New Hampshire Statesman

Dr. Kane and an Esquimaux after Seals.

" I started with Hans and five dogs, all we could muster from my disabled pack, and reached the Pinnacle Berg in a single hour's run. But where was the water ? where were the seals? The floes had closed, and the crushed ice was all that told of our intended hunting ground.

Ascending a berg, however, we could see to the north and west the dark cloud-stratus which betokens water. It ran through our old battleground, the Bergy Belt'—the labyrinth of our wandering after the frozen party of last winter. I had not been over it since, and the feeling it gave me was anything but joyous.

In a couple of hours we emerged upon a plain unlimited to the eye, and smooth as a billiard table. Feathers of young frosting give a plush like nap to its surface, and toward the horizon dark columns of frost smoke pointed clearly to the open water. The ice was firm enough: our experience satisfied us that it was not a very recent freezing. We pushed on without hesitation, cheering ourselves with the expectation of coming every minute to the seals, We passed a second ice-growth; it was not so strong as the one we had just come over, but still safe for a party like ours. On we went, at a brisker gallop, may be for another mile, when Hans sang out at the top of his voice: 'Pusey! pusey! seal. seal!' At the same instant the dogs bounded forward, and, as I looked up, I saw that we had passed upon a new belt of ice that was obviously unsafe. To the right, and left, and front, was one great expanse of snow-flowered ice. The nearest solid floe was a mere lump, which stood like an island in the broad white level. To turn was impossible; we had to keep up our gait. We urged on the dogs with whip and voice, the ice rolling like leather beneath the sledge runners; it was more than a mile to the lump of solid ice. Fear gave to the beasts their utmost speed, and our voices were soon hushed in silence.

The suspense, unrelieved by action or effort, was intolerable. We knew that there was no remedy but to reach the floe, and that everything depended upon our dogs, and our dogs alone. A moment's check would plunge the whole concern into the rapid tide-way. No presence of mind or recourse, bodily or mental, could avail us. The seals—for we were now near enough to see their expressive faces—were looking at us with that strange curiosity which seems to be their characteristic expression. We must have passed some fifty of them, breast high out of water, mocking us by their self-complacency.

This desperate race against fate could not last. The rolling of the tough salt water ice terrified our dogs, and when within fifty paces from the floe they paused. The left hand runner went through; our leader, "Toodlamick," followed; and in one second the entire left of the sledge was submerged. My first thought was to liberate the dogs. I leaned forward to cut poor Tood's traces, and the next minute was swimming in a little circle of pasty ice and water alongside him. Hans, dear good fellow, drew near to help him, uttering piteous expressions in broken English; but I ordered him to throw himself on his belly, with his hands and legs extended, and to make for the island by cogging himself forward with his jack knife. In the meantime—a mere instant—I was floundering about with sledge, dogs, and lines, in a confused puddle about me.

I succeeded in cutting poor Tood's lines, and letting him scramble to the ice—for the poor fellow was drowning me with his piteous caresses—and made my way for the sledge; but I found that it would not buoy me, and that I had no recourse but to try the circumference of the hole. Around this I paddled faithfully, the miserable ice always yielding when my hopes of a lodgment were greatest. During this process I enlarged my circle of operations to a very uncomfortable diameter, and was beginning to feel weaker after every effort. Hans, meanwhile, had reached the firm ice, and was on his knees, like a good Moravian, praying incoherently in English and Esquimaux; at every fresh crushing in of the ice he would ejaculate 'God!' and when I recommenced my paddling he recommenced his prayers.

I was nearly gone. My knife had been lost in cutting out the dogs, and a spare one which I carried in my trowsers pocket was so enveloped in the wet skins that I could not reach it. I owed my extrication at last to a newly broken team-dog, who was still fast to the sledge, and in struggling carried one of the runners chock against the edge of the circle. All my previous attempts to use the sledge as a bridge had failed, for it broke through to the much greater injury of the ice. I felt that it was my last chance. I threw myself on my back, so as to lessen as much as possible my weight, and placed the nape of my neck against the rim of the edge of the ice, and then with caution slowly bent my leg and placing the ball of my moccasined foot against the sledge, I pressed steadily against the runner, listening to the half-yielding crunch of the ice beneath. Presently I felt my head was pillowed by the ice, and that my wet fur jumper was sliding up the surface. Next came my shoulders; they were fairly on. One more decided push, and I was launched upon the ice and safe. I reached the ice-floe, and was frictioned by Hans with frightful zeal. We saved all the dogs; but the sledge, kayak, tent, guns, snow-shoes, and everything besides, were left behind. The thermometer at eight degrees will keep them frozen fast in the sledge till we can come and cut them out."