True Tales of Arctic Heroism in the New World Part 12

Actually they were in desperate straits of hunger, for Tyson relates that in his igloo they ate greedily the refuse of the cooking-lamp oil.

Tookoolito turned into food and cooked pieces of dried seal-skin which had been set aside for repairing their clothing. Of this Tyson says: "It was so very tough it made my jaws ache to chew it."

Day after day, in storm and in calm, faithful Ebierbing kept the field, always hoping for success on the morrow. After thirty-six days of unsuccess he killed a seal in the open sea. Shot through the brain, the seal floated until he could be reached by that wonderful skin boat of the Eskimos--the kayak. Then land shot up into view to the southwestward, and all felt that they were saved.

The new year of 1873 opened in dreary form, with no game, and a dinner of two mouldy biscuit with seal entrails and blubber served frozen, as their fuel was gone. The improvident seamen had not only burned one boat, but even the boards under their sleeping-robes. Compelled at last by dire need, they now made a lamp from an old can and began to cook Eskimo-fashion. Most of the time the seamen pa.s.sed idly in their igloo, quarrelling and disputing. In their ill-clad, half-starved condition they suffered terribly from the severe and prolonged cold of January, during which the mercury was often frozen, with occasional temperatures seventy degrees below freezing. Hopes of relief were high when a bear was found near, and then came a feeling of despair when the animal escaped after injuring badly the two remaining dogs.

Affairs then went from bad to worse, and the utter disruption of the party was imminent, although Tyson used to the utmost his powers of command over the natives and of persuasion with the seamen. An unruly and mutinous member of the crew invaded Tyson's igloo, roundly abused the captain, and even threatened him with personal violence, well knowing that he was unarmed. The evil effects of such conduct was so plain to all that the culprit was forced by public opinion to make an apology for his actions and thus in a manner to strengthen Tyson's hands in the future.

After an absence of eighty-three days the sun returned on January 19, which gave new courage to the natives and increased chances of game.

When they killed a seal after many days of hunting, the starving seamen, almost crazy at the sight of food, dragged the animal into their own igloo and gave to the hunters only a small and unfair part of the meat and blubber. With difficulty Tyson was able to mollify the offended natives, by whom this injustice was the more felt as Tobias, one of Hans's babies, was quite sick and could not eat pemmican.

February opened with ten days of fruitless hunting, when Hans fortunately saw a seal thrust his head up through young ice far from the floe. Would he come again? Could he kill him at that distance, and was it possible to bring him in? While asking himself these questions, with his eyes intent on the air-hole, the nose and then the head of the seal rose slowly into view. On this shot might depend their lives, and with the care and slowness of the Inuit hunter, half-starved Hans, with steady hand and unerring aim, sent a bullet through the brain of the seal, paralyzing him and thus keeping the air in the seal's lungs and floating his body. As the thin new ice would not bear a man, Tyson solved the difficulty by putting Hans in his kayak and pushing him forward as far as could be done. With his paddle braced against rough bits of the floe and by squirming his body, Hans finally reached the seal, fastened a line to it, and worked his way back in the kayak.

With food failing again and the revival of the selfish spirit of every man for himself, Tyson's lot was hard and he knew not what would happen from day to day. Always quiet and cool, he spoke only when there was need, and never with harsh tones or angry words. He did not waste his force on matters of minor importance--an att.i.tude that carried weight in the end.

When almost in despair there came seal after seal, and scores of arctic dovekies, or little auks in winter plumage. Though each of the birds gave but four ounces of meat, they were welcomed both as a change of diet and as harbingers of coming spring. The seamen then listened to Tyson's advice and decided to eke out life on one meal a day, owing to the fast-vanishing stock of bread and pemmican.

Cape Mercy, in about 65 north lat.i.tude, was now in sight though forty miles distant. Some of the men were ready to heartlessly abandon the natives, owing to the smallness of the sole remaining boat, but Tyson said tactfully that all _could_ go (not _must_ go) when the water was ice-free. Preparations were made, the tent enlarged from spare canvas, the ammunition divided, etc., but ice conditions grew worse instead of better.

March opened with a violent storm, which kept all in their igloos save the indefatigable hunters. Then Ebierbing shot a monster harp seal about nine feet long, the largest that Tyson had ever seen, which gave about seven hundred pounds of its rich, nutritious meat and blubber. So delirious were the quite starved seamen that they rushed at the body, carved out pieces and ate them raw, soon being so frightfully besmeared with blood that they looked like ravenous brutes devouring their prey.

The heedless men, who turned to Tyson in all cases of dire distress, now ignored his advice not to eat the liver of the seal, and paid for their imprudence by fits of sickness, fortunately not fatal.

With a persistent, fatuitous belief that they would drift to Disco, the seamen were first aroused to the extreme seriousness of their situation by a most violent gale of sixty hours in which they barely escaped death. As has been said, their igloos were built near the centre of an enormous floe nearly a hundred feet in thickness and fifteen miles in circ.u.mference. When the storm began the sea seemed covered by floes of similar size and of equally unbreakable ice. The party again failed to have in mind the many insecure and dangerous icebergs which dotted the ice-plain that covered the sea. Throughout the first night the cracking and breaking of the floes sounded like the firing of heavy artillery and the explosion of high-powered sh.e.l.ls. Under stress of anxiety the men pa.s.sed the second night dressed and ready for the worst.

The howling of the gale, the snow-filled air making everything invisible, the recurring roar of the sea, the sound of splitting floes within a few yards of the igloos, and the awful moaning of the moving pack around them, with the steady grinding of colliding bergs, made it a night of horrors. With the gale ended they found themselves saved almost as by miracle, for though their igloos were safe in the centre of a tiny fragment of the great floe, its area was less than a hundred square yards. Surrounding them were hundreds of icebergs and huge floes of all sizes and shapes inextricably entangled and disrupted. Yesterday they could walk miles on their own floe, now they were confined to a floe-fragment.

Dangerous as was the gale it brought about their safety, for the open pack made seal-hunting more productive. The twenty-three seals which were killed during the succeeding two weeks gave needful food, revived their courage, and renewed their strength. Tyson then arranged to save for emergencies their little remaining bread and pemmican. As they were now off the entrance to Hudson Strait, on the breeding grounds of the seal, their safety as regards food seemed to be a.s.sured. But another gale brought fresh and unlooked-for disaster, for while they collided with a large iceberg without destruction they were driven far to the eastward, into the open ocean, where their floe was by itself away from the main ice, with only water in sight.

Tyson knew that separation from the icebergs and floes meant speedy death, and as soon as the sea calmed, April 1, he ordered the party to prepare for the abandonment of the floe. Many objected to leaving their comfortable igloos, with plenty of meat, to seek ice so far to the west that it could not be seen, but they finally obeyed Tyson's orders.

The short-sightedness of the seamen in burning a boat was now evident to all. There were nineteen persons to be crowded into a whale-boat intended for eight. Some of the selfish would have left the natives behind, for taking them meant the leaving behind of nearly all meat and other dead weights. Bread, pemmican, some ammunition, the tent, and sleeping-gear were put in the boat, and with a spirit of loyalty criticised by the seamen, Tyson took on board the desk and records of Captain Hall. If this man lived it would be with honor; if he died it should be with his self-respect. The fearfully overcrowded boat barely escaped swamping several times--saved only through Tyson's skilful seamanship. Some men were so alarmed that in panic they threw overboard seal meat to lighten the boat. Three days of unremitting labor brought them to a floe that seemed solid, which they occupied in face of bad weather.

They had barely put up igloos when an awful gale burst on them, and for four days it was a steady battle against death. Their floe began to crumble under pressure from other bergs, and Ebierbing's hut was carried off as the floe split. Seeking the centre of the ice they built a new igloo, which lasted for the night only. Next day the floe, caught between two giant bergs, burst with a mighty roar, splitting completely in two, the crack running through the floor of the igloo. They were left on a piece of ice so small that they could not make arrangements for all to lie down together. Everything was put into the boat, and all through the night they stood watch, half-and-half, ready to launch her at a moment's notice. Again the floe split while breakfast was being cooked in the tent, the crack running through the tent; the cook escaped but the breakfast fell into the sea. The tent was again pitched alongside the whale-boat. The tent could not shelter all the party, but by turns they got a little sleep.

About midnight there was heard a fearful crash, and, as Hans relates, "The ice which served us as a camping-place parted between the boat on which I slept and the tent. I jumped out to the other side, while that piece on which the boat was placed moved off quickly with Mister Maje [Meyer] who was seated in the boat, and we were separated from it by the water. Our Master [Tyson] asked the sailors to make a boat out of a piece of ice and try to reach it, but they refused. We had never felt so distressed as at this moment, when we had lost our boat. At last I said to my comrade [Ebierbing]: '_We must try to get at it!_' Each of us then formed an _umiardluk_ [a bad boat] out of a piece of ice, and in this way pa.s.sed to the other fragment. As now we were three men we could manage to put the boat into the water. On doing so Mister Maje [Meyer]

fell into the sea; Ebierbing pulled him up. Meanwhile the ice had screwed together, and we stood still. At this time night fell, and our companion who had been in the sea, now lying in the boat, was like to freeze to death. I said to my comrade that if he remained so he would really die. When I had spoken we asked him to rise, saying that if he remained he would perish. The first time he rose he tumbled down, but, after having walked a long time, he recovered. At daybreak we discovered our friends close by, and the ice joined together. They came to us and a.s.sisted us to drag the boat over to them."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "WE WERE NEARLY CARRIED OFF, BOAT AND ALL, MANY TIMES DURING THIS DREADFUL NIGHT."

From Tyson's "Arctic Experiences."]

The crucial trial on the evening of April 20 may best be realized from Tyson's graphic description: "Finally came a tremendous wave, carrying away our tent, skins, and bed-clothing, leaving us dest.i.tute. The women and children were already in the boat (Merkut having her tiny baby Charlie Polaris, Inuit-fashion, in the hood of her fur jacket), or the little ones would have been swept into watery graves. All we could do was to try and save the boat. All hands were called to man the boat--to hold on to it with might and main to prevent it being washed away. With our boat warp and strong line of _oogjook_ (seal) thongs we secured the boat to vertical projecting points of ice. Having no grapnels or ice-anchors these fastenings were frequently unloosed and broken, and we had to brace ourselves and hold on with all the strength we had.

"I got the boat over to the edge of our ice where the seas first struck, for toward the farther edge the gathered momentum of the waves would more than master us and the boat would go.... We were nearly carried off, boat and all, many times during this dreadful night. The heaviest seas came at intervals of fifteen to twenty minutes.... There we stood all night long, from 9 P. M. to 7 A. M., enduring what few, if any, have gone through and lived. Tremendous seas would come and lift up the boat bodily, and carry it and us forward almost to the extreme opposite edge of our piece.

"Several times the boat got partly over the edge and was only hauled back by the superhuman strength which a knowledge of the desperate condition its loss would reduce us to gave us. With almost every sea would come an avalanche of ice-blocks in all sizes, from a foot square to the size of a bureau, which, striking our legs and bodies, bowled us off our feet. We were black and blue with bruises for many a day.

"We stood hour after hour, the sea as strong as ever, but we weakening.

Before morning we had to make Tookoolito and Merkut [the women] get out and help us hold on too.... That was the greatest fight for life we had yet had. G.o.d must have given us strength for the occasion. For twelve hours there was scarcely a sound uttered save the crying of the children and my orders: '_Hold on! Bear down! Put on all your weight!_' and the responsive '_ay, ay, sir!_' which for once came readily enough."

These awful experiences past, they were rescued ten days later, off the coast of Labrador, by Captain Bartlett of the sealing-steamer _Tigress_.

They had lived on an ice-floe one hundred and ninety-six days and drifted fifteen hundred miles. Through G.o.d's providence they were restored to the world in health and without the loss of a life or even of a limb.

His work accomplished, the heroic sailor, Tyson, went back to the every-day things of life without parade or boastings, and in an humble position did well and contentedly the ordinary round of work.

In the difficult and dangerous arctic service herein told Tyson did from day to day what seemed his present duty as best he could without thought of self. Without other ambition than to save the lives of the men, the women, and the children whom Providence had intrusted to his charge, he did not seek but he found fame and good report. Let the youth of our great land note that this is but one of the many cases in our day and generation in which, as Tennyson sings:

"Let his great example stand, Till in all lands and thro' all human story The path of duty be the path of glory."

FOOTNOTES:

[14] See map, page 95.

[15] Of this situation Hans Hendrik, in his "Memoirs," written in Eskimo, says: "But especially I pitied my poor little wife and her children in the terrible snow-storm. I began thinking: 'Have I searched for this myself by travelling to the north? But no! we have a merciful Providence to watch over us.' At length our children fell asleep, while we covered them with ox-hides in the frightful snow-drift."

THE SAVING OF PETERSEN

"Only action gives life strength."

--RICHTER.

In 1875 the British arctic expedition steamed northward through Kane Sea in its attempt to reach the north pole. Its commander, Captain George S.

Nares, R.N., thought it prudent to insure a safe retreat by establishing a southerly base of operations where one ship should remain. Nares, in the flag-ship _Alert_, chose the dangerous and exposed winter quarters at Floeberg Beach, an open roadstead of the ice-clad Arctic Ocean at the northern entrance of Robeson Channel. The _Discovery_, under command of Captain S. F. Stephenson, R.N., was laid up at a sheltered anchorage in Lady Franklin Bay, more than a hundred miles to the southward of the _Alert_. An attempt to open communication between the two ships by sledge party failed in the autumn of 1875. With the return of the sun in 1876, after an absence of one hundred and fifty days, it became most important to establish communication with the _Discovery_ at the earliest moment. From the _Alert_ there was visible far to the eastward, on clear days, the mountains of northwest Greenland, which Nares wished Stephenson to explore instead of making a sledge trip to the Etah Eskimos to the south as originally planned. The heroic conduct of the officers attempting this journey and their success in saving the life of Petersen are set forth in this tale.

The efficiency of every army and of every navy of the world is known only by the final and supreme test of active service in war, but it is plain that the essential attributes to success--skill, solidarity, and devotion to duty--are acquired in times of peace. Nowhere are greater efforts made to cultivate these admirable qualities than in the royal navy of Great Britain, the most formidable of the world.

Among its chiefs is the second naval lord, whose duties lie especially with the hearts of oak, the men behind the guns, whose courage and skill are the very soul of the service. The second naval lord has in charge the manning and officering of the war-ships; he plans the bringing together at a special place and in a given time the mighty dreadnoughts, the tiny torpedo-boats, the swaying submarines, and the swift destroyers; and he sees that gunnery, marksmanship, and other special training are up to the highest mark. Such a lord should, above all, be a man among men--one inspiring confidence both by knowing when and how times of peril should be met and also through having himself done such service in earlier life.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Robeson Channel and Lady Franklin Bay.]

Such is the life history of Admiral Sir George Le Clerc Egerton, who, pa.s.sing from a high sea command to duty as the naval aid to his majesty the King, rose a few years since to this lofty station and a.s.sumed its important duties. Great as may be the respect and high as can be the admiration of the world for efficient performance of public duties by officials of high station, yet the hearts of sympathetic, tender-hearted men and women are more deeply moved whenever and where-ever they hear a tale of self-sacrifice and of heroic comradeship. Such is the story of this great naval lord, enacted by him as a sub-lieutenant far from the civilized world, on the ice-bound coast of a desolate arctic land, for the safety of an humble dog driver. The n.o.bler the heart the greater is its sense of duty to helpless dependents in deep distress. And more heroic was the work of Lieutenant Egerton, flying his sledge flag, "_Tanq je puis_ (All that I can)," than any done under his stately flag as a naval lord or as admiral of the fleet.

When Captain Nares looked longingly southward from his ship on the Arctic Ocean, wishing in his heart for word of his a.s.sistant, he was not blind to the dangers and difficulties of the journey. The preceding September gallant Lieutenant Rawson with strength and courage had pressed on to Cape Rawson. The precipitous cliffs there made a farther journey by land impossible, while the half-open sea was covered with a shifting, ever-moving ice-pack that made the ocean as impa.s.sable for a boat as the ice was for a sledge.

Now in late winter the surface of Robeson Channel was covered by a solid, unmoving pack, but the cold was so intense that it could be endured in the field only by men of iron. Day after day the temperature was eighty degrees below the freezing-point, and even when it should moderate the travelling party must be carefully chosen. Rawson was to go as a pa.s.senger, for his ship was the _Discovery_ to which he was now to return. Of all available officers Egerton seemed to have physical and mental qualities that promised well. Naturally the dog driver--for they were to travel with a dog-sledge--would have been Eskimo Frederick. In this emergency Niels Christian Petersen offered his services, claiming that his arctic experiences and powers of endurance fitted him for such a journey. A Dane by birth, his years of service in Greenland had made him a skilled dog driver, and experiences with Dr. Hayes in his expedition of 1860 had made him familiar with field service. A vigorous man of forty years, he seemed the best of the three sledgemen for stanch endurance in such ice and weather.

Nares said in his letter of instructions: "In performing this duty in the present cold weather, with the temperature more than seventy-seven degrees below freezing, great caution is necessary." The date of departure was originally fixed for March 4, 1876, the day on which the retiring sun was first clearly seen above the southern hills at 11.30 A.

M. The cold was intense, being one hundred and one degrees below the freezing-point. Whiskey placed on the floe froze hard in a few minutes.

Egerton's departure was therefore postponed until the prolonged cold ended eight days later.

Meantime it was clear that such awful temperatures would seriously affect the dogs, who were suffering in short exercise marches from the action of the intense cold on the sharp, sand-like snow particles--all separate. Nares relates that in crossing the trails of the dogs near the ship he "noticed, lying on the floe, numerous frozen pellets of blood which always form between the toes of these animals when working during severely cold weather. The heat of the foot causes the snow to ball; this soon changes into ice, and collecting between the toes cuts into the flesh. On board of the _Resolute_ in 1853 we endeavored to fit our dogs with blanket pads on their feet, but these were found to increase the mischief by first becoming damp and then freezing, when the hardened blanket cut into the sinews at the back of the dogs' legs."[16]

On March 12, 1876, Petersen threw forward the long flexible lash of his Eskimo whip, calling sharply to the waiting dogs, and the party dashed off in a temperature of minus thirty degrees. Petersen, Rawson, and Egerton took turns on the sledge, one riding at a time. The others ran behind the sledge, holding fast each to one of the upstanders.[17]