notion is put forward in some of our

systematic treatises, and accompanied by the suggestion that we are

to look for the type of the merman and mermaid in this animal. If we

look we shall not find. The walrus has a square-shaped head, with a

frontal bone presenting a steep descent to the eyes, and any likeness

to humanity must exist in the imagination of the spectator. Some of

the seals exhibit a much greater resemblance: the size of the head,

the regularity of the facial oval, the drooping shoulders, even the

movements of the seal, remind us impressively of man. And certainly,

when seen at a distance, with head raised above the waves, it affords

some justification for the fanciful conception of the nymphs of ocean,

the mermaids who figure so attractively in song and legend.

Dr. Kane remarks that the instinct of attack, which is strong in

the walrus, though so feeble in the seal, and is a well-known

characteristic of the pachyderms, is interesting to the naturalist,

as assisting to establish the affinity of the walrus to the latter.

When wounded, it rears its body high out of the water, plunges heavily

against the ice, and strives to raise itself upon the surface by means

of its fore-flippers. As the ice gives way under its weight, its

countenance assumes a truly ferocious expression, its bark changes to a

roar, and the foam pours out from its jaws till it froths its beard.

Even when not excited, the walrus manages its tusks bravely. So strong

are they that they serve as grappling-irons with which to hold on to

the surface of the steep rocks and ice-banks it loves to climb; and

thus it can ascend rocky islands that are sixty and a hundred feet

above the sea-level. It can deal an opponent a fearful blow, but it

prefers to charge, like a veteran warrior; and man, unless well armed,

often comes off second best in the contest.

Governor Flaischer told Dr. Kane that, in 1830, a brown walrus--and the

Eskimos say that the brown walrus are the fiercest--after being speared

and wounded near Upernavik, put to flight its numerous assailants, and

drove them in fear to seek help from the Danish settlement. So violent

were its movements as to jerk out the harpoons that were launched

into its body. The governor slew it with much difficulty after it had

received several rifle-shots and lance-wounds from his whale-boat.

[Illustration: FIGHT WITH A WALRUS.]

On another occasion, a young and adventurous Innuit plunged his

_nalegeit_ into a brown walrus; but, alarmed by the savage

demeanour of the beast, called for help before using the lance. In

vain the older and more wary hunters advised him to forbear. “It is a

brown walrus!” they cried; “_Aúvok-Kaiok_! Hold back!” Finding the

caution disregarded, his only brother rowed forward, and hurled the

second harpoon. Almost instantaneously the infuriated beast charged,

like the wild boar, on the unfortunate young Innuit, and ripped open

his body.

Here is a description of a walrus-hunt:--

On first setting out, the hunters listen eagerly for some sounds by

which to discover the habitat of the animal. The walrus, like amateur

vocalists, is partial to its own music, and will lie for hours enjoying

the monotonous vocalization in which it is accustomed to indulge.

This is described as something between the mooing of a cow and the

deepest baying of a mastiff; very round and full, with its “barks”

or “detached notes” repeated seven to nine times in rather quick

succession.

The hunters hear the bellow, and press forward in single file; winding

behind ice-hummocks and ridges in a serpentine approach towards a group

of “pond-like discolorations,” recently frozen ice-spots, which are

surrounded by older and firmer ice.

In a few minutes they come in sight of the walrus. There they are, five

in number, rising at intervals through the ice in a body, and breaking

it up with an explosion which sounds like the report of heavy ordnance.

Conspicuous as the leaders of the herd are two large and fierce-looking

males.

Now for a display of dexterity and skill. While the walrus remains

above water, the hunter lies flat and motionless; when it begins

to sink, behold, the hunter is alert and ready to spring. In fact,

scarcely is the tusked head below the water-line before every man is in

a rapid run; while, as if by instinct, before it returns all are prone

behind protecting knolls of ice. They seem to guess intuitively, not

only how long it will be absent, but the very point at which it will

reappear. And, in this way, hiding and advancing by turns, they reach

a plate of thin ice, scarcely strong enough to bear a man’s weight, on

the very brink of the dark pool in which the walrus are gambolling.

The phlegmatic Eskimo harpooneer now wakens into a novel condition

of excitement. His coil of walrus-hide, a well-trimmed line of many

fathoms length, lies at his side. He attaches one end to an iron barb,

and this he fastens loosely, by a socket, to a shaft of unicorn’s horn;

the other end is already loosed. It is the work of a second! He has

grasped the harpoon. The water eddies and whirls; puffing and panting,

up comes the unwieldy sea-horse. The Eskimo rises slowly; his right arm

thrown back, his left hanging close to his side. The walrus looks about

him, and throws the water off his crest; the Eskimo launches the fatal

weapon, and it sinks deep into the animal’s side.

Down goes the wounded _awak_, but the Eskimo is already speeding

with winged feet from the scene of combat, letting his coil run out

freely, but clutching the final loop with a desperate grip. As he runs,

he seizes a small stick of bone, roughly pointed with iron, and by

a swift strong movement thrusts it into the ice; he twists his line

around it, and prepares for a struggle.

The wounded walrus plunges desperately, and churns the ice-pool into

foam; meantime, the line is hauled tight at one moment, and loosened

the next; for the hunter has kept his station. But the ice crashes;

and a couple of walrus rear up through it, not many yards from the

spot where he stands. One of them, a male, is excited, angry, partly

alarmed; the other, a female, looks calm, but bent on revenge. Down,

after a rapid survey of the field, they go again into the ocean-depths;

and immediately the harpooneer has chosen his position, carrying with

him his coil, and fixing it anew.

Scarcely is the manœuvre accomplished before the pair have once more

risen, breaking up an area of ten feet in diameter about the very spot

he left. They sink for a second time, and a second time he changes his

place. And thus continues the battle between the strength of the beast

and the address of the man, till the former, half exhausted, receives a

second wound, and gives up the contest.

The Eskimos regard the walrus with a certain degree of superstitious

reverence, and it is their belief that it is under the guardianship of

a special representative or prototype, who does not, indeed, interfere

to protect it from being hunted, but is careful that it shall be hunted

under tolerably fair conditions. They assert that near a remarkable

conical peak, which rises in the solitudes of Force Bay, a great walrus

lives all alone, and when the moon is absent, creeps out to the brink

of a ravine, where he bellows with a voice of tremendous power.

The walrus-hunter, unless he keeps to the sea-shore, and the ice-floes

within reach of a boat, must be prepared to undergo many hardships, and

to confront with a calm heart the most baffling and terrible dangers.

He may be overtaken by a gale; and a gale in the wild remote North,

far from any shelter,--a gale which drives before it the blinding snow

and pitiless icicles,--a gale which sweeps unresisted and irresistible

over leagues of frozen snow,--a gale which comes down from the

mountain-recesses where the glaciers take their rise,--is something so

dread, so ghastly, that the dweller in temperate regions can form no

idea of it.

We remember that one of the gallant seekers after Franklin describes

an Arctic gale, and its effects. He says that the ice, at a short

distance from the shore, had in many places been swept bare of snow by

the driving blast; and over the glassy sheet he and his companions were

helplessly carried along before the gale. The dogs, seldom stretching

their traces, ran howling in front of the sledges, which pressed upon

their heels.

Wild was the scene, and dark. The moon had sunk far behind the

snow-shrouded mountains, and the travellers had no other light than the

shimmer of stars. The deep shadows of the cliffs, towering a thousand

feet above their heads, lay heavily upon them, and enhanced the

midnight gloom. The patches of snow clinging to the sharp angles of the

colossal wall; the white shroud lying on its lofty summit; the glaciers

which here and there protruded through its clefts, brought out into

striking relief the blackness of its cavernous recesses. The air was

filled with clouds of drift, which sometimes completely hid the land,

and swept relentlessly before the explorers, as they tottered across

the frozen plain.

Suddenly a dark line became visible across their path; its true nature

revealed by circling wreaths of “frost-smoke.” “_Emerk! emerk!_”

(Water! water!) shouted the drivers, checking as suddenly as possible

the headway of the sledges, but not until the party were within a few

feet of a recently opened and rapidly widening crack,--a fissure in the

ice-crust, already twenty feet across.

Some of the travellers now clambered to the summit of a pile of

hummocks, and endeavoured to pierce the obscurity. A headland, laid

down on the map as Cape Alexander, lay only a few miles in advance. The

ice in the shallow bay on its southern side was rent in all directions;

while beyond, from the foot of the cape, a broad sheet of water

extended westward. The wind diversified its dark surface with ridges

of snowy spray; while here and there a frosty surf tumbled in breakers

over a small berg or drifting floe. The pieces of ice lying along its

margin were in motion, and the crash of their hard surfaces could be

heard as they came into constant collision. Their strident clamour, the

ceaseless washing of the surface, the moaning of the wind, the steely

rush of the drift, the piteous wail of the dogs, and all the strange

noises and voices of the storm, added to the gloom and awful melancholy

of that moonless night.

We need not wonder that the Eskimos of the Arctic wilderness are as

fearful of a tempest as are the Bedouins of the African desert. It

overwhelms the one with a cloud of snow, and it buries the other in a

cloud of sand; and each demands and receives its quota of victims.

That seal-hunting should be more extensively pursued than

walrus-hunting is natural; for if less exciting, it is also less

dangerous; and the seal is not only a more valuable prey than the

walrus, but is more easily captured.

The Phocidæ are well represented in the Arctic waters. In Behring

Sea we encounter the sea-lion and the sea-bear; while from the Parry

Islands to Novaia Zemlaia extends the range of the harp seal (_Phoca

Grœnlandica_), the bearded seal (_Phoca barbata_), and the

hispid seal (_Phoca hispida_). The skins of all these species are

more or less valuable; their oil is much esteemed; and their flesh

supplies the wild northern tribes with one of their principal articles

of subsistence.

[Illustration: HERD OF SEALS, NEAR THE DEVIL’S THUMB, BAFFIN SEA,

GREENLAND.]

The structure of the seal is admirably adapted in every detail to an

aquatic life. It lives chiefly in the water, where its motions are

always easy and graceful; but it spends a part of its time in enjoying

the sunshine on ice-fields, open shores, rocks, and sandy beaches; and

the female brings forth her young on land.

The body of the seal is elongated, and tapers considerably from the

chest to the tail. The head has been compared to that of the dog; the

brain is generally voluminous. The feet are short, and little more than

the paw extends beyond the integument of the body; they are webbed, and

pentadactylous, or five-toed: the fore feet are set like those of other

quadrupeds; but the hind feet are directed backwards, with toes which

can be spread out widely to act as paddles. The tail is short.

The motions of the seal on land are constrained and peculiar. The

fore feet are but little used, and the body is thrown forward in a

succession of jerks produced by a contraction of the spine. Awkward as

this mode of progression seems, it is, nevertheless, exceedingly rapid.

The seal, however, never ventures far from the shore, and the moment it

is disturbed or alarmed it plunges into the water.

The physiognomy of the animal is in perfect accord with its character,

and expresses a considerable degree of intelligence combined with much

mildness of disposition. The eyes are large, black, and brilliant; the

nose is broad, with oblong nostrils; and there are large whiskers.

The seal has no external ears, but in the auricular orifices exists a

valve which can be closed at will, and protects the internal organism

from the water; the nostrils possess a similar valve. The body is

thickly garnished with stiff glossy hairs, very closely set against the

skin, and plentifully lubricated with an oily secretion, so that the

surface is always smooth, and unaffected by water. The teeth differ

in different genera, but in all are specially adapted for the seizure

of fish and other slippery prey, though the seals are omnivorous in

their habits, and will partake both of vegetable and animal food. There

are either six or four incisors in the upper, and four or two in the

lower jaw; the canines are invariably large and strong; and the molars,

usually five or six on either side, in each jaw, are sharp-edged or

conical, and bristle with points. The seal is fond of swallowing large

stones; for what purpose is not certain, but, probably, to assist

digestion.

Seals live in herds, more or less numerous, along the frozen shores of

the Arctic seas; and on the lonely deserted coasts they bring forth

their young, over which they watch with singular affection. They swim

with much rapidity, and can remain a considerable time under water.

They are migratory in their habits, and at least four species visit our

British waters. On the northern coasts of Greenland they are observed

to take their departure in July and to return again in September. They

produce two or three young at a time, and suckle them for six or seven

weeks in remote caverns and sequestered recesses; after which they take

to the sea. The young exhibit a remarkable degree of tractability;

will recognize and obey the maternal summons; and assist each other in

distress or danger. Many, if not all, of the species are polygamous,

and the males frequently contend with desperate courage for the

possession of a favourite female.

There is not much difference in the habits of the different genera

or species of the Phocidæ; but while the great Arctic seal dives

like the walrus, making a kind of semi-revolution as it goes down,

the common seal (_Phoca vitulina_), called by the hunters the

_stein-cobbe_, from its custom of basking on the rocks, dives by

suddenly dropping under water, its nose being the last part of its body

which disappears, instead of its tail.

The common seal has a very fine spotted skin, and weighs about sixty

or seventy pounds. It is much fatter, in proportion to its size, than

the bearded seal, and its carcass, consequently, having less specific

gravity, floats much longer on the water after death.

A third kind of seal found in the Spitzbergen seas is, probably, the

Phoca hispida, though the hunters know it only by the names of the

“springer,” and Jan Mayen seal. In the spring months it is killed in

large numbers by the whalers among the vast ice-fields which encircle

the solitary rocks of Jan Mayen Island.

Mr. Lamont observes that these seals, though existing in such enormous

numbers to the west, are not nearly so numerous in Spitzbergen as

the great, or even as the much less abundant common seal. They are

gregarious, which neither of the other varieties are, and generally

consort in bands of fifty to five hundred. They are extremely difficult

to kill, as during the summer months they very seldom go upon the

ice; they seem much less curious than the other seals, and go at

such a rapid pace through the water as to defy pursuit from a boat.

On coming up to breathe, these seals do not, like their congeners,

take a deliberate breath and a leisurely survey, but the whole troop

make a sort of simultaneous flying leap through the air like a shoal

of porpoises, as they go along, and reappear again at an incredible

distance from their preceding breathing-place. Hence the name of

“springers” given to them by the whalers.

[Illustration: THE COMMON SEAL.]

The Jan Mayen seal weighs from 200 to 300 lbs., and is described as the

fattest and most buoyant of the Arctic mammals.

We have spoken of seal’s flesh as an important article of subsistence

to the Eskimo tribes. Our Arctic voyagers and explorers have frequently

been glad to nourish themselves upon it, and speak of it as somewhat

resembling veal in flavour. Not once or twice, but several times, it

has saved the hardy pioneer of civilization from destruction, and the

discovery of a stray seal has been the means of preserving a whole

expedition.

There is a very striking incident of this kind in the narrative of

Dr. Kane. He and his party had reached Cape York on their way to the

Danish settlements, after their long but fruitless search for Sir John

Franklin. They were spent with fatigue, and half-dead from hunger. A

kind of low fever crippled their energies, and they were unable to

sleep. In their frail and unseaworthy boats, which were scarcely kept

afloat by constant bailing, they made but slow progress across the open

bay; when, at this crisis of their fortunes, they descried a large seal

floating, as is the wont of these animals, on a small patch of ice, and

apparently asleep,--a seal so large that at first they mistook it for a

walrus.

Trembling with anxiety, Kane and his companions prepared to creep down

upon the monster.

One of the men, Petersen, with a large English rifle, was stationed

in the bow of the boat, and stockings were drawn over the oars as

mufflers. As they approached the animal, their excitement became so

intense that the men could hardly keep stroke. That no sound might be

heard, Dr. Kane communicated his orders by signal; and when about three

hundred yards off the oars were taken in, and they moved on, stealthily

and silently, with a single scull astern.

The seal was not asleep, for he reared his head when his enemies were

almost within rifle-shot; and long afterwards Dr. Kane could remember

the hard, careworn, almost despairing expression of the men’s haggard

faces as they saw him move; their lives depended on his capture. Dr.

Kane lowered his hand, as a signal for Petersen to fire. M’Gorry,

who was rowing, hung, he says, upon his oar, and the boat slowly but

noiselessly forging ahead, did not seem within range. Looking at

Petersen, he saw that the poor fellow was paralyzed by his anxiety, and

was vainly seeking to find a rest for his gun against the cut-water of

the boat. The seal rose on his flippers, gazed at his antagonists for

a moment with mingled curiosity and alarm, and coiled himself for a

plunge. At that moment, simultaneously with the crack of the rifle, he

relaxed his huge bulk on the ice, and, at the very brink of the water,

his head fell helplessly on one side.

[Illustration: SHOOTING A SEAL.]

Dr. Kane would have ordered another shot, but no discipline could have

controlled his men. With a wild yell, each vociferating according to

his own impulse, they urged both boats upon the floes. A crowd of hands

seized the precious booty, and bore it up to safer ice. The men seemed

half crazy, they had been so reduced by famine. They ran over the floe,

crying and laughing, and brandishing their knives. Before five minutes

had elapsed, each man was sucking his streaming fingers or mouthing

long strips of raw blubber.

Not an ounce of this seal was wasted!

The intestines found their way into the soup-kettles without any

observance of the preliminary home-processes. The cartilaginous parts

of the fore-flippers were cut off in the _mêlée_, and passed

round for the operation of chewing; and even the liver, warm and raw

as it was, bade fair to be eaten before it had seen the pot. That

night, on the large halting-floe to which, in contempt of the dangers

of drifting, the happy adventurers had hauled their boats, two entire

planks of the _Red Eric_ were devoted to the kindling of a large

cooking-fire, and they enjoyed a bountiful and savage feast.

Such is an experience of Arctic life; of the hardships endured by the

heroic men who go forth to do the work of Science and Civilization.

Returning to the seals, we may remark that, according to a scientific

authority, the angle of weedy rock on which a phoca is accustomed to

rest with his family comes to be regarded as his property, and no other

individuals of his species are entitled to lay claim to it. Although

in the water these animals congregate together in numerous herds,

and protect and courageously defend one another, yet, when they have

once emerged from their favourite element, they regard themselves on

their own space of rock as in a sacred domicile, where no comrade has

a right to intrude on their domestic tranquillity. If any stranger

approach this family centre, the chief--or shall we call him the

father?--prepares to repel by force what he considers an unwarrantable

encroachment; and a terrible combat invariably ensues, which terminates

only with the death of the lord of the rock, or the compulsory retreat

of the intruder.

But a family never seizes upon a larger tract than it absolutely

requires, and lives peaceably with neighbouring families, from which it

is seldom separated by a greater interval than forty or fifty paces. If

compelled by necessity, they will even live on amicable terms at much

closer quarters. Three or four families will share a rock, a cavern, or

an ice-floe; but each occupies the place allotted to it at the original

apportionment, and shuts himself within it, so to speak, nor ever

meddles with individuals of another family.

[Illustration: THE OTARY.]

Our modern naturalists divide the Phocidæ into two distinct orders: the

_Phocæ_ properly so called, which have no external ears, but only

an auditory orifice on the surface of the head; and the _Otariæ_,

which are provided with external organs.

The remarks we have been making apply more particularly to the common

seal (_Phoca vitulina_), or small Spitzbergen seal, which

measures from four to five feet in length. The Greenland or harp

seal (_Phoca Grœnlandica_), to which we have already alluded,

is larger and fatter, and is distinguished by the changes of colour

it undergoes before it reaches maturity. We have also spoken of the

bearded seal (_Phoca barbata_), which sometimes attains a length

of ten feet, and is known, not only by its size, but its thick and

strong moustaches. The hooded seal (_Stemmatopus cristatus_) is

distinguished by the globular and expansible sac situated on the summit

of the head of the males. This species grows to the length of seven or

eight feet, and inhabits the waters of Newfoundland and Greenland.

The value of the seal to the Eskimo tribes will best be understood from

a description of the uses to which various parts of the animal are

applied in an Eskimo hut.

[Illustration: THE HOODED SEAL.]