North-Pole Voyages: Embracing Sketches of the Important Facts and Incidents in the Latest American Efforts to Reach the North Pole, from the Second Grinnell Expedition to That of the Polaris — John Shaqi
North-Pole Voyages: Embracing Sketches of the Important Facts and Incidents in the Latest American Efforts to Reach the North Pole, from the Second Grinnell Expedition to That of the PolarisMudge, Zachariah Atwell
History
North-Pole Voyages: Embracing Sketches of the Important Facts and Incidents in the Latest American Efforts to Reach the North Pole, from the Second Grinnell Expedition to That of the Polaris
Mudge, Zachariah Atwell
Arctic regions; Arctic regions -- Discovery and exploration -- American; Discoveries in geography -- American
Now came the fight between Myouk, the crafty, expert hunter, and a
strong, maddened, persistent walrus. Morton was the interested
looker-on, following the hunter like a shadow, ready, if it had been
wanted, to put in his contribution to the fight in the form of a
rifle-ball. When the walrus's head is above water, and peering
curiously around, the hunter is flat and still. As the head begins to
disappear in the deep he is up and stirring, and ready to dart toward
the game. From his hiding-place behind a projecting ice knoll the hunter
seems not only to know when his victim will return, but where he will
rise. In this way, hiding and darting forward, Myouk, with Morton at his
heels, approaches the pool near the edge of which the walruses are at
play. Now the stolid face of Myouk glows with animation; he lies still,
biding his time, a coil of walrus hide many yards in length lying at his
side. He quickly slips one end of the line into an iron barb, holding
the other, the looped end, in his hand, and fixes the barb to a locket
on the end of a shaft made of a unicorn's horn. Now the water is in
motion, and only twelve feet from him the walrus rises, puffing with
pent up respiration, and looks grimly and complacently around. What need
_he_ fear, the mighty monarch of the Arctic sea! Myouk coolly, slowly
rises, throws back his right arm, while his left arm lies close to his
side. The walrus looks round again and shakes his dripping head. Up goes
the hunter's left arm. His victim rises breast-high to give one curious
look before he plunges, and the swift, barbed shaft is buried in his
vitals! In an instant the walrus is down, down in the deep, while Myouk
is making his best speed from the battlefield, holding firmly the looped
end of his harpoon-line, at the same time paying out the coil as he
runs. He has snatched up and carries in one hand a small stick of bone
rudely pointed with iron; he stops, drives it into the ice and fastens
his line to it, pressing it to the ice with his foot.
Now commence the frantic struggles of the wounded walrus. Myouk keeps
his station, now letting out his line, and then drawing it in. His
victim, rising out of the water, endeavors to throw himself upon the
ice, as if to rush at his tormenter. The ice breaks under his great
weight, and he roars fearfully with rage. For a moment all is quiet. The
hunter knows what it means, and he is on the alert. Crash goes the ice,
and up come two walrusses only a few yards from where he stands; they
aimed at the very spot but will do better next time. But when the game
comes up where he last saw the hunter he has pulled up his stake and run
off, line in hand, and fixed it as before, but in a new direction. This
play goes on until the wounded beast becomes exhausted, and is
approached and pierced with the lance by Myouk.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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