C. A. Stephens

“ Shelving ledges rose up, terrace on terrace, into dark mountains, back two and three miles from the sea. The whole landscape seemed made up of water, granite, and ice. The black, leathern lichens added to the gloomy aspect of the shore-rocks, on which the waves were beating—forever beating—with sullen plashings. Terrible must be the aspect of this coast in winter. Now the hundreds of water-fowl wheeling over it, and enlivening the crags with their cries, softened its grimness. Farther along the shore-ledges Kit presently espied a black animal of some kind, and called our attention to it. ”

“ It shone on the sails; it shone on the sea. The great glassy faces of the swells cast it back in phosphorescent flashes. The patches of ice showed white as chalk. The ocean took a pale French gray tint. Overhead the clouds drifted in ghostly troops, and far up in the sky an unnatural sort of glare eclipsed the sparkle of stars. Properly speaking, there was no night. One could read easily at one o'clock. Twilight and dawn joined hands. The sun rose far up in the north-east. ”

“ Raed muttered.
We crept down toward the brink of the ledge, Kit and Wade a little ahead. Arriving at the crest, they peered over cautiously, and with muskets cocked.
"Here he is!" Kit whispered back of his hand.
We stole up. There, on a little bunch of ice not yet thawed off the shore, lay the unsuspecting monster,—a great brown-black, unwieldy body. There is no living creature to which I can easily compare it. ”

“ To the lovers of the awfully sublime, it would have been worth a journey around the earth. It seemed as if all the vast antagonistic forces of Nature had been suddenly confronted with each other. The schooner had been hove to in the lee of an ice-field engirdling one of [161] the smaller islets, with all sail taken in save the jib. Weymouth was at the wheel; the captain stood near him; Hobbs and Donovan were in the bow; Bonney stood by the jib-halliards. ”

“ The dogs howled and snarled viciously at us. Donovan cut at them with his oar right and left; while Raed, Kit, and Wade levelled their muskets at the horde of rushing, breathless savages, who seemed not to have seen us at all till that moment, so intent had they been after the negro. Discovering us, the front ones tried to pull up; and, those behind running up, they were all crowded together, shouting and screaming, and punching each other with their harpoons. ”

“ The aurora itself is miles above the fog, up in the sky and probably of the same bright yellow as usual; but the dense mist gives it this red hue."
"I've heard that the northern lights were caused by electricity," said Weymouth. "Is that so?"
"It is thought to be electricity passing through the air high up from the earth," replied Raed. "That's what the scientific men tell us."
"They can tell us that, and we shall be just as wise as we were before," said Kit. "They can't tell us what electricity is."
"Why!" exclaimed the captain, "I thought electricity was"—
"Well, what?" said Kit, laughing. ”

“ About ten we all lay down on our bear-skins, and, covering them over us, were soon comfortable. But, somehow, that night my head was full of dreams. I dreamed everything a fellow could well imagine, and a good many things no one ever could imagine awake. I went all over the stern experiences of the past two months. Again we were hunting bears in "Mazard's Bay." Again we were tossing amid the ice. At that stage of my fancies, the dogs probably got to fighting; for suddenly I was back on our desolate isle. It was mid-winter; cold! oh, how cold! The island was a mass of ice. ”

“ Raed said. "We must sit up, some of us, in future, to tend it."
Any thing like the dreary gloom of that morning I hope never to experience again. Sea, sky, and crags seemed all of one color,—lead. Seven or eight miles to southward, the mountains of the mainland (Labrador) showed their black bases under the fog-clouds. The great island to the south-east seemed to have been dipped in ink, so funereal was its hue.
The rain had frustrated our attempt at salt manufacture. We had to take our breakfast of fried goose in all the freshness of nature. ”

“ The idea of being caught here among these cliffs and icebergs in a three-days' fog or a north-east gale, with the whole fury of the Atlantic at our backs, was anything but encouraging. The advice of the elder navigators, "to seize a favorable day and get as far up the straits as possible," kept [49] recurring to our minds. The words had an ominous sound. They were the utterances of many a sad experience.
"There never could be a better day nor a fairer wind," remarked the captain.
"Now's our chance; I'm convinced of it," said Kit. ”

“ Wade sighed, and fell to softly whistling "Dixie."
"I suppose," said the captain as we got aboard, "that it will be too late to get into Hudson Bay farther this season."
"Yes," replied Raed: "we are all a little home-sick, I expect. Let's go home."
The boat was taken up, and the schooner brought round. The sails swelled out in the stormy wind. "The Curlew" stood away, down the straits.
"Adieu to Isle Aktok!" cried Kit, looking off toward the snowy island. "Our reign ends here; but no one can say that we have not been kings in our day." ”

“ We got into the boat,—eleven of us; about as many as could find room. Hobbs and Bonney lay back at the oars. Kit steered us up to the low ledges of the small island on the west side of the ice-packed arm, where the bears had been seen. We landed, and pulled the boat up after us. No danger from the tide at this time of day. The captain and Raed led off, climbing over the rocks, and following along the jam of ice, which was piled considerably higher than the shore of the arm. Palmleaf, jolly as a darky need be, kept close behind them. ”

“ After breakfast, Kit and I went up to the top of the ledges overlooking the straits to the north, east, and west, to see if we could discover any vessels. Some of us used generally to make our way up here every four or five hours to take a long look. For an hour we sat gazing off on the heaving expanse, flecked white with ice-patch, and bounded far to the north by a low line of black mountains. ”

“ Round and round the huts they went, all snarling and snapping at the wounded one. Presently out rushed old Shug-la-wina and Twee-gock with their whips, shouting "Eigh, eigh!" and laying about them. The ends of the thongs cracked like pistol-shots. The hair and hide flew up from the dogs' backs. As fast as one got a crack, he would leap up and run off, licking at the spot. How the boys laughed!
[288] "That's a savage weapon!" exclaimed Wade. "I should about as lief take a shot from a revolver as one of those 'cracks' on my bare skin. ”

“ A minute later, Raed had out a "ten-pounder;" and, having once begun to bite, they kept at it, until the deck grew lively with their frantic leaping.
"Got all we want!" cried the skipper, after about an hour of this sort of thing. "There's a good two hundred weight of them.—Here, Palmleaf, pick 'em up, dress 'em, and put 'em in pickle: save what we want for dinner.—Now, you Donovan and Hobbs, bear a hand with those buckets. Rinse off the bulwarks, and wash up the deck."
"This is the kind of sport they have on a cod-fisher every day, I suppose," said Raed. ”

“ One gets used to any thing, every thing. "Use is second nature," says an old proverb. It is more than that: it is Nature herself.
Land and ice, ho!
"Tumble out!" shouted Raed.
It was half-past three. We went on deck. The sun was shining brightly. Scarcely any wind; sea like glass in the sunlight; ice in small patches all about.
"Where's your land?" asked Wade.
"Off there," replied young Hobbs, pointing to the north-west.
Ah, yes! there it was,—a line of dark gray cliffs, low in the water. Between us and them a dozen white icebergs glittered in the sun.
"Is that the cape, captain?" queried Kit. ”

“ It might have been four seconds, though it seemed longer, when we saw the ice fly up rapidly in three or four places half a mile from the schooner as the ball came skipping along, and, bounding off the edge of the ice-field, plunged into the sea with a sullen sudge, throwing up a white fountain ten or a dozen feet high, which fell splashing back. We all felt immensely relieved.
"That didn't come within three hundred yards of us," said Kit.
"They'll give her more elevation next time," said Wade. "I don't believe that was an Armstrong slug, though: it acted too sort of lazy." ”

“ The oomiak was then brought up close, and the foot of the stairs set inside the gunwale. The oomiak was about twenty-seven feet in length by six in width. Like the kayaks, it was covered with seal-skin; or perhaps it might have been the hide of the walrus. The framework was composed of both bone and wood tied and lashed together. This was the women's boat, and was rowed by them. The only man in it was a hideous, wrinkled old savage, who sat in the stern to steer.
"Two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve, and an odd one," counted Raed. "Invite 'em up, captain." ”

“ Kit then gave a hatchet to each man and each boy. Raed gave to Shug-la-wina an extra knife for one of his dog-whips, which he wished to keep for a curiosity; and Kit gave to little Twee-gock an extra knife and hatchet for the walrus-tusk dagger with which he had tried to stab him. The little dark chap was too much astonished at that to do anything but stare.
The boat was then sent back after a load of four-foot wood, and returned, bringing each one a stick. Nothing else seemed wanting to make the poor creatures regard us as objects worthy of worship. ”

“ Kit replied. "But I don't care: this is a force-put with us. We don't want to place ourselves in the power of those savages. Yet we need their assistance,—assistance for which we will repay them well when 'The Curlew' comes,—if it comes. Now, I say it is best for us, and will be better for them, to have them do as we want them to while we are on their island."
"In a word, you propose to make slaves of them," remarked Raed. "You mean to deprive them of their liberty." ”

“ Seriously, I have more fear for Weymouth and Donovan than for Wade. That is most always the way where there's hardship and suffering. Your great, strong, thoughtless fellow is the first to give out and fail up. You mark my words, now. If we have to undertake this journey, Weymouth and Donovan will be the first to sicken and fall behind. I don't believe they would ever get through it. But, after the first three days, Wade would lead us all. He will sort of rally and rise as the peril and hardship increase. ”

“ Now and then a faint scream from high aloft declared the passage of some lonely seabird; and the ceaseless swash and plash of the sleepless sea filled out in my mind a picture of home-sick misery. It is no time, or at least the worst of all times, to reflect on one's woes in the night when just awakened from dreams: better turn over and go to sleep again. ”

“ Jumping to the boat, we pulled round to "The Curlew." The sailors were watching for us, with a touch of anxiety on their rough, honest faces.
"Throw us a line!" shouted Capt. Mazard; "and bear a hand at those pike-poles to shove her off. We'll get clear of this iceberg as quick as we can. Something the matter with its insides: liable to bust, I'm afraid."
Catching the line, we bent to the oars, and, with the help of the men with the poles tugged the schooner off, and gradually towed her to a distance of three or four hundred yards from the berg. ”

“ Bonney was stationed at the wheel, and Corliss at the sheets. Old Trull stood by the howitzer. The rest of us took each a musket, and formed in line along the after-bulwarks. Palmleaf, who in the midst of these martial preparations had been enjoying a pleasant after-breakfast snooze, was now called, and bade to stand by Corliss at the sheets. His astonishment at the sight which the deck presented to his lately-awakened optics was very great; the greater, that no one would take the trouble to answer his anxious questions. ”

“ Why is it that a person standing near a gun—especially a heavy gun—can never see what execution is done during the first second or two? He may have his eye on the mark at the discharge, but somehow the report always throws his ocular apparatus out of gear. In a moment I espied one of the bears scrambling over an ice-cake. The other had already disappeared; or else was killed, and had fallen down some fissure.
"Man the boat!" exclaimed Raed. "I'm anxious to see the result of that shot! Bring up those muskets, Wade!"
"Who goes on the bear-hunt, and who stays?" cried the captain. ”

“ Could put you to the north pole in fifteen days with such a capful,—if there were no ice in the way," he added.
"We might soon be at Hudson Straits were this to hold," laughed Kit.
"Yes, sir," replied the captain. "Eight days would do it. But of course this is mere fine talk. You are not to look for any thing of the sort."
"We don't," said Raed. "But how long do you suppose it will take to work up there with ordinary weather?"
"Oh! well, for a guess, eighteen days,—anywhere from eighteen to twenty-five. Oughtn't to be over twenty-five with this schooner. Will sail thirteen knots on a wind." ”