One portion of the cargo of the unfortunate _Kittywake_--and a very
important one it proved to be--was a pack of Yack or Eskimo sledge dogs.
Uncouth-looking rascals they are at the best of times, much given to
quarrelling and fighting among themselves, and by no means inclined to
be over-friendly to mankind.
With them came two native keepers, who professed to, and I dare say did,
know something about their uncouth pets, although their rule of the road
proved to be a rough one, as far as the dogs were concerned.
Fingal was at first inclined to regard these animals with extreme
distrust. He asked Claude, in his own way of speaking, whether he
mightn't begin the fun by charging the pack.
"I am sure, master," said Fingal, "I would soon make short work with one
or two of them."
"No," said Claude, holding up a warning finger; "you must never attempt
to molest them, Fingal; you will come to love them yet."
"I don't believe _that_," Fingal seemed to reply.
The dogs were taken on shore at once, and though the _Icebear_ was
anchored some little distance from the land, giving her plenty of room
to swing round, the row these animals made the first night seemed
unearthly. The men could not sleep, and roundly rated the new-comers.
Had the noise been a continuous one it would not have been so bad, but
it was not so. The deep, deep silence of the Arctic regions would be
allowed to remain unbroken for, say, the space of fifteen minutes, then
all at once such a chorus of barking, howling, and screaming arose as
only the pen of a Dante could describe adequately. This would continue
for five minutes, mingled with the cracking of the keepers' whips and
their wild shouting, then gradually the unearthly Babel of sounds would
die away, the men and officers on board would give sighs of relief and
go to sleep once more, only to be disturbed again in the same fashion
ere slumber had well sealed their eyelids.
"Frightful!" said Claude, next morning, at the breakfast-table; "I'll
put a stop to it."
"You'll be very clever if you do," said the surgeon.
"Don't go meddling near them with a whip, captain," Lloyd remarked.
"Poor Sanderson of ours got drunk one night, and went on shore with a
rope's end to settle, as he thought, a rumpus like what those beggars
made last night. He was never seen again."
"They killed him?"
"Yes, sir, and ate him afterwards, every bone of him. We never found a
vestige of him, except the soles of his sea-boots, and we couldn't bury
those in a Christian way, you know, so we were saved the trouble of a
funeral."
"Call the carpenter, steward," cried Claude. "Carpenter Jones," he
continued, when that worthy appeared, "build comfortable kennels for
those dogs half a mile from the spot where our shore quarters are going
to stand."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"To the lee of a rock, you know."
"Yes, sir."
And so the pack was soon disposed of, to the great satisfaction of every
one.
By the time, then, that the sun had set for the last time, and the long,
icy, Arctic winter had fairly commenced, the _Icebear_ and her gallant
crew were fairly settled in their winter quarters, and everybody felt as
happy and jolly as possible under the circumstances. Nor was their lot
to be despised, after all. Had they not every creature comfort that
heart could wish? Had not clever Dr Barrett found coals enough to keep
fires burning constantly--fires big enough to roast a whole bear or a
small ox, were they so inclined? Had he not also discovered a gold and
silver mine? Not that much had yet been taken out of it, to be sure.
But it gave them hope. Well, they had never a care, although it must
not be supposed they did not often think of home, for ah! the sailor
does.
To crown all, was there not a kind Providence above them whose eyes
could penetrate the darkness of even this dreary land, and watch over
them?
One thing, I believe, that contributed greatly to their happiness was
this, everybody seemed determined to do the best he could, not for
himself only, but for his shipmates as well.
They had built a house of general entertainment on shore. Also a store
for extra provision and other things, in case the ship might be
destroyed.
In the storehouse one or other of the Indian keepers always slept as
sentry, or rather on guard. Not that there was much fear of an attack
on the stores by bears, for most of them had gone south, and the others
were curled up asleep in caves and corners among the rocks. But Bruin
does _not_--in my poor judgment and experience--sleep all the winter
through. When the weather is milder, even to a few degrees, he awakes,
yawns, out-stretches himself, and goes for a turn round in the moonlight
and on the snow. He is but the ghost of his former self; like the ghost
of a bear revisiting scenes of a former existence. He stalks about,
shaking his mighty head, and looking as melancholy as a barn owl.
"How changed is everything!" he appears to soliloquise. "How dead and
drear! How hungry I am too. Shouldn't I like just one pawful out of
the back of a fine fat seal now. [Note 1.] Ah! I would eat a whole
seal, even the flippers, though there's not much on those, to be sure.
But, mercy on me, how cold it is! Bed's the best place, after all."
And away he trots.
But Mr Lloyd knew right well from experience what a hungry rascal like
this could do even in a single night.
"It isn't what they eat so much," he explained to Claude, "as what they
destroy. A bear will stave in the head of half a dozen casks of flour,
perhaps, before he comes to a barrow of beef. And that doesn't satisfy
him, for he argues that there may be something better in the other
casks, and goes clawing away like an evil spirit."
"Talking about spirits," put in the second mate, "he is a strict
teetotaller; he won't touch rum."
"Tins of _soupe-en-bouilli_, I suppose," said Claude, "would also defy
him."
"Not if he gets a tooth in one," replied Warren; "and as for sardines--
my conscience! sir, he _is_ fond of them; if once he tastes them he'll
swallow the boxes at a single bite."
"Boxes and all?" inquired Claude, laughing.
"Well, I never saw the empty boxes left about anywhere."
"Must be a capital tonic, anyhow!" said Dr Barrett; "but a rather
indigestible one."
There had been wood enough brought on purpose to build huts on shore--
simply rough planks. The house of amusement was a famous one. Built
with stone as to its chimney, and with wood, filled in with dry moss, as
to its walls. There was a capital fireplace, too, in it.
The general routine of the day was somewhat as follows--that is, when
there was any kind of bright star, or moonlight, or aurora gleams;
though these last were very intermittent, and, like some of our electric
lights, would go out without a moment's warning. There was breakfast at
eight; muster to prayers afterwards, on the upper deck, which was almost
entirely covered over.
Prayers are seldom more impressive than when repeated away out in the
middle of the boundless ocean, but there is even more solemnity in them
when heard amid the eternal silence of Greenland wilds. I don't think
there was one poor soul on board the _Icebear_ who would have missed
those morning prayers for anything.
Jack-the-Sailor is a rough stick, I must confess, and, as a rule, a very
jolly stick. Yet, nevertheless, he has his solemn moments, as well as
you, reader, who, maybe, never were afloat on blue water, have.
"I feels some sentences o' them prayers, that the captain reads, go kind
o' round my heart," said Chips one day down in the half-deck mess.
"That bit, for instance, `_O God, at whose command the wind blows, and
lifts up the waves of the sea and stills the raging thereof_.'"
"You hain't got the words what you might say altogether correct," said
Bos'n Bowman; "but, howsomedever, you've got the main thing, and that's
the sense."
"Well, Pipes," replied Chips, "you're more of a scollard than me."
"And," put in Spectioneer Wray, "there's that bit, you know, `_When we
gave up all for lost, our ship, our goods, our lives, Thou didst
mercifully look upon us, and wonderfully command a deliverance_.'"
"I've often found the truth of that," said Pipes. "So 'as most on us,"
said Chips, solemnly. "But," continued Pipes, "there's these words:
`_That we may return in safety to enjoy the blessings of the land_.'
Don't they bring old England up before your mind, with her green valleys
and flowery fields, and all that kind of thing, eh, maties?"
"Ay, and there's those as follows," said Chips, who was a married man
and hailed from Rotherhithe, "`_Enjoy the fruits of our labours_,' which
means, o' course, take the missus and the children to Margate for a
whole month."
After prayers, till "pipe for dinner," there were the various duties of
the ship to be carried on, and there was not an officer or man, from
Claude himself to little saucy Boy Bounce, who emptied the cook's ashes,
helped to clean the coppers, and attended to the aviary and the wants of
Fingal, who did not find something to do. Dinner and smoking done, if
the weather permitted, a pleasure party for the shore would be told off.
The doctor and his merry men could do but little exploring now, and his
mines lay some distance in the interior among the wild hills, and, from
its colour, the ore could not easily be worked by lamplight.
Sometimes for whole weeks the darkness would be intense [Note 2], then
the _Icebear's_ crew had to seek their pleasures indoors or on board the
ship. That house on shore was an incalculable boon to these forlorn
adventurers. It was devoted, not to games--these could be played on
board--but to music, dancing, acting, and to lectures. The musicians
were several, and therefore a by no means bad ship's band was formed.
Those, therefore, who could not play could listen; moreover, many of
those who could not play, could spin a yarn, dance, or sing.
The lectures were given by good Dr Barrett, whose gentleness and
thoughtfulness of the men had rendered him a very great favourite.
These lectures of his, although often on such abstract subjects as
chemistry, botany, geology, or astronomy, were always simple and always
interesting, and often amusing.
But there were games on the snow-covered ice--frolics we might call
them--invented by the men themselves, but none the less exhilarating on
that account. The sea about them might be as deep as the hills around
were high, but no fear could be entertained of any one falling through--
a band of elephants might have frolicked and floundered on it without
the least danger.
The snow in some places had been swept off the ice by the wind, leaving
it but a few inches deep. These were just the spots for a right roaring
game of genuine football. But there was another game, invented by Paddy
O'Connell, who was the life and soul of his mess, if not of the whole
ship. It was carried on among _deep_ snow, and was very amusing and
exciting.
Paddy called it "football." Well, it was "Irish football," for the only
man in the ship who could kick the thing a yard was gigantic Byarnie.
"It was as large as the biggest pumpkin ever you saw, and quite as big
as the largest," so said Paddy. You had to throw it to begin with, and
when you got it you had to run with it, and you did not run many yards
before you fell with half a dozen on top of you. But the cream of the
game lay in the fact that, however much light there might be, before you
had played many minutes you could not tell who was your opponent and who
not, everybody being as white as the dustiest of millers. When you were
struggling for the ball, it was just as likely as not that you were
trying to trip up a friend Besides, often when you got it, and could
have a fair shy, then, as you could not see well, what with the
uncertain light, and what with the powdery snow, you perhaps threw it
the wrong way. It was a rare game, and oh! did it not make you hungry!
No wonder that on returning on board you could eat a hot supper with all
the appetite of a Highland drover.
"Paddy," said Dr Barrett once, as he patted him on the back, "you're a
genius!"
"Thrue for you, sorr," says Paddy, "and it's just that same me mother
towld me. `Paddy,' says she, `you're a born ganious, and there ain't
the likes o' ye 'twixt Killarney and Cork.'"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. The shoulder of the seal is the bear's favourite tit-bit, and I
have seldom seen him eat more of Miss Phoca, when sport was good and
provisions (seal) plentiful--G.S.
Note 2. There are winters _and_ winters in Greenland. Sometimes for
two or even three months together the darkness is deep and depressing,
the whole country shrouded in a night that seems never-ending.