The Open Polar Sea: A narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States"Hayes, I. I. (Isaac Israel)
History
The Open Polar Sea: A narrative of a voyage of discovery towards the North pole, in the schooner "United States"
Hayes, I. I. (Isaac Israel)
Arctic regions; United States (Schooner)
Another Esquimau had seen a vessel drifting about in the
North Water among the ice, and finally it was sunk in the mouth of
Wolstenholme Sound. This was four summers ago. Another had seen the
same vessel, but the event had happened only two years before; while
still another had accidentally set fire to the brig and burned her up
where she lay in Van Rensselaer Harbor. No two of them gave the same
account. Indeed, one of them asserted quite positively that the vessel
had drifted down into the bay below, was there frozen up the next
winter, and he had there boarded her when on a bear-hunt. Kalutunah had
nothing positive to say on the subject, but he rather inclined to the
story of the burning.
Every object around me was filled with old associations, some pleasant
and some painful. I visited the graves of Baker and the jovial cook,
Pierre, and looked for the pyramid which Dr. Kane mentions as "our
beacon and their tomb-stone," but it was scattered over the rocks, and
the conspicuous cross which had been painted on its southern face was
only here and there shown by a stone with a white patch upon it.
[Sidenote: A DRIVE IN A GALE.]
On our homeward journey we camped again at Cairn Point, and made there
a long halt, as I desired to get another view, from a loftier position
than before. Jensen was fortunate enough to shoot a deer, and our weary
and battered dogs were refreshed with it. Thence to the schooner was
one of the wildest rides that I remember ever to have made. A terrible
gale of wind set upon us, and, with the thermometer at -52°, it carried
a sting with it. The drifting snow was battering us at a furious rate;
but the dogs, with their heads turned homeward, did their best, and the
thirty miles were made in three and a half hours.
CHAPTER XXV.
SENDING FORWARD SUPPLIES.--KALUTUNAH AS A DRIVER.--KALUTUNAH
CIVILIZED.--MR. KNORR.--PLAN OF MY PROPOSED JOURNEY.--PREPARING
TO SET OUT.--INDUSTRIOUS ESQUIMAU WOMEN.--DEATH AND BURIAL OF
KABLUNET.--THE START.
During the next few days the dog-sledges were going and coming between
the schooner and Cairn Point continually, carrying to the latter place
the stores needed for our summer campaign. The temperature still held
very low, and I did not deem it prudent to send out a foot party. I
knew by former experience how important it is for a commander to keep
inexperienced men under his own eye, for one frozen man will demoralize
a dozen, and a frosted foot is as contagious as the small-pox.
[Sidenote: KALUTUNAH CIVILIZED.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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