Title: My Northern Exposure: The Kawa at the Pole
Author: Chappell, George S. (George Shepard)
Language: English
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[Illustration: Dr. Walter E. Traprock and Snak]




 MY
 NORTHERN EXPOSURE

 THE _KAWA_ AT THE POLE

 BY
 WALTER E. TRAPROCK
 F.R.S.S.E.U., N.L.L.D.

 AUTHOR OF "THE CRUISE OF THE KAWA"

 WITH TWENTY-ONE FULL PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS

 G.P. PUTNAM'S SONS
 NEW YORK AND LONDON
 The Knickerbocker Press
 1922




 Copyright, 1922
 by
 G.P. Putnam's Sons

 Made in the United States of America

 [Illustration]




 DEDICATED

 TO

 IKIK, SNAK, YALOK, LAPATOK
 AND KLIPITOK

 (THE ONLY ESKIMOS I EVER LOVED)

 AND

 SAUSALITO




FOREWORD

BY

Irving T. Grosbeak, R.O.T.C.

AT DURFEE COLLEGE, XENIA, O.


For hundreds of years men have struggled amid snow and ice to reach
one or the other of the earth's poles. Why? What has attracted them?
What has been the lure which has led them from warm firesides and
comfortable radiators to suffer the rigors of a most annoying climate?

We search in vain among the writings of modern polar explorers for a
satisfactory answer to this question.

In earlier days we find credible reasons for this fanatical zeal,
reasons which were material and commercial. In the dark ages we know
that hardy Norsemen sought an Ultima Thule beyond the Arctic Circle.
The Irish also claim credit for the earliest discoveries. They would.
These voyages were mere forays undertaken with the hope of advantages
in barter and exchange. Following the establishment by Columbus of
the globular theory of earth formation we read, likewise, of many
futile attempts to reach the fabled wealth of India by short cuts and
northwest passages. The adventurous Cabots, fearless Frobisher and
gallant Gilbert were mainly occupied with material aims, the securing
of additional colonies for the crown, additional gold for the royal
treasury. They were out for the cush.

But when we turn to modern days in which the forbidding character of
the northland has been well understood we are more puzzled to find a
reasonable explanation for its fascination. We meet frequently that
strange phrase, "the lure of the North," which is later described
in terms of unspeakable hardships. We are told that this or that
expedition was undertaken in order "to add to the sum of human
knowledge" though that addition proves to be a series of tidal
observations and barometric readings which could have been arrived at
with sufficient exactness by scientific computations.

Moreover, without belittling the courage and determination of our
gallant Peary, it is evident that his exploit was not discovery in
its strictest sense. The pole had been located for centuries as
being the exact point of convergence of the meridional lines. Its
precise position was known. To reach it, then, was a problem in
transportation rather than one of actual discovery. This problem Peary
solved magnificently and since that memorable April 6th, 1909, the
flags of the United States, Delta Kappa Epsilon (Gnu Chapter), the
world's Ensign of Peace, the Navy League and the Red Cross have flapped
concertedly at the top of the world.

And yet the mystery has remained. We can not read the stories of these
brave men, from the most successful to the least, without wondering
what it was which actually drew them into the regions of eternal ice
and snow. We can but suspect some great, unrevealed truth, some untold
secret lying back of the veil of fog, shrouded in the darkness of the
long Arctic night.

May we not well ask, "Has the entire truth been told? has the last word
been spoken which will forever answer the natural question, why go
there?"

It has remained for Walter E. Traprock to answer that question in no
uncertain terms. The writer has no hesitation in saying that since the
perusal of Dr. Traprock's log the entire northern question has been
illuminated with perpetual sunshine.

It is not within the province of this foreword to go into details. The
reader can, at the close of this book, lay it down with the thought
that he knows the whole story of the North, the truth, the whole truth,
and a lot else.

But it would be wrong for us to lay our pen aside without a word
of explanation as to how the Traprock Polar Expedition came to be
undertaken, for the circumstances were at once so dramatic and unusual
as to warrant their preservation in definite form. In the spring of
1921, following Traprock's amazing discovery of the Filbert Islands,
a meeting of the Explorers Union of the United States was held in the
Federation Rotunda in Cambridge, Mass. The name of Traprock was in
every mouth and to many it was distinctly unpalatable. A three days
meeting resulted in the formation of the Traprock Polar Expedition.
One half of the necessary funds was supplied by the Federation, the
remainder being pledges by individuals.[1] But here is the dramatic
truth which has never before been stated.

THE FEDERATED EXPLORERS NEVER EXPECTED DR. TRAPROCK TO RETURN!

The entire expedition was a deliberate plot on the part of jealous
scientific men to forever remove from the field of action their most
brilliantly successful rival. How this dastardly effort failed is told
in the succeeding pages, which add fresh lustre to the crown, fresh
laurel to the brows of America's intrepid son, Walter E. Traprock.

A mere statement of the fact that the first condition of Traprock's
contract was that he should not only reach the Pole himself but that
he should take his ship there will indicate the handicaps which were
imposed from the start.

Did Traprock flinch or evade? Did he hesitate or shilly-shally?

Let the ice-bergs answer! Let the seals bark reply! Let the north wind
howl its answer.

Better still, let the testimony of Traprock be graved on the Palisades
of Time, that the world may know forever just exactly "Why Explorers
Leave Home!"

 Irving T. Grosbeak.
 Hall of Applied Ceramics,
 Durfee College, Xenia, O.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: All of these individual pledges are still
outstanding.--Ed.]




CONTENTS


  Chapter I

  The Origin of the Expedition. A memorable meeting.
  Inklings of a plot. My innocent enthusiasm. Our personnel.
  I put the proposition up to Triplett                           Page 17

  Chapter II

  Our triumphant departure. A man missing. Wigmore's
  gallant embarkation. The _Kawa_ herself. A new idea in
  construction. A few boresome details                           Page 31

  Chapter III

  The choice of a route. Off at last. We take aboard a
  passenger. Seeds of discontent. Into the long twilight.
  Radio reversals. The ice at last. Trouble with our
  water-line. Its happy solution                                 Page 55

  Chapter IV

  We reach the polar cap. The strange incident of the
  missing Orders. Who stole the papers? The Arctic
  summer. A sportsman's Paradise. Notes from my
  journal. Whinney's sad experience                              Page 79

  Chapter V

  The last ten miles. A mental observation. We lose our
  magnetic bowsprit. The Big Peg at last! "The Lady,
  first!" We celebrate our arrival. I glimpse a vision          Page 103

  Chapter VI

  Fatal procrastination. Our one-dimensional position. An
  extraordinary ornithological display. I confide in Swank.
  His plan. I capture my vision. The Klinkas. An embarrassing
  incident                                                      Page 131

  Chapter VII

  Still procrastinating. Our pastimes at the Pole. An
  exchange of love-tokens. Ikik's avowal. Caught in the
  embrace of the Aurora                                         Page 163

  Chapter VIII

  The Arctic Night. The temptation of Traprock. The
  pros and cons of falling. We solve an age-old riddle.
  Our Polar Christmas. The love-philtre. Abandonment            Page 181

  Chapter IX

  Sausalito's strategy. Orders must be obeyed. We turn
  southward. The parting. Mutiny and desertion. In the
  grip of the Ice King. A fight to the finish. Victory          Page 205

  Chapter X

  In home waters. The celebration in our honor. And
  what of my companions? Reveries and Recollections.
  The End                                                       Page 229




"_The Camera Cannot Lie_"

ILLUSTRATIONS


                                                                    PAGE
  Dr. Walter E. Traprock and Snak                           Frontispiece

  Triplett the Undaunted                                             23

  Un Déjeuner à la Bougie                                            35

  What the Well-dressed Explorer will Wear                           47

  The Big Hunting                                                    59

  The Two Bears                                                      71

  The Nine o'Clock Bottle                                            83

  Intensive Optimism                                                 95

  The Avowal                                                        107

  About to be Captured                                              117

  Something New in Dramatics                                        127

  After the Bath                                                    137

  Dinner is Served                                                  147

  A Far-off Fashion Plate                                           157

  A Nimrod of the North                                             167

  An Arch Archeologist                                              177

  The Battle on the Brink                                           187

  Ode to the Aurora                                                 197

  A Moment Musical                                                  209

  Dirty Work at the Igloo?                                          221

  A Consultation                                                    233

 Photographs by
 N. COURTNEY OWEN




MY NORTHERN EXPOSURE




Chapter I

  _The Origin of the Expedition. A memorable meeting. Inklings of a
  plot. My innocent enthusiasm. Our personnel. I put the proposition up
  to Triplett._




MY NORTHERN EXPOSURE




Chapter I


"Mush!"

The cry of command rang out on the frosty air.

"Mush!"

Again the surrounding ice echoed the word which seems, more than any
other, to tell the whole story of the North.

At its repetition, my sturdy followers hurled their bulks against the
trace-collars while a babel of exhortation shattered the silence.
"Let's go!" "We're off." "Attaboy!"

The Traprock Polar Expedition was on its way!

We had reached the edge of the great polar-pack. Those of my readers
whose knowledge of ice packs is limited to those which can be wrapped
in an ordinary hand-towel can, of course, form no impression of the
magnitude and desolation of the scene which lay before us. As far as
the eye could see....

But I am far north of my narrative. It would be an obvious injustice
to my companions and fellow-polarists to omit mention at this time of
the personnel of our extraordinary expedition, the most complete and
carefully organized that ever set out toward the Big Peg.

Let us go back, then, in memory to the eventful meeting of the
Explorers Union, held in Cambridge on Friday, April 1st, 1921. I can
see the picture with vivid distinctness, the shining bald-heads and
snowy crowns of the aged members, o'er arched by the larger but no more
dignified dome of the Rotunda itself, the bright spots of light on the
polished mahogany table, the swift fingered secretary, who had gorgeous
henna hair, I remember--I can see it all;--and I can hear clearly
the voice of old Dr. Waxman, the President, (whose exploits in the
Ant-Arctic will be well remembered,[2]) as he rose and said,

"Well then, gentlemen, it is settled. Traprock must go."

The company as one man echoed the President's remark.

"Traprock must go!"

With the sound of this verdict ringing in my ears I delivered a short
speech of appreciation. Little did I realize at the time the sinister
influences which had been at work to bring about the very result
which so filled my heart with pride. Little did I know that among the
men who sat by my side that evening sharing with me the hand and hip
of friendship, passing me an occasional peanut from the store which
the President was cracking with his gavel, little did I imagine that
among them were some to whom the words "Traprock must go" meant a far
different thing from what it did to me. But as old Tertullian has it,
"_Nemo me impune lacessit_"--"What you don't know won't hurt you"; and
so from a full heart I thanked them.

At the end of twenty minutes, President Waxman interrupted me to ask,
"When can you start?"

I heard one of the older members whisper, "Not 'when can he start?'
When can he stop?"

"Now." I answered with characteristic brevity, giving the whispering
member a look which he will never forget.

The meeting broke up forthwith. Before leaving the Rotunda, Adolph
Banderholtz, Secretary-for-Polar-Affairs of the Explorers Union (which
I shall hereafter refer to as the E.U.) handed me a typewritten list of
names.

"These are our nominations for the expedition," he said with
his shallow smile. "You will find them admirably equipped in their
respective departments. Good-bye."

  TRIPLETT THE UNDAUNTED

  Captain Ezra Triplett, the navigator of Dr. Traprock's metamorphic
  yawl needs no introduction to students of marine accomplishment.
  To lay-readers perhaps a brief preamble is in order. Born a
  not-too-simple son of New Bedford, Mass., Triplett has climbed the
  rope-ladder of success from cabin-boy to Captaincy, from poop-deck to
  mast-head. Gifted with uncanny nautical skill this Captain Courageous
  is equally at home on ice.

  Seldom if ever has the camera been more successful in catching the
  very soul of the sitter, who in this case is standing. But whether
  _assis_ or _debout_ Ezra Triplett is always master of the situation.
  The animals in the background are not dogs but Amoks, those wild
  vulpines of the North which have been trained by hand to obey their
  master's voice.

  The whip, coiled snake-like about the Captain's friendly artics, is
  an entirely superfluous emblem of authority, for this remarkable man
  achieves his results by the power of the human eye alone. In this
  connection it should be noted that Triplett is limited to a single
  optic. The one on the right as one faces the photograph is phony,
  the original having literally leaped out of its socket many years
  ago during an exciting kangaroo hunt. The eye, rolling away into the
  bush, was never recovered in spite of a handsome reward-notice in the
  Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide press. Thus Triplett lost not only the
  sight of the eye but the eye itself. What the Captain achieves with
  his single orb is nothing short of amazing and we have frequently
  seen him face-down such fearless fellow-men as George Jean Nathan
  merely by turning towards them _his blind_ eye.

  Both attitude and costume are superbly characteristic, the massive
  oak-timbered frame filling to repletion the bearskin jerkin with
  its practical one-man-top. As a protection for the nether limbs
  Triplett invariably wore light woolen pajamas with gee-string exits
  and entrances. This scant covering was ample even in the severest
  weather, owing to the fact that Triplett's own limbs are clothed with
  a heavy coat of natural fur which, in his own words, is "grown on the
  place."

[Illustration: Triplett the Undaunted]

He extended a limp hand which I hurt as much as possible by using a
peculiar grip taught me by an old swaboda in the Malay peninsula. He
went deathly white and faded from my view. I fear I do not always
realize my strength.

Banderholtz is one of the type of arm-chair explorers which I
particularly detest. Everything he does is superficial. In the early
days when airplanes were safer than they are now because they would
not rise more than six feet from the ground, he gained a great
reputation as a birdman on the strength of once having been up in a
captive-balloon in the Bois de Boulogne.

But this is no place for personal animosities. I caught the midnight
train to New York, rang for the Porter and insisted that my section
be un-made and a table furnished. Now that the matter was settled I
was burning with a desire to work out the details. All night I toiled
away, the click of my typewriter being the only sound except an
occasional curse from the occupants of nearby berths. An old gentleman
in upper-seven disturbed me somewhat with his snoring but gradually
the sound blended itself with the snorts of the sea-lions which I
was already hearing in imagination and I became oblivious to all
interruption. When the train pulled into Grand Central my preliminary
work was complete. My various lists, personnel, food, equipment,
scientific objects, etc. had all been sketched out. The remaining weeks
of April were devoted to the detail of complete organization, all of
which I attended to personally.

Since I have already spoken of the E.U. list of names, I may as well
dispose of the subject at this time. Quite naturally it was composed,
in the main, of scientific men, men famed each in his particular field.
I knew them by their works, and a casual glance at the list convinced
me that our expedition would compare with the best in its scientific
departments.

The first name was that of Warburton Plock, whose reputation in
anthropology, zoology and biology fitted him to size up and classify
any living thing. Plock's work on simians and femurae is the accepted
monkey-manual in most menageries. I shall never forget the impression
it made upon me the first time I read it.

The important studies of cartography, oceanography, topography and
kindred subjects were allotted to Elmer E. Miskin, of the E.U. library
forces. Miskin was what one might call a self-made explorer. He had
worked his way up from the bottom of the paper basket, through a long
course in filing and cataloguing. While a boy in the grade schools of
his native town of Peapack, N.J. he had shown early promise by winning
five consecutive gold stars in map-drawing and one of his prize-winning
creations with the Orange Mountains represented by caterpillars glued
on the cardboard now hangs behind the door of the Principal's office of
the Hooker Avenue School. This was his first experience in the field.

Three other names complete the E.U. list, Croyden Sloff, magnetician,
electrician and victrologist, Winchester Wigmore, snow- and ice-expert
and Bartholomew Dane, egyptologist.

It was with surprise that I saw the name of Warburton Plock. We had
met frequently in the old days when we used to gather round the keg at
the E.U. meetings and our feelings had always been antipathetic. But I
resolved that no fancied grudges should cloud the sky of our venture
and immediately wired Plock a cordial telegram saying, "Am counting on
your loyal support and hope I shall get it."

It is hardly necessary to say that my own selections for travelling
companions included my old friends Herman Swank, the artist, and Reg
Whinney, scientist, whose loyalty and devotion during my South Sea
travels have forged links of friendship which can never be broken.
Swank's enthusiasm at the prospect of actually painting the aurora
borealis from life was unbounded. He at once thought of his colleagues
in the colorful modern school. "I'll have them skinned a mile," he
cried.

Other men may possibly excel in special lines, but I am confident
that as an all-round scientist, Whinney can give them all cards and
spades. His fund of general information saved me thousands of dollars
for he combined several people in one. For instance he knew quite
enough about medicine to be our official doctor. As soon as he received
the polar invitation he set about studying polar diseases, snow
blindness, scurvy, chill-blains, frost-bite and so on. He was an expert
photographer and got results from a 3-1/4 × 4-1/4 Kodak that surprised
everybody including himself. He had also become keenly interested in
radiography and brought a complete outfit aboard with him, using his
own body as a spool upon which to coil his antennae until they could be
rigged in a proper manner. Most men have two sides, but Whinney had
at least a dozen. He combined many men in one. Way back in our college
days I recall that he was taken on the Christmas trip of the Glee Club
because he could play the banjo and he made the banjo-club because he
could sing. He wasn't good at either but he averaged well.

In addition to Swank and Whinney, I made another selection based on
painstaking thought. I asked my life-long friend, Sydney Freemantle
Frissell, to go along as recreationist and entertainer. Northern
expeditions, especially through the long hours of the Arctic night are
very dull affairs. Along about midnight, with morning three months
away, the party is apt to die. Then is when a man like Frissell is
invaluable. He has no brains whatever, but the most amazing vitality
and can wake up any assembly by sheer audacity. I deliberated a long
time as to whether to get Ed Wynn or Frissell, but finally decided in
favor of Frizzy as he could come and Wynn couldn't.

Needless to say, our Captain was the same staunch old oak-framed
navigator, Ezra Triplett, who had gotten the Kawa into so many tight
holes in the past.

"What ship?" he asked when I put it up to him.

"Kawa," I said.

"Done, by thunder," he roared.

Honest Ezra Triplett! Loyal, staunch friend, quaint, saturnine,
creature that he is.

"Doc," he said, "I'd like darn well to take one of my wives along.
It's gonter be kinder lonely up there in the ice with all you boys off
gunnin'."

I smiled indulgently at the old man's foibles.

"Which one do you want to take?"

"The gal from Sausalito," he explained. "I ain't seen her in about a
year, an' I'm gettin' kinder fed-up on ... you know ... Noo York."

I nodded. "We'll have to keep it secret. You know I've absolutely
forbidden it. She can join us at St. Johns and come aboard as wardrobe
woman. No one must suspect that she is your wife."

Triplett shifted his quid and slowly winked his false eye.

"She ain't," he said.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: "Ants of the Ant-Arctic" by W.W. Waxman, F.O.B.]




Chapter II

  _Our triumphant departure. A man missing. Wigmore's gallant
  embarkation. The Kawa herself. A new idea in construction. A few
  boresome details._




Chapter II


From her berth in the Harlem, the Kawa steamed, or to be more exact,
gasolined, to the landing stage of the N.Y.Y.C. station at the foot
of East Twenty-second St. Our progress had been one of triumph. Every
passing ship had hailed us by bell, whistle or horn, to which was added
the hoarse blare of sirens from the converted breweries which line the
banks. Gay stevedores threw their caps in the air and tossed lumps of
coal in our direction, surely a magnificent tribute with coal at its
present price. Street urchins shouted unintelligible remarks and all
manner of citizens joined in the usual riparian rites. Passing under
the stern of a United Fruit Company steamer, the cook waved a farewell
from his galley and dumped a bucket of potato peelings in our path.

Off Blackwell's Island the scene was particularly affecting, the
inmates giving me an appreciative greeting, the trusties rushing to
the sea wall and gazing longingly in my direction while those in
durance vile plucked off their shoes and beat upon the cell bars to
attract my attention. With my glasses, I thought I recognized one or
two familiar faces but I can not be sure. At any rate I feel certain
that their hearts went out to me even as mine went in to them, and I
could but paraphrase the remark of Dean Bullock, "There, but for the
Grace of God, is the whole Traprock Expedition."

  UN DÉJEUNER À LA BOUGIE

  The candle which Dr. Traprock presented to the beautiful Ikik as
  a love-token was generously shared by her with her co-wives. Its
  appeal, curiously, was entirely gustatory, the flavor of refined wax
  being a revelation to the native taste after their customary fare of
  seal-fat and fish-oil.

  Here we see the charming Yalok nibbling her share of the prized
  dainty. The candle shown is one of six, specially cast for Dr.
  Traprock by the Candlemas Club of Pittsburgh. Each one was designed
  to last a month and thus bring light into the Arctic night. The
  donors doubtless will be surprised and pleased at the knowledge that
  the heroic-size of their gift met with great appreciation though not,
  perhaps, in the way intended.

  "Evening after evening," says Dr. Traprock in a private letter to
  the editor, "the maidens sate about our Primus, passing the candle
  from hand to hand much as we pass a loving-cup, though with less
  reluctance. Each would nibble perhaps an inch from the coveted
  cylinder and then hand it to her neighbor, crying, 'Lapatok's turn!'
  or 'Klipitok's turn!' with the heartiest good-will imaginable."

  The eminent explorer adds in a later paragraph, "Yalok seemed the
  most greedily fond of the great taper and on one occasion narrowly
  escaped death from choking on the wick which became wound about her
  palate. Seeing her inordinate appetite for the strange food, Ikik
  gallantly ceded her share, but I solaced the latter by secretly
  giving her the beeswax tomato from my mending kit upon which she
  feasted in private with vast delight!"

  It is hard to imagine a more touching human sidelight than the above
  intimate incident. The Editor has forwarded a copy of Dr. Traprock's
  letter to the Candlemas Club where it is suitably framed and hung in
  the swimming-pool.

[Illustration: Un Déjeuner à la Bougie]

The reception at the Yacht Club station was a gay affair. It was
positively my first appearance upon any landing-stage. The efficient
steward had arranged an authoritative punch and many a hearty toast
was pledged and responded to with feeling. But we were soon on our way
again. My final orders sealed with the official-seal of the Explorers
Union, were placed in my hands by the venerable President, Waxman, who
was greatly affected at parting. He had been eating peanuts of which
he was passionately fond, and I recall that he thrust a few of them
into my hands after saying, "Traprock, we expect a great deal ..." he
choked, and was unable to complete his sentence.

At exactly two o'clock, on the flood tide, we backed out of the
pier and under Triplett's guidance worked our way sideways to
mid-channel. The steward at the Yacht Club dipped his colors and
fired a commodore's salute with his brass half-pounder to which I
replied in proper fashion, lining up the entire expedition at the
rail, eyes-right, while Triplett blew our Klaxon and shook a chain of
sleigh bells which Frissell had brought along "because they seemed so
northern."

It was during this lining-up process that I discovered that one man
was missing. It was Wigmore, the snow and ice expert, who had failed
to put in an appearance and I was greatly depressed by the fact which
seemed to me to be an evil omen. Moreover he was an extremely valuable
man with vast experience in alpine work as well as in the practical
phases of glaciology with which he came in contact in his work as
general-manager of the Higley Ice Cream Cone Co. But marine law is
rigid. We were due to sail at two sharp, Wigmore or no Wigmore, and we
sped off without him.

But my disappointment was to be almost immediately assuaged. When we
were about an eighth of a mile above the Canal Street bridge, the last
of the great arches which spans the river, Swank rushed up to me and
cried, "Look, look. There he is----!"

I followed the direction of his pointing finger. Sure enough, there
was Wigmore, a tiny speck, running along the center span of the
bridge. He was in full Alpine costume with rope, ax, pick and felt
hat, and I saw to my amazement that he was going to board us. With
the nimbleness of a chamois he scrambled over the railing, instantly
beginning a spider-like descent of his rope which he had hooked above.
Silhouetted against the sky I could see the curved feather in his cap,
a minute question mark. The question in my mind was one of hair-raising
anxiety. Would he make it, or not? Upon the answer seemed to depend
the whole success or failure of our venture. His descent was timed to
a nicety. Just as the Kawa plowed beneath him he gave a shake of his
body, loosening the fastening, and dropped lightly to the deck amid our
resounding cheers. Was it only in imagination that I saw the Goddess of
Liberty wave her gigantic, torch-bearing arm, as if she too felt the
thrill of a brave deed, nobly done?

"Bravo, Wigmore," I cried. "But what detained you?"

"My equipment, sir," he said, coming to attention. "They wouldn't let
me into my apartment. The clerk thought I was a line-man for the Edison
Company."

We all laughed heartily at the incident and settled down to
routine-life on ship-board. Our last farewell from the great port
of the Metropolis was from the Detention Ward on Ellis Island. The
Pesthouse band was out in full-force and blew germs into the air with
much enthusiasm, but Triplett had laid a course to windward so that we
felt no apprehension.

It is perhaps not amiss at this point to say something regarding the
highly important part played in our expedition by the Kawa herself. She
may be said, I think, to be the star of a distinguished cast, or more
accurately, that she divided stellar honors with me. For one of the
conditions which was part of my bargain with good old Waxman and his
associates was that I should actually take my ship to the Pole!

The expression on the faces of the worthy committee of the E.U. when I
accepted this astounding condition is something that I must leave to
the reader's imagination.

"Yes, gentlemen," I had said to them. "It can be done, and it will be
done. Either I hitch the Kawa to the Pole or I never return!"

My announcement was greeted with cheers.

Immediately upon my return from Boston I closeted myself with Captain
Triplett in the cozy nautical room of the Book-lovers Library and we
jointly went over the layout of the Kawa from stem to stern. We were
surrounded by files of drawings and a great mass of data upon naval
architecture with special reference to Arctic conditions. From the
outset I was imbued with a conviction that we should find nothing of
real importance in what had been done before. A careful study of my
predecessors convinced me that they had uniformly been on the wrong
track. What they had tried to do was to fight the ice. What I proposed
was to humor it.

The outstanding feature of such vessels as the Fram and the Roosevelt
was their rigidity. Their construction followed the general principle
of the onion, consisting of numerous layers of heavy oak sheathing
shored up from the inside with a veritable cob-web of balks, stanchions
and braces. In addition to this, the sides of these ships were shaped
so as to offer as small a vulnerable target as possible. The idea was
that the stupendous pinch and pressure of the ice-pack failing to get a
firm hold of the vessel should project her up from and out of the ice.
This idea is graphically illustrated by an ordinary, household orange
seed pinched sharply between the thumb and forefinger. But I could
not help smiling at the naive short-sightedness of these earlier men,
for, assuming as sometimes happened, that the constructive features
functioned as outlined, what then? The ship was merely lifted up until
she canted over at a ridiculous and uncomfortable angle where she lay
on the ice, a helpless and absurd spectacle. Further motion in any
direction was plainly impossible except at the whim of the floe itself
which often evinces a contradictory tendency to move southward instead
of northward as per schedule.

While not wishing to discard entirely the idea of elusive conformation
I saw at once that radical innovations would be necessary in order to
accomplish my object. In a word, I proposed to convert the Kawa into a
non-rigid type of vessel.

"Triplett," I said, during our first conference, "what is the
slipperiest animal you know?"

The ancient mariner scratched his head reflectively before replying.
"Seals."

"Right!" I cried. "Go to the seal, thou sluggard! Triplett, it's an
idea! We'll make the Kawa as easy to handle as a greased hot water
bottle."

For many days we worked over the plans and eventually began actual
operations on the Kawa herself, hauling her out for the purpose at
Tutbury's shipyard. She was completely eviscerated. Her oak ribs and
keel were removed and replaced by Austrian bent-wood, of the finest
temper. A thin layer of yew-planking was laid over her sides with
lapped, sliding joints, filled with elastic roofing-cement. Outside
of this came a second layer of slippery elm (3/8" × 2-1/2") laid
diagonally so that the joints crossed those of the yew. The entire
hull was then covered with seal-skin, fur side out. When she slid from
the ways on her re-launching the Kawa took the water as noiselessly
as a musk-rat, and it was with the greatest difficulty that we made
her fast as she slipped from the ship-wright's grasp at the slightest
pressure.[3]

"Gosh-t-a'mighty," grinned Triplett. "She's a seal!"

You may be sure I utilized Whinney's scientific ingenuity and it
is to him I owe two innovations which contributed greatly to our
success. One of these was the magnetic bowsprit, highly sensitized by
induction-coils run from the exhaust of our 20 h.p. Tutbury engine;
the other was the thermal water-line, the temperature of which could
be raised to 180 degrees by turning a switch which connected with our
storage batteries. Both of these inventions worked perfectly.

Thanks to the bowsprit the problem of steering our svelte craft, about
which Triplett had expressed some doubts, became a simple matter. Left
to herself she invariably came up into the north and as that was the
direction we wished to go all was well. The thermal water-line made
passage through all but the thickest ice comfortable and easy. For many
years the Kawa had had no water-line whatever so that we were uncertain
how she would behave. The new one consisted of a thin layer of copper
fastened to the elm siding, underneath the seal skin. I like to think
that the little Kawa behaved so nobly because she knew her water-line
was not visible.

Thus we arrived at a type of construction which gave us the strength
and elasticity of a water-tight basket. What we had lost in rigidity
we gained in feather-like lightness. Before her engines were installed
the Kawa floated on the surface like a toy balloon. When loaded, as she
usually was, she drew two-feet-six. The installation of the engine and
stowing of stores also had a tendency to stabilize the hull and keep
her masts pointing upward which was a distinct advantage.

In addition to these marine features it was necessary to consider the
eventuality of encountering solid, impenetrable ice in the region of
the pole, ice through which even the thermal water-line would not make
it possible for us to melt our way. Authorities agree that such ice may
be expected north of eighty-six, even though we planned to time our
arrival in that vicinity for mid-summer when, as is well known, the
weather is extremely hot. This is the fascination of Arctic travel; one
never knows what to expect. Our problem, then, was to make the Kawa
equally at home on the floe or in the open leads, a glorified sea-sled.
My previous experience with the various types of sledges convinced me
that for my purpose they were useless. My object was to take the Kawa
to the Pole. Then why not make the Kawa herself a sled?

I recognized instantly the feasibility of my scheme, which consisted of
folding guide-runners framed of carefully selected greenheart. When not
in use these runners extended horizontally along the counter, giving
my little craft a singularly bird-like appearance. Incidentally they
formed convenient luggage carriers similar to those attached to the
running boards of automobiles and, in fair weather, could be used as
piazzas or sleeping porches covered with a high pile of bear-skins to
make occupancy easy.

  WHAT THE WELL-DRESSED EXPLORER WILL WEAR

  Fine feathers do not make fine birds, but aigrettes are still forty
  dollars a stalk. Something of this thought evidently dominated the
  mind of Warburton Plock in the selection of his wardrobe. Plock, who
  is shown against a typically iglootinous background, was the only
  member of the expedition who paid no heed to his leader's advice in
  this regard, namely, to dress off-the-Eskimos. Instead of so doing
  he ordered his outfit built for him by Buskwa, the leading tailor
  of Nome. The garments were taken aboard at St. John's and formed a
  large part of Plock's luggage. They varied in design from a simple
  going-away suit to the most elaborate mufti, sports costume and
  evening dress.

  In the attached fashion-plate the fastidious explorer is clad in
  the well-known "Buskwa-model" morning suit, which is made from the
  pelts of unborn teddy bears. This, according to the wearer, is the
  super-correct thing for the Young-Man-About-the-Pole. The accessory
  cane and cigarette are personal touches calculated to attract the
  attention of whomsoever he may meet north of Eighty-six. Vanity, in
  the Great White Spaces as elsewhere, precedes a fall, but usually
  only by a step or so. To be fair to the house of Buskwa it should be
  stated that Plock's garments were invariably tastefully designed and
  well-made. No detail of findings or linings was slighted. They were,
  however, entirely unsuited to the rigors of Polar climate.

  The Buskwa trade is chiefly derived from the wealthier Chicoutimi
  families living along the Mad River and points South. To single out
  a single defect, the self-drawing fish-pockets are doubtless useful
  features to a people who spend many hours in the salmon streams. In
  the icy polar region the cold air naturally forced its way through
  the sartorial scuppers with the result that the wearer was soon
  forced to don another suit to avoid freezing. At the time of his
  attempted escape Plock was wearing his entire wardrobe, seven suits
  in all, which were recovered with the body of the fugitive. The
  clothes were later eaten by members of the return-party, who more
  than once had occasion to pay tribute to the tailor who had selected
  such delicious materials.

[Illustration: What the Well-dressed Explorer Will Wear]

Thus you have a fairly complete idea of my metamorphosed vessel,
adapted to meet any and all conditions.

But one word more, as to stores and equipment, and I will promise not
to bore my readers further with these deadly technical details, which
I fully realize have prevented the success of many a tale of Arctic
adventure. In making up my lists I was guided by a principle which I
have followed all my life, namely, that of taking with me only those
things for which a proper substitute could not be found in the high
latitudes. This simple thought I always practise in a restaurant, for
instance, where I never by any chance order anything which might be
served in my home. Just prior to leaving New York I heard a gentleman
ask for corned-beef hash in the Ritz! I could but pity him. Yet it is
this apparently trivial tendency which has sent many an expedition
off to the Arctic circle burdened with voluminous packs of furs and
crushing weights of supplies, all of which could be most easily secured
from the Eskimos themselves who, with the possible exception of the
Cambodians, are the most friendly people I have ever encountered.[4]

Our clothing then was of the lightest. We started our journey dressed
in plain business suits such as are worn by guides in the Canadian
wilderness, but stowed in our duffle-bags were ample quantities of
light underwear, both union and non-union, while included in my
personal kit were three pairs of medium-weight, woolen longs with
reinforced or sliding seats to make progress over the ice more easy.
For outer wear during the warm season we carried the conventional
tennis flannels and Palm-Beach suits and I am thankful to Swank for the
suggestion that we include the tropical helmets which had shielded us
so faithfully in the Filberts. They proved of inestimable value.

Most travellers into the land of refrigeration insist upon taking in
with them bales of hay with which to pack their boots and thus absorb
the moisture which would otherwise result in aggravated cases of cold
feet. For this particular product I substituted a type of breakfast
food of my own invention called "wheat whiskers" which comes in
compacted cubes of farinaceous filament. These, when needed, can be
teased out to four times their initial bulk. The advantages of this
product are evident, since it is both excellent boot-packing and
nourishing food, or, as Frizzie put it "good for both hoof and mouth
disease." Another dual personality in our list of stores was the solid
alcohol, primarily intended for fuel, but also edible. This necessity
was under my immediate jurisdiction as the responsible head of the
party.

Too much credit can never be given to those great American
institutions, the 5-and-10-cent stores, from which we were able to
obtain at slight cost the necessary snow-goggles, ice-picks, cooking
utensils, etc., which form a part of every expedition. From the same
source we also purchased a sizable number of toys for use in bartering
with the natives. All these lighter elements of our baggage were
rolled in bolts of mosquito netting in the folds of which were packed
fly-swatters (two per man), bottles of citronella, green fishing-veils,
and other objects useful in combating the teeming insect life which
springs into being at the first touch of the Arctic sun.

These, then, were our general stores. Each individual looked after the
equipment necessary for his own department. Sections of the Kawa,
amidship, were allotted in alphabetical order, where, with a narrow
aisle between, were tightly crammed Plock's anthropological charts,
Miskin's map-cardboards, surveying instruments and colored crayons,
Sloff's batteries, Wigmore's alpine ice instruments (including a
horn), Dane's mummy-cases and scarabs, Whinney's camera supplies and
radio-outfit, and Swank's paints and palettes. Frissell's personal
impedimenta was unique and had no bearing whatever upon scientific
research. It consisted of eighteen different fancy-dress costumes,
wrapped up in which were a ukelele and six pogo sticks. At later
intervals he kept producing smaller musical instruments, magic egg-cups
and other entertaining devices which more than once rescued our spirits
from the depths of black despair. Triplett carried, as usual, only his
pouch of extra glass eyes and a small, well-worn, black bag which, to
my certain knowledge, he never opened. I think he felt that it gave
him dignity and was demanded of him, just as baggage is considered
necessary by some punctilious hotel clerks. Whenever we left ship
for more than a day, Triplett insisted on carrying his black bag. He
looked as if he were about either to embalm a body or tune a piano. I
could never quite decide which. One day when he was ill, during the
latter part of our trip, I peeked in the bag. It contained the upper
half of a pair of pajamas and the photograph of a beautiful,--but I
feel that respect for the old fellow's romantic heart, hidden deep
beneath his tough hide, forbids me to say more. Somehow that little
black bag became to me a symbol of its owner, concealing beneath its
alligator-skin rind the elements of some exquisite life-incident!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 3: A quarter-scale model of the re-modeled Kawa has been
presented to the Smithsonian Institute by the Jibboom Club of New
London, Ct. Needless to say all structural and mechanical details are
thoroughly protected.]

[Footnote 4: As guest of King Sisawath II in 1908, I was presented
with the Bkatha or Freedom of the Palace, which was more than I could
possibly use.]




Chapter III

  _The choice of a route. Off at last. We take aboard a passenger.
  Seeds of discontent. Into the long twilight. Radio reversals. The ice
  at last. Trouble with our water-line. Its happy solution._




Chapter III


Those of my readers who have not deserted during the cataloguing of
our supplies may be interested in knowing something of our route. The
lines of approach to the Pole are, of course, infinite in number. Let
me illustrate this fact in a simple way.

A direct projection of the northern hemisphere would resemble a pie
with the Equator at its rim and the Pole at its center. Now imagine
our pie cut into four quarters. We have, obviously, four ways to the
Pole. But now suppose the arrival of unexpected company, four in
number; a less generous distribution of our pie becomes necessary. The
scientific housewife would at once solve the difficulty by cutting the
pie on intervening lines. We now have eight pieces to our pie and,
consequently, eight ways to our pole. If we have eight we may
have sixteen, if sixteen, thirty-two, and so on, by subdivision, to
infinity. Q.E.D.[5]

  THE BIG HUNTING

  As soon as the early August frosts warn the Eskimo huntsman that
  winter is nigh, he begins to think about his food-supply. In fact
  this is a thing he thinks about most of the time. Food is the
  paramount consideration in polar-regions. It is the standard of
  value, the source of warmth, the unit of measure it is everything.

  There are in reality but two seasons, Winter and Summer, in the
  regions immediately surrounding the Pole. Hunting is impossible in
  the one because of the intense cold. But between the two periods come
  a few days, a week at most, of intermediate temperature, too short to
  be called Spring or Autumn, but too valuable to be lost. It is during
  these short spells that the native must lay in his winter or summer
  supply of meat, skins, etc. Consequently he is always in a hurry.

  The photograph shows Makuik at his favorite sport of
  seal-slaughtering. Dr. Traprock tells us that owing to the amazing
  abundance of game in these remote regions it was possible for the
  mighty hunter to pursue his prey for four days without stopping for
  rest or food save for an occasional hunk of flesh or fat torn from
  one of his victims _en passant_.

  "Makuik's elation," says the intrepid author, "became almost
  unpleasant." As the herds of seal, walrus and otary accumulated about
  him their blood seemed to go to his head. Uttering a low crooning cry
  which rose to a wild screech at every thrust of his raktok (trident)
  he leaped about the floe with the soft agility of a Mordkin. An
  extraordinary sight was to see him hurl his weapon into a passing
  flock of pemmican, spearing a fine bird on each of its prongs. But
  his favorite game was seals because of their comparative inability to
  escape and their rich food-value. Incidentally the skins would make
  excellent gifts for his wives during the approaching Yule-tide season
  (Kryptok-Boknik-lok or Feast of Food). Makuik evidently believed in
  "doing his Christmas stabbing early."

  At the close of the "big hunting," Makuik had to his credit, besides
  countless other game, four hundred and seventy seals. The photograph
  pictures him making three holes in one, a feat which no golf-player
  can ever hope to rival.

[Illustration: The Big Hunting]

The question immediately arose as to which route I should select. I
decided on the straightest, just as I had decided, in Cambridge, to
take the Kawa to the North Pole instead of the South because it was
nearer. Obviously I must reach the polar ice-pack before making my
beeline as my ship was adapted for but two elements, ice and water.
Travel over bare ground was not contemplated. Wheels had never entered
my head. How nearly this fact cost us our lives makes a thrilling story
but one which comes later.

Thus, our object was to round Cape Race and pick our way through Davis
Strait which runs due north through Baffin Bay, well beyond the Arctic
Circle. This is the most direct water route from New York.

Our last glimpse of the homeland was the white water over Sow-and-Pigs
Ledge off Cuttyhunk, from which we set a course North by slightly
East to pick up the gas-beacon at mouth of St. John's Harbor. As we
swashed along outside of Cuttyhunk I saw through my glasses a signal
flag waved from the piazza of the old fishing club which I recalled
having visited as a small boy in '88 when the last sea-bass was hauled
from those waters. A moment later a small boat put off from the beach
near the lighthouse and rowed in our direction. It was a hard pull for
the sturdy islanders but we stood by and finally took their helmsman
aboard who handed me a letter marked "Rush" which proved to be a notice
from the Westchester Lighting Company informing me that there was still
a payment due on my gas range. As I had opened this missive in the
privacy of my cabin I was able to go on deck and tell the messenger,
rather curtly, that there was "no answer" and the good fellows rowed
away, giving us a hearty cheer as we turned our nose to the open sea.

St. John's was our first port-of-call for I had to redeem my promise
to Triplett to pick up the woman, "Sausalito," as he called her. I
think the old man was inspired by the thought of seeing her, for he
gave us an exhibition of navigation that was an eye-opener. After
leaving Cuttyhunk we ran into a dense fog. For forty-eight hours
this continued, thick and impenetrable. Once we heard the distant
sound of the cod-fishers on the Banks singing their morning song--an
unspeakable chantey about a dissolute person named Mary Brown--but we
saw no gleam of binnacle, sun or shorelight. Yet through this murk,
with the magnetic pull on our bowsprit tending always to veer us from
our course, Triplett led us with such accuracy that at exactly the
appointed time we caught the distant flash of the beacon and knew that
our first leg had been completed.

My followers knew nothing of my plan to take Sausalito aboard and
my instructions to Triplett were to keep silent. The lady's first
appearance was not reassuring. She was standing on a dilapidated
pier head, valiantly defending herself from volleys of stones hurled
by native village lads. Crouching behind a rusty try-out kettle she
responded in kind, directing her missiles with vicious speed and
accuracy. A curious morning picture.

"That's her," chuckled Triplett. "She allus were a speritted female."

The others looked on wonderingly as the Captain dropped over the stern
into our cockle-boat, pulled toward the dock and took the bulky figure
aboard.

"Who the devil is this?" asked Plock, scowling darkly, as they neared
our counter.

"My sewing woman," I said briefly. "Lend a hand, man."

He did so with an ill grace, and a moment later I saw him whispering
to Wigmore and Sloff with every evidence of displeasure. I myself was
not a little upset at the over-exuberance of Triplett's manner toward
this strange woman. She was a dark, unkempt creature with bright
gray-blue eyes which contrasted strangely with her brown cheeks. Her
hair, what we could see of it, under her man's cap, was nondescript;
teeth irregular. Two extraordinary qualities, however, she had--a smile
which vivified her oddness with an unearthly beauty, a brilliant,
mocking irradiation that made her look magically youthful, a crone
metamorphosed into a little girl, and a voice--O, a mystery of still
waters!--such a voice!--a deep resonant contralto, at once caressing
and vibrant, with strange breaks and husky notes, melting softnesses
and brazen clangor! The Captain was delighted with the reunion.

"My leetle apple!" he cried, patting her, and, indeed, the term was
not inexact as her dusky cheeks flashed with pleasure 'neath his great
paws.

"How you've grown, Ezra!" she laughed, pointing to his capacious girth.

"Ain't I, though," he assented; "mostly 'round the water-line!"

I felt that it was time I intervened.

"Gentlemen," I said to the group which had gathered in the waist, "this
is Mrs. Sausalito, our sewing woman...."

Then Triplett fairly spiked my guns by adding,--

"And my wife!"

I could have killed the old fool! I hustled them both below and turned
back to face an indignant ship's company.

Block bustled up officiously. "See here, Traprock," he blustered, "we
don't like this. You know...."

"STOP!" I commanded in a voice that shook the Kawa to the place where
her keel would have been had she had one. "To begin with, I want you,
Plock, to know that I am not 'Traprock' to you or to any one else. I am
'_Doctor_ Traprock, _Sir_'--do you understand?"

Plock growled an uneasy assent as I continued.

"I know perfectly well what is in your minds, namely, that the
understanding was that there should be no wives on this voyage. This
Sausalito woman was engaged by me as seamstress. If she is Triplett's
wife, as he says, it is news to me. In any case I want it thoroughly
understood that I am Boss on this ship. To your posts! Ready-about to
wear ship. Triplett, take the helm." (He had come smirking out of the
cabin.)

With surly "Aye, aye, sirs," they took up their duties, as I struck
sharply on the table-bell which was screwed to the combing, the
faithful Tatbury began its revolutions and once more the little Kawa
slid gracefully through the long Atlantic swells.

It was a magnificent day but I was frankly depressed. Already a cloud
of discord had arisen in the ranks. Already an ominous rift had opened.
What might happen in the future only the future could tell. I was
filled with disquieting memories of what had occurred to other Arctic
explorers whose cohorts had been split by dissension and bitterness. I
knew full well how they had separated, sometimes to perish under the
very shadow of the Pole itself, sometimes to fight their way back to
civilization in broken fragments which spent the remainder of their
lives in vilifying each other. Little did I realize how much more
tragic was to be the outcome of this apparently trivial incident.

In the meantime I was lulled into false security. Two weeks of glorious
weather made our progress exceed even my sanguine schedules. Once clear
of Cape Race our course lay almost due north and the full force of the
magnetic pull on our bowsprit could be utilized. To this we added, in
favoring weather, a mainsail forward and a jigger aft so that we were
able to conserve our fuel supply most satisfactorily.

Our trip through Davis Strait into Baffin Bay was a sight-seeing trip
new to most of my men and I was glad to be able to point out to them
the objects of interest along either shore, on the left the cozy
English hamlets of Mugford, Chislinghurst-on-Trent and Philpot Island,
on the right the quaint Greenlandic fishing villages of Fiskernoes,
Svartenhunk and Sükkertoppen, names eloquent of their respective
origins.

The days grew steadily longer. We were approaching the long twilight.
On a memorable Tuesday in June we crossed the Arctic Circle. This is
always an exciting event but particularly so for those who experience
it for the first time. Needless to say, we observed the ritual honored
by mariners the world over. This follows closely the ceremony
celebrated in the tropics when "crossing the line," with the variation
that, instead of Neptune coming aboard, the aquatic visitor is the
North King, a snowy potentate who is received with due honor by all the
ship's company, especially the novices, who are forced to bring him
presents and perform tricks at his behest. We hove-to in a narrow inlet
on the Baffin shore known by the romantic name of Petty's Bight, where
we spent a blithe two hours. Triplett played the kingly rôle while I
acted as master of ceremonies. I must admit that this did not tend to
calm the somewhat ruffled feelings of my following but it made a merry
interlude in our routine.

During the long evenings Sausalito, laying aside her busy needle, would
read to us books from her own library, "The Sheik" and the works of
Ethel Dell, Harold Bell Wright and the Johnstons, Sir Harry and Owen.
It was surprising how entertaining these things became to our little
isolated band. Often after a particularly serious page the reader's
sunlike smile would flood the main-deck and the whole company would
burst into peals of laughter; then once more we would sit enthralled.
It must have been her voice. Frissell, alone, absented himself from
these readings and sat apart, lost in the perusal of "If Winter Comes"
which he supposed was a work intended for polar novices.

At this juncture Whinney was having a most annoying time with his radio
outfit upon which I had counted to keep the company amused. The best he
could get was a series of noises which, in themselves, were interesting
but scarcely entertaining. At times the magna-vox or "loud squeaker" as
Frissell called it, would emit dismal cat-calls such as I have often
heard from the upper gallery of theatres.

"That's Arlington!" Whinney would exclaim.

Again the sound would be that of penny-a-pack firecrackers such as one
gives to children.

"Newark is calling us!" Whinney would say seriously. "Wait a minute."

A series of readjustments and Jimmy Valentine motions with the
combination would result in a raucous scraping as if a discouraged
Victrola had cut its throat.

"Pittsburgh!" would be the operator's triumphant comment. "Wait a
minute!"

We waited many a minute and hour, patiently expectant, but nothing
happened. The most trying thing was Whinney's explanation. He would
fix us mournfully with his brown eyes, while at the same time trying to
fix the machine and say solemnly:

"The length of the antennae is in direct relation to the wave length of
the tuner. At the same time the vacuum tubes must be connected with or,
at least, related by oscillation to the tuning circuit. When a ship is
in motion the undue number of electric 'strays' disturbs the delicate
filaments of the tickler and absolutely wrecks the radio activity."

"I had one of those Radio-Rex things," cried Swank. "My sweetie gave it
to me for Xmas."

"I suppose you gave her a tickler," rumbled Triplett.

  THE TWO BEARS

  Ikik is solemn. Ikik is offended. Her tender heart is roused. Why?
  In the answer lies the story of one of the most charming incidents
  of the Kawa's entire polar-cruise. In another picture the reader
  will see Makuik descending with murderous intent, on the back of a
  large polar-bear. Shortly after the kill it was discovered that this
  bear had just become a mother. Her offspring--there was but one--was
  immediately adopted by Ikik. Mother-love, which flourishes even in
  the high latitudes, surrounded the little cub with every protection.
  First reared as a bottle-bear, the bearlet passed safely through
  the teething period and soon became the regular attendant of his
  foster-mother who fed him solicitously at every meal.

  It was this devotion which brought about the disturbance recorded by
  the camera. Warburton Plock seems to have developed an insatiable
  fondness for toasted-blubber. Not content with his own share he
  resorted to the cowardly practice of prigging from Toktok, as this
  _ursus minimus_ was called. His method was characteristic of the man,
  combining cunning with greed. Having privately constructed a small
  cube of wood corresponding in size to the usual blubber-portion he
  would attract Toktok's attention and ostentatiously bury the decoy
  in the snow at some distance from the actual feeding ground. Then,
  while the little chap was busily digging for the supposed dainty
  Plock would swipe the real blubber which Makuik distributed with an
  impartial hand.

  Ikik was no match in logic for the wily scientist.

  "You are robbing my baby!" she wailed in the present instance.

  "Yes," agreed Plock, "and your baby is under the impression that he
  is robbing me."

  Needless to say Dr. Traprock settled this matter in his own direct
  fashion. As he said in conversation with the writer, "It is
  impossible to argue with such fellows. The only practical thing is to
  crown them."

[Illustration: The Two Bears]

The whole business vastly amused the old salt. He could see nothing but
foolishness in Whinney's maneuvers, "trying to git God-a'mighty on the
'phone," as he put it.

But the attempts whiled away many an idle moment, and day by day we
were passing landmarks which told me clearly that our goal was nearer.
The water became steadily colder, a fact which we verified by the usual
scientific method of dipping out pailfuls from time to time and taking
their temperature with a bath thermometer.

At the northern end of Kane Basin where Greenland makes out toward
Ellesmere and Grant Land we began to encounter ice. My readers can
perhaps imagine the thrill which was mine when I first heard the soft
scrape of frozen lips against the Kawa's silky skin!

Ice at last! Ice! the vaunted terror of the north! Leaning over the
garboard streak I watched anxiously to see how our gallant carrier
would take to the element for which she was designed. It was a magical
performance and a warm glow of satisfaction suffused my heart as I
noted how she slipped through the glazed surface. Far beyond in the
northern sky gleamed the "ice blink," that luminous brightness which
told of frozen fields and floes in the great beyond. We could feel the
chill of their vast bulk as we sat on deck of an evening.

We were now at the 82nd parallel and were passing through what is known
as mulch ice, which is of about the same consistency and saltiness
as ordinary brine. Wigmore made a number of interesting experiments
with a small freezer, using corn starch and condensed milk from his
own equipment and was able to produce a fair quality of ice cream
which had a slightly oily flavor doubtless due to the presence of
seals. From then on the ice developed into what is called squidge-ice,
thicker and more lumpy than mulch, but still navigable. This, however,
soon became a solid sheet, from four to ten inches in thickness, the
Kawa's progress became slower and with something like acute anxiety I
requested Whinney to switch on the thermal water line.

The effect surprised even Whinney whose inventive imagination had
proven itself capable of foreseeing almost anything which might happen
and many which might not. We were instantly surrounded by a dense fog
of our own making!

The ice edges of the squidge coming in contact with the candescent
copper vaporized immediately and the atmosphere on board became that
of a Turkish steam-room. As is often the case it was not so much the
heat as the humidity.[6] Our clothing was wringing wet and we were
perspiring at every pore. It was easy to see what the fatal result
would be when we shut off the electric spark and exposed our wide-open
pores to the icy breath of the north. Pneumonia and consumption, if not
worse, were almost certain.

Ordering all hands below for a rub-down we came to a standstill
and for two days did nothing more than maintain our position by
quarter-speed revolutions of the Tutbury. At the end of that time
Whinney emerged from the main hatch, where he had been incubating
his ideas, with a look of suppressed elation which told me that he
had found a solution of our difficulty. Without a word he set about
stringing wires from the storage batteries to two points on the forward
rail on a line with the capstan. In less time than it takes to tell it
he had lashed two electric fans to the projecting sides of the guide
runners and screwed the wires into the poles after which he walked aft
and came to attention.

"You may fire when ready, sir," he said, hand-at-visor.

I gave the signal and once more the throb of the engines shook our
jelly-like sides, once more we heard the hiss and crackle of the
squidge as it gave way before our burning zone but--a new sound! We
also heard the blended sonority of the two fans as they pushed a
powerful current of air along our water line. Dense and low, the fog
streamed past us like parted rivers of milk, to rise in soft clouds far
to the southward.

A spontaneous cheer burst from my anxious band and we gave Whinney
three times three with a right good will. At Triplett's suggestion--for
he was overjoyed at being able to see where he was going--I ordered
"half holiday" and issued five plugs of solid alcohol in honor of our
resumed motion. It was a happy evening we spent in the little cabin,
Triplett, Sausalito and I, while the others sat on deck in the pale
sunlight, crooning the old song which has been sung by polar explorers
since viking days, "Nordenskold! Nordenskold! Tilig am poel."[7]

Triplett's adjustable yard-arm which controlled our conviviality was
occasionally shifted to keep the low circling sun directly over it
and many a toast was eaten as the cheery plug passed round. My last
conscious memory after my fifth quid, was the sound of Frissell's
ukelele above my head and beside me the unabashed endearments of
Triplett talking to his "apple."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: Ekstrom illustrates the same point in his lectures by
using a cake (usually chocolate) in place of a pie. The objection to
this method is that the segmental walls have a tendency to crumble,
confusing the illusion of polar travel. Otherwise his system follows
mine.

W.E.T.]

[Footnote 6: In Taupol, the southernmost of the Maladive Islands, I
lived for three months in a similar climate without injurious results
but it must be borne in mind that I wore only a one-piece suit of
Khitra (gobang leaves). T.]

[Footnote 7: "Northland! Northland! I for you am." Undoubtedly
the fragment of an old Saga of Icelandic origin. A modern musical
derivative was once popular in American folk song with the refrain,
"Hip, Hooray, we're off for Baffin's Bay, etc." See W.J. Krehbiel's
"Gems of Greenland," pp. 94-96.]




Chapter IV

  _We reach the polar cap. The strange incident of the missing Orders.
  Who stole the papers? The Arctic summer. A sportsman's Paradise.
  Notes from my journal. Whinney's sad experience._




Chapter IV


"Men, it is the Ice."

These words rang with a portentous solemnity as I delivered them to the
entire ship's company.

We had reached the solid floe. About us, white and interminable,
stretched the polar pack, with here and there inky streaks, the open
"leads" which often yawn between the very feet of unwary travellers.
But for us, the way lay straight. Glancing at the compass and adjusting
my gesture parallel to its needle, I pointed.

"Yonder lies the Pole!"

The seriousness of the moment imposed a silence broken only by the
screams of distant flocks of pemmican and the yooping of seals--for
we were in the land of prolific game. The second leg of our journey
was accomplished. The great test still remained, the long tug over the
rough floor to the Main Post itself.

"Men of the Traprock Expedition," I continued, "you have served
me long and faithfully. The reward of our efforts lies close at hand.
Yonder, I repeat, lies the Pole. Captain Triplett's last observation
shows that we are at 86° 13´ 6-7/8´´, fifteen miles better than all
previous records, Nansen's, Steffanson's and Peary's excepted. We
are running ahead of schedule time. From now on our progress will be
slower. But, though we will not be dragging light sledges over the ice,
remember that we carry our base of supplies with us. 'Tis an arduous
task, lads, but with fair weather and good luck we'll win through yet!"

  THE NINE O'CLOCK BOTTLE

  Here we have a typical scene in Camp Traprock during the late days
  of the Arctic-Indian-Summer. Bartholomew Dane, the Egyptologist
  and Sausalito are busily engaged nursing the expeditionary mascot,
  Toktok, a tiny bear-cub which was adopted by Ikik after the demise
  of its parent. The picture can give no idea of the painstaking care
  which was lavished upon the little pet. As in the case of many
  infants it was extremely difficult to find a food upon which he
  would gain his orthodox ounce a day. Various forms of nourishment
  were tried, the happy formula being finally found in a four-ounce
  bottle administered every four hours, the meal consisting of modified
  whale's-milk to which was added minute particles of "wheat-whiskers,"
  a cereal-diluent to the perfection of which Dr. Traprock has devoted
  many years of study.

  Ikik, to whom credit must be given for the capture of the cub, was
  hopelessly ignorant of how it should be cared for. Her idea was that
  common to most primitive mothers, namely, that the infant should be
  immediately put upon a meat or fat diet. The result of this treatment
  was loss of weight and incessant crying on the part of Toktok.
  Fortunately the ship's library contained a copy of Holt's "Care and
  Feeding of Infants," a book which Dr. Traprock says he never feels
  safe without.

  Both Dane and Sausalito are wearing the summer costumes which are
  practically a necessity during the heated term. Dane's tropic helmet
  with its deeply overhanging cornice undoubtedly saved him from the
  dreaded snow-blindness which so fatally attacked his companion
  Whinney. The attractive dress worn by Sausalito is part of a wardrobe
  assembled by her as she passed through Canada on her way to join
  the expedition. The fur-edged chemisette and roll-down buskins are
  similar to the parade uniform of the O'Howese Toboggan Club.

[Illustration: The Nine O'Clock Bottle]

The cheer which greeted this announcement surprised me by its
feebleness. I had felt that I was doing rather well. Plainly a number
of voices were silent. Puzzled and apprehensive I glanced toward my
men. Warburton Plock, oily and deferential, stood slightly in advance
of the others.

"Have you read your orders?" he asked.

"My orders?" I replied,--"my orders from whom?"

"Your sealed orders," he repeated, smiling craftily, "the ones Waxman
handed you when we left."

I did not like his tone. I detested the familiar way in which he spoke
of the aged president of the Explorers Union. His manner was that of
veiled bravado. The air was highly charged as before a coming storm.

"My brief-case ... cabin ... Swank.... Fetch."

I was excited and spoke monosyllabically, but Swank, like a faithful
dog, disappeared at the word "fetch" down the companion-way. In the
interval of his absence a thousand black thoughts whirled through my
brain. These mysterious orders, what were they? A plot ... something
was afoot, some deadly blow aimed to dash the cup of accomplishment
from my grasp as I raised it to my lips. To my credit I can say that,
even in this agonizing moment, I absolved Dr. Waxman of any share in
this dastardly work. I seemed to see his benevolent sheep-like face
smiling a good-bye, while before me, glowered Plock, palpably gloating
at my discomfiture. But orders were orders and duty was duty. Traprock
must be true! With a hand that trembled in spite of my best efforts, I
grasped the brief-case which Swank proffered and, turning it so that
all might see, I opened it.

It was empty!

I stood like a conjurer surprised by his own trick.

A threatening growl rose from the group huddled about Plock who now
came forward boldly, his face distorted with passion. The mask was off.

"This is buncomb, Traprock," he shouted. "You have done away with those
orders! Where are they? You know perfectly well that your instructions
are to...."

What he was about to divulge will never be known. Whipping up my left
arm I caught his heel with my right foot and the back of his head
struck the ice with a crack that roused the distant pemmican to renewed
screaming.[8]

"Stow that dunnage," I said quietly, and the limp carcass was tossed
aboard where it lolled grotesquely over the hatch-combing.

"To your places, you others...."

A slow, straining heave at the traces brought the Kawa up on her
guide-runners and she moved gracefully across the ice.

Pondering mournfully on the strange turn of events, wondering who could
have purloined the fateful packet, but taking care to show no exterior
sign of my perplexity, I trudged on, occasionally breaking the silence
with a single word of command.

"Mush."

       *       *       *       *       *

Day succeeded day, days scarcely marked by any change, and yet there
was no sign of the missing document. The most rigid search was
fruitless and, gradually, the incident was forgotten.

So unbroken was the sunlight that it was only by exercising great care
in keeping our watches wound that we were able to know definitely just
what day it was. As time wore on, confusion arose. Miskin insisted
that it was Wednesday, Swank held out for Thursday and so on. But it
mattered little. They were all days of accomplishment and of glorious
Arctic summer, growing steadily hotter as we climbed up the glacial
coverlet. We were now beyond the latitude of my previous "farthest"
(87° 21' 22") which I had reached with the Royal Geographic Expedition
which met such a tragic fate on its return trip to England.[9]

The insect pests began to be very troublesome and I thanked the high
Gods for the green veils and mosquito-bars which made life tolerable.
A part of every man's equipment was an atomizer containing four fluid
ounces of oil-of-citronella, and a fly-swatter attached to his wrist by
a thong of reindeer sinew.[10]

I was amazed at the tropic temperature of these high latitudes. At noon
the thermometer frequently stood around 90° Fahr. in the shade and it
must be remembered that there _was_ no shade. Our thinnest garments
were none too comfortable nor were we able to say, as is usual, that
the nights were cool, for again it should be borne in mind that there
were no nights. Hour after hour the brazen disc of the sun circled
round the heavens, staring pitilessly at the moon which, strange
phenomenon! shone palely above the opposite horizon as if the two great
planets were balancing to partners in a stately astronomical dance.

At definite periods sleep was the order of the day, an enforced
regulation. During our waking hours we struggled on, at times wading
through mulch and squidge, at times sailing through seas of melted ice.
Yet, though the sun's rays were hot, there still remained the solid
pack below, too vast to be more than touched on the surface by this
fleeting summer.

Though we were surrounded by animal life it was much too warm for
hunting. In fact the very thought of such things as blubber and fur was
nauseating. Our civilized diet and clothing were better suited to our
stomachs both inside and out. But how quickly the warm polar weather
passed none knew better than I and from my place in the bow I urged my
men on until even Swank and Whinney cast reproachful glances at me over
their streaming shoulders.

"You aren't taking the Kawa to the Pole, she's taking you," they
complained.

"Mush," I replied.

A fact which was the cause of surprised comment by several members of
the expedition was that we had thus far encountered no Eskimos on our
journey. I confess that I myself was somewhat perplexed. In a country
in which game abounded it seemed strange to find no hunting parties. I
could account for this phenomenon by two courses of reasoning; either
the natives had gone south to escape the intolerable weather which we
were experiencing--for it will be remembered that these simple folk
have practically no way of combating heat--or their hunters might
possibly have fallen victims to the mistake so common to nimrods the
world over, of leading their bands into localities in which there was
no game whatever. Upon consideration the latter conclusion seemed the
more probable for it follows a great general law of humanity. Each
of my readers doubtless numbers among his acquaintance a sportsman
who makes an annual pilgrimage into inaccessible regions in search of
caribou, deer, salmon or big-horn and who invariably returns with a
tale of disappointment. "It has been a very poor year for caribou."
"There was too little water--or too much." These excuses are familiar
to any one who holds converse with the disciples of rifle and rod.

Our case was different. We were a scientific group, not occupied with
the capture of animal trophies and so we naturally saw a great deal of
game.

It is difficult for me to set down the amazing amount of interesting
live stock which flourished about us at every stage of our journey.
In the lower latitudes these were the more familiar caribou, rabbits,
wolves, and deer.

A sight I shall never forget was one which confronted us shortly after
clearing the westernmost point of Wrangel Island. This was in the
earlier stages of our journey while we still enjoyed a few hours of
restful darkness. Through the murky night I heard a low muttering sound
with an occasional note of complaint or discontent. The noise was not
single and distinct but vast and widespread as if a large area of land
had become vocal. "What do you suppose is wrong?" I asked Triplett with
whom I was keeping watch. "There's allus somethin' wrong on Wrangel,"
said that worthy imperturbably. But I could see that he was interested
for he kept his good-eye alternately on our compass and the dim bulk of
land that loomed on our quarter.

Dawn came on apace and a marvellous picture lay before us. Far into
the interior, on the snowy slopes, were millions of reindeer feeding
on the Christmas trees which do so well in this locality. The noise I
had heard was the swishing of great branches and the guttural grunts
of these picturesque mammals as they devoured their provender. Others
of my men had stolen on deck and stood silently watching. Frissell was
greatly excited.

"Who said there wasn't any Santa Claus!" he cried, and at the sound
of his voice the huge herd tossed its broad-leaved antlers and rushed
madly toward the distant horizon while Frizzie urged them on with cries
of "Now, Vixen, now, Dasher!" It was an odd but interesting scene.

The Arctic hares were not as numerous as I have seen them on my
previous northern trips and those I observed through my glasses were of
poor quality and sickly physique. Evidently the gradual dying out of
the lapland lark-spurs, which are the natural cover of the hares, has
worked havoc among these charming creatures.[11]

But now, beyond eighty-six, we had left behind us these semi-domestic
creatures and were among the truly Arctic animals, those weird denizens
of berg and floe which civilization sees only in zoological gardens or
vaudeville performances. From my station near the forepeak I swept the
horizon hourly with my glasses cataloguing the myriad species of Arctic
life and entering them in my journal with notes as to quantity,
quality and other attributes which had a bearing on the commercial or
scientific value of the type referred to. I can give no better idea
of this sportsman's paradise than by quoting a few extracts from the
volume.

  INTENSIVE OPTIMISM

  As long as brave deeds are recognized and heroic fortitude receives
  its just due the name of Reginald Whinney will shine forth in
  letters of gold. Reference is made in the text to his tragic attack
  of snow-blindness on the very eve of the arrival of Dr. Traprock
  (and party) at the Pole. This untoward visitation (by which we mean
  Whinney's affliction, not the Traprock Expedition), would in itself
  have been enough to break the heart of any ordinary man, but not the
  heart of a Whinney. To such as he adversity is as the sunshine to
  the flower or the flower to the bee, a new source of inspiration and
  sweetness.

  In the early days of his blindness he was, of course, greatly
  depressed. "I am put out but not crushed" was his simple comment.
  Having recourse to his typewriter he recorded that touching
  paraphrase of Milton ending with the line, "They also serve who
  only sit and type." Then came the magnificent "Ode to the Aurora,"
  after which the sun of his vision seemed to burst through the walls
  of his temporary night. Full of sparkling wit and joyous laughter
  he fully earned his soubriquet of "Sunbeam-of-the-North." Even
  before breakfast he was mirth personified; in the evening, he was
  irrepressible. The Eskimos found in him a source of inexhaustible
  wonder. To a race living far beyond the sound of a songbird his
  carollings were nothing short of a miracle.

  Dr. Traprock has confessed that at times his friend's gaiety was
  trying. During the frightful sufferings of the return journey, for
  instance, it was upsetting to face starvation and death to the
  accompaniment of "I love a lassie," warbled by the stricken scientist
  from the forepeak. But as the Doctor acutely remarks, "How unjust
  to condemn a man who was doing the only thing left for him to do,
  namely, trying to cheer us up. Moreover I knew that his optimism was
  but blind. Incessant cheerfulness, when sincere, is impossible to
  stand; I can enjoy it when I know that it masks a broken heart."

[Illustration: Intensive Optimism]

For instance, under date of June 18th, I find the following:

"June 18th. 86° 12' 5". Bright and fair. Going good. For two hours in
fore-noon passed three large seal schools, mainly phoca vitulina and
mitrata, probably about one thousand per school. Each group lay taking
its mid-day siesta near the open lead with sentinel seals carefully
posted at regular intervals. They maintained this position until we
were within approx. 100 yds. when they slid noiselessly into the sea
where I watched them at play for sometime, diving over and under each
other and emitting their throaty mating cry of 'Ook, ook.' Peron says
(See Mammi-feres, Livraison, Sept., 1819, p. 2) that the phoca vitulina
are monogamous but close observation of a large bull seal in the second
group convinces me that he is in error."

"June 20th. Slightly cooler, a blessed relief. More seals today
(Leopardina and Stemmatopus). Passed one group at feeding time and
watched them chase the smaller otaries into shallow ice pools where
possession of the fish was disputed by large flocks of pemmican. The
smaller fragments, otary-eyes, fins, etc., were in turn made-off with
by snow-buntings."

"June 21st. Climbed to main truck at noon and found three pemmican eggs
in crow's-nest. Must have been laid during rest period. Left them for
observation and posted order on main and jigger to leave nest strictly
alone. Whales spouting to leeward, evidently genus bone-head, in large
quantity. Memo. Report to United Corset Mfrs. and Umbrella Makers."[12]

"June 28th. Showers. Vast quantities of seals (Hirsutus) the true
fur-bearing or sack seal. Called the entire company before the mast and
warned them against shooting. Rough going today over raftered ice. Made
only six miles. Mother pemmican sitting on crow's-nest. Polar bears
becoming more numerous, also large numbers of white foxes. Disturbed
during rest period by snorting of walruses. Memo. Look up sealing-wax,
source of supply, market, etc. Another week should see us at the Pole!
Hold fast and strike hard."

The reader can imagine with what difficulty I restrained my companions
from wholesale slaughter of the thousands of friendly creatures among
whom we were making our slow but steady progress. We were individually
armed and equipped for any event which might befall us, but many
considerations urged me to be firm in this regard and my posted
notices, "No hunting or fishing under penalty of the law," were sternly
enforced. Primarily I wished to save time, knowing full well what delay
would be caused by the pursuit and what inconvenience by the capture
of any of the hulking carcasses which surrounded us. Secondly I was
anxious to conserve ammunition for a time when it might be needed. Our
own food supply was ample and it seemed wise to defer experiments with
eskimo diet until absolutely necessary.

How fortunate this caution proved will be related in its proper place.
That we should ever be thrown entirely upon our own resources naked and
stripped in this far land, seemed totally unlikely. But who knows the
design of an inscrutable providence! Not I, for one.

Two days from the Pole a tragic misfortune befell one of our little
group, none other than my faithful friend, Reginald Whinney.

He had come to me in the morning and asked for a two hours leave from
the traces to take up work which he said was more scientific, namely,
the study of the snow algæ which blossomed about us in rare profusion.
As it was my custom to let my men out of harness, two at a time, to
pursue their various specialties, I readily assented.

"Whinney, botanist and Dane, Egyptologist, on leave" was the order of
the day.

They departed in opposite directions. Scientists in general avoid each
other's company when making discoveries and these were no exception. It
was the last Whinney saw of us for many weeks.

At seven-and-a-half-bells Dane came aboard and went below to file his
data. Eight-bells sounded and still no Whinney. With my glasses I
scanned the expanse about us. Far away on our starboard bow I glimpsed
for an instant a moving black speck, lost it in the quivering lens,
found it again and held it. Was it a bear? No, it was too black. A
seal?--too tall!

In an instant I had given the order, "Cease mushing!"

"Swank, Wigmore, come with me. Triplett, you are in command."

We were off in a trice. As we drew near the distant figure I saw that
it was indeed Whinney. But what was he doing?

He was tottering about in vague circles like a man distraught. Just as
I came up to him he fell forward on his knees with a despairing cry,
covering his face with his hands. Gently holding him by the wrists, I
lifted him up; his arms dropped to his side and I knew the awful truth.

I mentioned, when Whinney left the ship, that he would see no more of
us for many weeks. It was true, for though we could see him, the poor
fellow could not see us.

"Blind! Blind!" he shrieked, sinking down in despair and beating his
head against the ice.

Again we raised him and, soothing him as best I could, I rubbed his
inflamed lids with a sharp piece of snow crust, a native cure in such
cases. But we were too late to effect a cure. Wearied by gazing at the
minute flower-forms of the algæ, dazzled by the glaring snow crystals,
my friend's eyes had fallen an easy prey to acute snow-blindness.

"Let this be a lesson to you, men," I said after we had led our patient
back to the ship. "If any man, in the future, leaves this deck without
his goggles, let him take the consequences. This expedition cannot be
allowed to develop into a game of blind man's buff."

Whinney sat whimpering on the port rail, a pathetic sight. Though I
spoke sternly I could but grieve in my heart for the tragic irony of
his fate.

Many brave adventurers have struggled and died in vain efforts to reach
the top of the world. To Reginald Whinney remains the sad distinction
of being the only man in the world who has been to the North Pole and
back without seeing it!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 8: The trick is one I learned from an old limehouse "pug"
whom I befriended in the east-end of London. He could only show me his
gratitude by teaching me the secrets of his trade, which have served me
on many an occasion.]

[Footnote 9: The entire party on H.M.S. Daffodil, were sunk by a German
submarine off St. Jean deLuz. I escaped, having disembarked at Brigus,
N.F., in order to join my regiment at Derby, Conn.]

[Footnote 10: The Arctic mosquito differs from his southern brothers,
the common _stegomia muflans_, in that he does not strike and get away.
Like the Canadian "wingle," where he bites he burrows, and that with
such rapidity that one must be swift of stroke indeed who would escape
his attack. Within a few seconds he disappears beneath the cuticle
and dire illness is the result. It is not commonly known but I am
convinced that the Arctic variety is the carrier of the scurvy germ,
that dreaded terror of travellers. (See Windenborg's treatise "Die
Arbeiten Stegomanische und Fleibeiten von dem Nord-deutsches Landes,"
which, while making many absurd claims as to German supremacy in polar
regions, contains at the same time much solid information). T.]

[Footnote 11: The ever-watchful Canadian game commission has taken
up this matter (which vitally affects the mitten industry) and is
conducting at the Govt. Laboratory in Ottawa a series of experiments
with various hare-restorers. W.E.T.]

[Footnote 12: Since his return to New York, Dr. Traprock has formulated
a bill to be introduced at the next session of Congress. The bill
is aimed directly at the Fordney tariff-schedule, which imposes the
highest duties on whale-bone since whales were first discovered. This,
according to Dr. Traprock, is accountable for the corsetless flapperism
of today. "The higher the whale-bone the lower the corset," is his
trenchant comment.--Ed.]




Chapter V

  _The last ten miles. A mental observation. We lose our magnetic
  bowsprit. The Big Peg at last! "The Lady, first!" We celebrate our
  arrival. I glimpse a vision._




Chapter V


July fourth, 1921.

"Eighty-nine and two tenths!" said Capt. Triplett.

"Eighty-nine and two tenths," echoed Miskin, jotting down the figures.

Our navigator lowered the astrolabe through which he had been peering
and folded up his artificial horizon. He then figured for a few moments
on the edge of the taffrail, scrupulously erasing the calculation with
a combination of saliva and sleeve before he announced in his usual
formula:

"She proves. Key-rect as hell."

I piped down the engines and ordered the company abaft. We were working
through an open lead at the time.

The moment had come for another important announcement. These were of
almost daily occurrence at this time, each stage of our journey having
been marked by the establishment of a record for ship travel. It
had therefore become my custom to call the men together as soon as our
position had been officially announced, at which time we held a sort of
business "causerie," chatted over what had been accomplished, discussed
the future plans and policy of the expedition and so on, much as is
done today in business organizations whose lack of business gives them
ample time for such recreations.

  THE AVOWAL

  It was not to be expected that the temperamental Swank would long
  remain proof against the attractions of the beguiling Klinka maidens
  and here we have evidence of him running true to form, the form in
  this case being that of Klipitok, the youngest of the Mrs. Makuiks.
  The scene is the sub-polar apartment of the Kryptok hunter, hewn from
  the ageless ice.

  Obviously a tender passage is in progress. The jaunty Swank, holding
  in his hand a bunch of lapland-larkspurs, which, it should be
  remarked, were completely out of season at the time, is not only
  saying it with flowers but with all the practised ardor of a grade A
  Romeo.

  "You are the sweetest thing in the world," he whispers. "I have never
  met anyone like you in all my life."

  The child hears and believes.

  "You are so original!" she murmurs, bending her seal-like ear.

  "And you so aboriginal!"

  "More!" she sighs passionately.

  "Have you ever been to Niagara Falls?"

  At this point, due to the rising temperature, great drops of water
  began to fall from the ice-roof and a harsh command from Makuik drove
  the lovers into the open air.

  In justice to Mr. Swank it should be stated that all wife-wooing
  was conducted with the full knowledge and consent of the husband.
  Makuik's ulterior motive, doubtless, was to secure additional hunters
  for his tribe. Alas, for Swank's romantically planned honeymoon, it
  was doomed to end as so many do, in disappointment.

[Illustration: The Avowal]

Today, more than ever, I felt the responsibility of my position. Having
gained in assurance and poise by reason of experience at previous
meetings, my words were terse and well-chosen.

"Men," I said, "and lady" (bowing to Sausalito, who waved a tennis
shoe at me), "the end is well nigh come. The goal for which we have
labored is almost in sight. The Pole, reputed inaccessible, is at hand.
No longer the interminable leagues intervene. No longer do the long
miles stretch between us and our object. We have annihilated space--and
time!" (Cries of "Hear, Hear!")

"Men of the Traprock Expedition, tried, true and trusty Traprockians,
we have almost completed our journey, we are nearly there, the
long-sought----"

A tremendous cheer interrupted me. My companions were unable to control
themselves, and my oratorical intuition told me that it was the moment
to stop.

With a sweeping gesture toward the North, I shouted the magic
monosyllable "Mush!" and sat down.

In polar travel the last ten miles are invariably the hardest. One
is spent and exhausted. Ice conditions north of eighty-seven are
increasingly difficult. Absolutely nothing has been done by either
Canadian or United States Governments toward keeping the national
highways in condition. Raftered floes, composed of sheets of
twenty-foot ice, piled up like badly shuffled playing cards, often
directly oppose one's progress.[13]

But all things yield to an iron will. We had not come thus far to be
thwarted and our nearness to success roused me to feverish energy. As I
look back on that last day I am amazed at some of the things we did.

It has never been my habit to dodge a difficulty and true to this
principle we made straight at every barrier. There was no dodging or
deviating. Some we climbed, some we tunneled (the Kawa's masts folded
back along her deck), some we blew up, though I hesitated to resort to
this process for the practical reason of wishing to save my ice bombs,
and the more sentimental dislike of breaking the mystic silence of the
North with a sound so extraneous and artificial as that of blasting.

The northern silence has always seemed so pure and chaste that the
thought of shattering it was extremely repugnant. It was like violating
a virgin. It was, however, necessary to do this at times.[14]

Toiling, sweating, cursing, singing and shouting with excitement, we
fought our way foot by foot, mile by mile, over the rough ice-cap.

It was marvellous to see how the Kawa behaved, how magnificently
her pliant flanks adapted themselves to the jagged contours, how
intelligently and naturally she oozed over and between difficulties,
pressed in here, bulging out there, svelte, seal-like and delicious.

My office was that of general exhorter and encourager. It would never
have done for me to take the lines and do any actual pulling; the
men would have lost respect for me at once. But I was never idle for
a moment. Armed with an old riding crop, a relic of my days as M.F.H.
of the Derby Hounds, I circled about my straining comrades, shouting
encouragement and occasionally flicking them smartly on back and
buttock. They responded valiantly, though not a few black looks were
thrown at me.

At the top of every ice hurdle we stopped to rest and I issued extra
rations of alcohol plug. It was little enough to repay these gallant
chaps for their exertions and surely this was no time to play the
niggard with the "A-P" as we called it. Once refreshed, and the ice
slide ready, we coasted down the northward incline and spun merrily
across the level floe.

Late in the day, I called a halt. My comrades, somewhat exhausted
by their exertions and a little affected, perhaps, by my generous
distributions of A-P, sank on the ice near their traces or crawled up
on the Kawa's soft counter and fell asleep.

I was glad of their unconsciousness for I was very much excited. We
must be nearly there!

Before us rose a gentle snow eminence, the merest swelling in the white
plain, such as would be called a mountain in the middle west.[15]
Beyond this, unless I was mistaken, lay the Pole.

"Triplett," I said excitedly, "can you make a quick observation?"

"Sure," he observed. One glance at the low hanging sun was enough
for my old navigator. Rolling back his eyes he looked for a moment
into that reliable brain of his. I saw that he was taking a mental
observation! Marvellous man! In breathless silence, I waited.

"Eighty-nine and--nine tenths," he whispered. Sweat stood out on his
forehead and rolled in little rivers through his corrugations. This
sort of thing was plainly exhausting.

Quickly handing him an emergency plug I rose.

At that moment Warburton Plock came toward me. Though I disliked
him more than ever, he had been deferential and polite since I had
faced him down in his silly fuss over my orders, so that I listened
attentively while he spoke.

"Doctor, with your permission I'm going to unship the magnetic bowsprit
and set it here as a beacon. We must be way above the Magnetic North
by now and it is pulling us backward instead of forward."

"Very good," I answered. "Your idea has merit."

He touched his cap pleasantly and went forward. I liked the idea of
leaving a beacon or cairn. It is the proper thing among explorers. Here
and there we had run across them, an occasional pile of snow, topped
by a gin bottle enclosing a message from some previous expedition,
empty containers of various sorts whose labels were mute memorials
to the achievement of the great white race! Walker, Haig and Booth,
imperishable names these, with a solemn splendor when found on the
white register of the North.

I watched the work with interest. Plock and Miskin were busy at the
bow-chains, Swank, Wigmore and Frissell prepared the site, hewing
out rude blocks with their ice picks, while Sausalito cackled
encouragement. She was knitting a slip-on of reindeer yarn.

Suddenly a shout of dismay rose from under our forefoot. I saw Plock
and Miskin struggling with the bowsprit. Evidently they had completely
miscalculated the strength of the magnetic pull.

"Help!" cried Plock.

I sprang forward, even as the others threw down their picks and dashed
toward the bow.

We were too late.

Jammed against the side of the ship, his hands torn and bleeding Miskin
was forced to relinquish his grasp. With but the weight of Plock at its
butt end the long pole shot off at an angle across the ice.

"Leave it go!" I ordered.

But Plock was too dazed, too enraged to hear me. Fortunately at a
distance of two hundred yards his head struck a ridge of ice and he
keeled over.

Free of all hindrance, the steel stick bounded off with amazing
rapidity, leaving a faint trail, straight and true to the Magnetic
North. I watched it through my glasses until it disappeared over the
horizon to the southwest,--and there it is today, for all to see who
visit those strange regions, a record of the Traprock Expedition placed
there by a power more mysterious and greater than that of human hands.

Plock was gathered up and the company once more assembled.

This time I wasted no words. "Men, we are there. Beyond yonder eminence
is the Pole. Ten minutes, twenty at most, and then--rest!"

  ABOUT TO BE CAPTURED

  This picture represents what is probably the high-spot in Dr.
  Traprock's absorbing narrative, namely, the moment just before the
  author and his friend Swank burst from their hiding-places and
  captured Ikik, the Klinka maid, who is seen crouching over the
  bait which in this case was the scarlet hunting-coat worn by Dr.
  Traprock during many an exciting chase, though none, we venture
  to say, compared to this. Critics of this picture have said that
  the coat seemed unnecessarily voluminous. In explanation it may
  interest our readers to know that at meetings of the Derby Hounds,
  which organization takes its origin from the ancient Epsom Hunts of
  England, the M.F.H. wears the medieval hunting costume, the folds
  of which cover the rider, horse and at times several of the hounds
  as well. The thought of our intrepid friend Traprock thus clad in
  full cry suggests an inspiring sight. He says himself with his usual
  modesty, "The coat has always attracted women, but I have usually
  been in it."

  Better than words our illustration, snapped by Swank through the eye
  of "Dr. Pease," gives an idea of the simple beauty of the Klinka
  summer-furs. Though she has thrown aside her oomiak she is plainly
  apprehensive. Something is in the air, she knows not what.

  It was Dr. Traprock's intention to capture the maid as politely as
  was consistent with success. After the diving-tackle which he has
  described he had expected to deliver a conciliatory speech beginning,
  "Madame, I assure you my intentions are perfectly honorable."
  Makuik's arrival interrupted this program but we feel that in
  justice to Dr. Traprock his plan should be known lest some of our
  readers assume that he was unnecessarily rough. In the old Norman,
  "Chroniques de la Noblisse," we find significant note referring to
  Jean Marie Piegeroche, an early ancestor of the author. Says the
  historian, "_Fort comme la mort, beau comme le soleil, et toujour
  rosse mais pas trop rosse._" "Strong as death! Beautiful as the sun,
  rough ... but not too rough." It is indeed the Doctor.

[Illustration: About to be Captured]

With hearty good will they sprang to their positions and we shot
forward up the gentle grade.

Exactly twelve minutes later we reached the crest and below us,
sparkling in the sunlight, stood the Pole itself.

       *       *       *       *       *

How can I possibly describe the scene and the sensations of that
inspiring moment? Physically the outlook was perhaps unimportant save
for a feature that set my blood tingling while it stilled my heart in
reverence. This feature was Peary's cairn!

It was untouched, unchanged.

From the moment the object of the Traprock Expedition was announced
I had been haunted by a vague fear that some other group would head
straight for my goal, dragging with them some hapenny-tuppenny ships
model wherewith to wither my laurels.

It was not so.

Before us, a few hundred yards distant in the center of a shallow bowl
stood the rude monument of the great Commander, just as he had left
it. From the summit and flanks of the miniature mountain fluttered the
tattered ensigns he had placed there, our country's flag, the red
cross, the D.K.E. banner and the others.

The Stars and Stripes were nailed to a stout spar, evidently an extra
yard-arm or spare jigger from the Roosevelt. This mast still stood, a
graphic symbol of the Pole itself, as if the giant axis of the earth
projected beyond its surface. It was slightly out of plumb and the wood
toward the base was somewhat abraded.

But of the vandalism of late visitants there was not a trace. No picnic
baskets or discarded lily-cups marred the snowy surroundings. No other
ship, great or small, had made fast to Mother Earth's last mooring.

We rushed toward the spot in helter skelter fashion, but ten yards from
the cairn a thought, almost morbid in its chivalrousness, seized me.

I must stop this mad rush.

How?

Whipping out my Colt I fired three shots in quick succession. It was
the return-to-the-ship signal. The crowd hesitated, irresolute.

On the instant I dashed ahead and faced about.

"Gentlemen," I cried, "though thousands of miles from home, remember,
you _are_ gentlemen. The lady, first!"

Offering Sausalito my arm we climbed the slope together.

The others arrived en masse. Swank, Plock, Sloff, they were all like
children playing a game of prisoner's base, with the Pole as home. Poor
Whinney was "it."

In the excitement of the moment I had forgotten him. He was a pitiful
spectacle as he came tap-tapping his way across the ice, feeling each
step with his cane. We watched him in silence until I saw that he was
going to miss the Pole entirely and if not stopped would soon be bound
south again for an indefinite period. Tenderly Sausalito and I led him
to the cairn while her rich voice murmured comfort in his ear. He was
beside himself with emotion and hot tears kept welling from under his
goggles.

"The touch of a woman's hand!" he sobbed, as he smoothed mine with his.

Frissell's arrival was characteristic. He made the last sixty yards
between the Kawa and the Pole on a pogo stick--a new--in fact the
only--record for an event of this kind.

Second only to ourselves was the Kawa and willing hands soon hauled her
across the intervening distance and made her fast.

The great objective of my polar push had been gained and with a
reverent heart I called the men together for short but appropriate
ceremonies.

After a prayer of thanksgiving by Miskin, we sang as much of the Star
Spangled Banner as we could remember and ate a silent toast to the
memory of great explorers who had come and gone. I then made a few
appropriate remarks, outlining the progress of polar travel from Norse
days down to the present and we then proceeded to the picturesque
"planting of the flags." It was a charming picture in the amber
sunlight, not unlike the final chorus of some great operatic spectacle
in which the nations of the earth are gathered together.

Forming in a circle we marched slowly about the cairn singing the
ancient song: "Nordenskold--Nordenskold--helvig am trein," each man
planting his flag at the close of a verse, in the order named:

Traprock, U.S.A., Swank, Sons of American Revolution; Whinney, Guidon
of the Derby Fencibles (sometimes called the "Desperate Derbies");
Sausalito, Lucy Stone League; Frissell, Dutch Treat Club of New York;
Plock, Explorers Union; Miskin, National Geographic Society; Triplett,
New Bedford Chamber of Commerce; Sloff, Ass. Astronomers of America;
Wigmore, Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities;
Dane, Egypt.

With the cairn thus gaily decorated and the Kawa's full alphabet of
signal flags flying fore and aft spelling the word "Victory," the
formal ceremonies were over and I gave the order for complete rest,
relaxation and enjoyment.

How thoroughly these instructions were carried out may well be
imagined. Three days' rations of every sort were dragged from the
hold and spread about us. Without further urging all hands fell to.
Every man had five A-P's and a bountiful supply of potted ham, herring
and salt codfish.[16] This somewhat arid diet was washed down with
copious draughts of melted snow thickened with A-P, and the celebration
soon attained a terrific muzzle velocity. Songs echoed across the
surrounding plain, merry tales were passed about, tales which brought
a dull glow to Sausalito's cheeks and caused old Triplett to slap his
thigh with delight.

Frissell was a host in himself. He performed tricks of magic,
imitations and feats of acrobatics and ventriloquism, appearing
successively in various costumes from his inexhaustible supply. The
quiet Miskin disclosed an unsuspected social gift and lured us into
guessing games.

"What is the distance from Bremen to Hong Kong?"

We were staggered. Miskin, from the store of his librarian experience,
knew the answer. It was dull, but helped to keep the others sober for a
few extra hours.

The three days' rations lasted, I think, about one full 24-hour day.

A single unpleasant incident marred the close of the entertainment.

Plock, who was enormously exhilarated, crawled toward me and pointed
toward the D.K.E. flag above us.

"D.K.E. song," he said thickly.

I eyed him coldly.

"I can only sing it with a Brother."

To my disgust he stretched out a very dirty hand, and gave me the grip!

"Mew Chapter," he murmured.

It was revolting. That it should be Plock of all others!

We did the "Band of Brothers" together--my oath compelled it--but I
have never voiced its loving sentiments so half-heartedly.

Quiet fell at last. So did most of my companions. One by one they
toppled over. Whinney was the last to go. It is said that the loss
of one function strengthens another and I suppose that the absence
of eyesight gave him staying power. But he finally succumbed,
smiling happily and crooning to himself--"I don't no' whish is, m' I
blin'-drunk or drunk-blin'"; and he was gone.

My last memory is of Frissell saying "my next imitation" and then
playing "taps" on a mouth organ. I knew the impossibility of competing
with a parlor entertainer. Nothing will quiet such chaps but a dead
audience. So I rolled over, and slept the sleep of a tired but happy
explorer.

       *       *       *       *       *

What awakened me I cannot say, but I am sure that it was something
unusual, for my awakening was not gradual or difficult. It was the same
quick instant leap to consciousness as that which rouses the suburban
wife when she leans across the interim between the twin beds and
whispers tensely to her husband, "Horace, someone is trying to get into
the dining-room window!"

  SOMETHING NEW IN DRAMATICS

  A happy thought in the formation of the personnel of the Expedition
  was the inclusion of Frissell, the professional entertainer, who is
  here shown playing a leading part in the amateur theatricals which
  it was his delight to organize. The scene chosen for illustration is
  the famous shipping episode from "The Taming of the Shrew." Reginald
  Swank, who is no mean dramatic critic, tells us that Frissell's
  "Petruchio" was a spirited performance, while Snak's "Katharine"
  rivalled Ada Rehan at her best. The nautical background added a novel
  touch to the somewhat hackneyed vehicle and it is safe to say that
  Shakespeare is permanently established among the Klinka and Kryptok
  tribes.

  Not content with the success of this production, Frissell plans to
  bring to Broadway a newly organized company, "The Polar Players."
  They will appear in repertoire while the B and C companies tour
  the provinces. The Winter Garden has already been engaged for the
  venture, Al Jolson obligingly shifting to the Metropolitan Opera
  House. Tickets for the première of this interesting novelty, which is
  set for November 1st, may be had by application to any of the well
  known speculators. Mr. Frissell has already shown photographs of some
  of his best scenes to prominent professional critics. A few sample
  opinions may be of interest.

  George Jean Nathan: "Foreign and therefore good."

  Heywood Broun: "Lacking in background; we like it."

  Al Woods: "Niftik."

  Dorothy Parker: "I hate actors, but these people are different."

  Frederick O'Brien: "Taupo aloha che."

  The Literary Digest: "Better than the average and more average than
  the best."

  David Belasco: "All to the spot-light."

  Bernard Shaw: "They go further back than Methusaleh."

[Illustration: Something New in Dramatics]

I suddenly found myself sitting bolt upright, straining my ears through
the lightness.

What was it?

What uncanny influence had snatched me bodily out of the depths of
stupor?

All about me lay my companions. I counted them dazedly. Triplett,
Sausalito, Swank,--yes, they were all there, not one missing.

"It was nothing" I thought, and stretched myself, preparatory to
replacing my aching head in its original position.

And then my hair literally rose on that same head and a creeping chill
crept up my spine.

Close at hand, just back of me, rose a soft, exquisite, purling sound,
the sound of a woman's laughter! Whirling about I caught a fleeting
glimpse of her.

It was just a flash. She was peering over the edge of the cairn. The
instant my eyes met hers I knew that I had seen the most beautiful
woman in the world!

Leaping silently to my feet, for I did not wish to waken my comrades,
I raced toward the cairn. As I rounded the curve I heard again that
silvery laughter, spiced, I thought, with a note of mockery.

"One second, my beauty!" I muttered, "and I shall have you!" Remember,
I had been for months in the solitudes. My blood pounded in my temples.

Sweeping gracefully around the cairn I arrived on the opposite side.

Desolate and empty, the ice bowl curved to its rim.

Not a living soul in sight.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 13: The only highway comparable to the above, in my
experience, is the main street of Portchester, N.Y., which has been
torn up since the memory of man. Some of the rocks in the middle of
this thoroughfare are of volcanic origin. The detours are even worse.]

[Footnote 14: The explosive used is a development of Whinney's along
suggestions made by me. I am not at liberty to give the chemical
formula, but its lines of force are bi-lateral instead of perpendicular
as is the case with lyddite and the other nitroglycerine derivatives.
To any one especially interested in ice blasting I shall be pleased to
furnish additional information. W.E.T.]

[Footnote 15: The lowest mountain in the world is Mt. Clemens, Mich.,
which has an altitude of 6 ft. above lake level. I once climbed it on
crutches. W.E.T.]

[Footnote 16: These compact and easily carried food stuffs formed a
large part of our store. With the addition of a little water they
increase greatly in bulk and nutritive value. The idea came to me when
stranded for two weeks in the Dry Tortugas, during which time I lived
entirely on an old carriage sponge which I found on the beach. W.E.T.]




Chapter VI

  _Fatal procrastination. Our one-dimensional position. An
  extraordinary ornithological display. I confide in Swank. His plan. I
  capture my vision. The Klinkas. An embarrassing incident._




Chapter VI


The succeeding days were occupied with the business of getting settled.
Our eight-day clock recorded July 7th before we finally got down to
work. By throwing up a waist-high wall around the base of the cairn we
formed a circular dugout into which we moved our belongings, a man to
each segment. Already the weather had begun to moderate and I found my
medium-longs comfortable.

Sections of our camp were covered with tarpaulins and of course we had
the Kawa to retire to in case of need. A passing shower warned me that
the short Arctic summer was waning but I figured that we had ample time
to remain at least three weeks longer. We had but begun our scientific
work, our food supply was generously sufficient, and moreover, my men
had come a long way and were entitled to a rest.

Ah! How vainly does the mind of man delude itself with false reasoning.
Back in my brain nibbled the maggot of curiosity. Deep in my man-being
the age-old impulse lusted for a sight of the mysterious ice-maiden.
Like the old viking in the Saga--"_Moe entilgig sas, moe Tillig as
var--_"[17] I would have procrastinated forever. As it was my delay ...
but I am now getting south of myself.

Speaking of "getting south" we were in a curious position, one
previously remarked on, but which has received scant attention. I refer
to the fact that there was left to us but one direction. We had nowhere
to go but south. The idea seemed so fantastic that I verified it by
actual test. The empiric is after all the only actual, as Spencer says.
Standing close together four of us were able to touch the Pole with our
backs. At a signal we all stepped forward five paces.

We had all gone south!

And yet, Triplett and I had gone in exactly opposite directions: so had
Whinney and Wigmore who were assistants.

There are some things that are beyond the mind of man. Whinney said
that it was very simple. He explained that since it was already
possible, in a three dimensional world, to reduce motion to one
direction (which is the equivalent of one dimension) he was sure that
further research would show us the way to arrive at a point in which
there would be no direction at all.

"How would you get back?" I asked.

Although nonplussed he started in on a wordy explanation in the midst
of which I sneaked softly away, leaving him still talking under the
impression that I was at his side.

My unfortunate friend had taken up writing to mitigate his black
loneliness and the click of his typewriter could be heard at any time.
He was writing a description of our voyage and it surprised me to see
how much clearer and more interesting his account became after his eyes
were stricken and he was obliged to rely for information on what was
told him rather than on what he had seen. It has long been a theory of
mine that too much actual experience makes a man inarticulate, while
the reverse is stimulating and beneficial.[18] A realization of the
devastating dullness of most polar accounts has further confirmed this
view.

In the meantime our serious work was progressing. My plan was to
keep one of the men with me, giving the others freedom to pursue their
respective lines of research. This made it possible for me to be at
home most of the time and so not miss any recurrence of the feminine
phenomenon I had noted.

  AFTER THE BATH

  No libel has received wider acceptance than the often made statement
  that the Eskimos are an uncleanly people. It is true that during
  the winter season the skin is protected by frequent applications of
  various animal-oils such as seal, walrus, otary, sperm and pemmican.
  Only thus could the skin be protected against the rigors of the Polar
  winter. The usual specification employed by the Klinka tribe is as
  follows: (1) One (1) coat of otary oil thoroughly brushed in. When
  this has dried apply (2) one (1) coat of Makuik-mixture (1/3 otary to
  2/3 whale, sperm or equal), applied hot with a soft tundra sponge or
  seal-flipper; (3) two (2) coats grade A pemmican, applied separately;
  (4) finish coat of walrus-oil rubbed to a high polish. Fastidious
  individuals frequently add a coat of guppy-wax which results in a
  soft lustrous surface. By this method the entire body is hermetically
  sealed (just as our New England forebears used to seal their
  preserves and jams with paraffin) and the skin is kept immaculately
  clean.

  As soon, however, as the Spring sun has ameliorated the low
  temperature the native feels that it is time to slough his oily
  protection. Nature demands that his pores come up for air. This is
  accomplished by exposure to the sun's rays. The wax and substrata
  rapidly liquefy and are easily scraped-off with curved bone knives
  admirably adapted to the work in hand. The natives assist each other.
  One of the pleasantest experiences of Dr. Traprock and his men was
  that of watching a lovely Klinka scraping an acquaintance, aided by
  the friendly suggestions of her companions.

  When the final oil-coat is removed and all pores are wide open the
  body is rolled in clean snow and rubbed vigorously with a dried
  salmon-fin.

  The adjacent photograph shows little Kopek returning in his mother's
  oomiak after his Spring scouring. The snowy whiteness of his tender
  skin is ample proof of the hygienic wisdom of the Klinka method.

  Note the iglootinous character of the background. The perforated
  mounds are really hives, the winter quarters of the Poks or Arctic
  snow-bees which lay blue honey in large quantities from June to
  September.

[Illustration: After the Bath]

After a comfortable breakfast my followers departed in various
directions, each carrying his luncheon which Sausalito put up for him.
She, by the way, had become the uncrowned queen of all hearts and I
felt more than justified in having acceded to Triplett's sinful wishes.

Plock found it difficult to make any headway with his anthropology
because he could discover no inhabitants. Up to July 20th, he kept
entering regularly in his journal: "Density of population 1/316 to
square mile."

"It hardly seems enough," said Frissell brightly.

Plock gave him a sour look.

"I was not speaking of mental density," he said.

In zoology he was more successful, though he complained bitterly that
my "no hunting" edict cramped his style.

"You can't study life without taking it," he said.

I thought he was referring to the magazine.

"My family have been taking it since Vol. 1, No. 1," I retorted, "and
you know perfectly well it has always been anti-vivisection."

"Who said anything about vivisection?" he demanded, "though for that
matter, that's just one of Life's kinks, something that was wished on
'em in a will. Let me kill a few animals first, and I'll cut 'em up,
and maybe eat 'em afterward!"

He licked his lips greedily. In him, too, dormant appetites were
stirring, the blood thirst of the tiger! Strange irony, that he should
be the first to go.

Nevertheless he brought in some interesting live specimens caught
with ingenious snares and traps, among other things numerous birds,
ptarmigan, pelican and pemmican and a pair of polar kittens, the young
of the Felis-polaris, those quaint cats which always point toward the
north.[19] These charming creatures soon became our pets and took
avidly to the condensed milk which Sausalito prepared for them.

The pair of nesting pemmican who had pre-empted our crow's nest were a
source of constant interest. Three magnificent eggs about the size of
footballs were jealously watched day and night. Plock informed us that
the young birds might hatch any day now and warned us to be ready for
interesting developments. Though I believed him I was unprepared for
anything as novel as what took place.

Fortunately the event transpired on a Sunday--July 23rd to be
exact--which was a day of rest. We had just finished divine service
when Plock pointed excitedly toward the main truck.

"She's going to hatch!" he yelled.

The mother bird had risen from the nest. Between her powerful legs she
clutched one of the perfect ovates. Circling the Kawa three times she
uttered a piercing shriek and dropped the egg.

"Key-ryste!" ejaculated Triplett.

Plock motioned for silence.

The egg struck the floe with a deep boom off our weather lee and a
dense cloud of bright orange smoke filled the air in the midst of
which we saw the fledgling pemmican in full flight, rising to join its
mother. The male or bull pemmican now added himself to the party and
together they made off to the edge of the ice bowl where the young one
alighted.

"Stand back," warned Plock. "Cover up your noses."

The saffron laying fumes were drifting toward us, and their odor was
overpowering and indescribable. Even as I crouched behind our bulwarks
I thought of my old friend Lucien Sentent, the nasal gourmet of
Battambang and wished he were with us. He could have had my share!

Three times this curious phenomenon was repeated and though vastly
diverted we were glad when it was over.

Along other lines, Miskin covered a large number of cardboards with
maps. He was preparing a folio, "The Pole and its Environs," he called
it. A difficulty was that of locating any other point in relation to
the Pole. Triplett's science could go no further than it had.

"Son," he said to Miskin, who had been anxiously asking which direction
New York was. "Son, I kin tell yer where we be, but not where we ain't."

So Miskin tried the effect of the Pole in various positions on the
sheets and said he would fill in the details later.

Swank got some excellent photographs using Whinney's camera, some of
which are reproduced with this book. The views from the Pole itself
were particularly interesting, but his best results were to come later.

Wigmore kept adding to his collection of snow crystals and algæ which
he packed carefully in cracked ice, while Whinney, even in his darkened
condition found it possible to tinker with his radio outfit. Sloff
helped him rig his antennae to the Pole itself and we began to get
messages with increasing clarity.

Thus it will be seen that all our little band were busy and that not an
hour was wasted.

But deep in my heart lurked a determination to see again my lady of
mystery. As the days lengthened to weeks without my having made any
progress I at last confided in Swank.

He was incredulous but logical and infinitely woman-wise.

"You were cuckoo," he said. "But if you weren't, the only way to get
her is to rouse her curiosity. Then grab her."

"How?" I asked.

He pondered a moment before replying.

"See those snow men?"

I nodded. Frissell had occupied his valuable time carving effigies for
what he called his "Hall of Ill-fame, or Northern Musee of the World's
Worst Worms."--Volstead, Anderson, Dr. Pease, John Roach Straton,
Anthony Comstock and others. While I deprecated his taste I had no
suspicion how thankful I should be for its results.

"Here's the idea," Swank continued. "Get everybody else out of the way
for a whole day, see? Then plant a decoy over on the other side of the
cairn where you saw the woman; something bright and snappy in color."

"My old hunting coat!" I suggested.

"Just the thing. Then you and I creep into a couple of Frizzie's
masterpieces, poke out their prune-stone eyes and watch."

"Swank!" I cried, grasping his hand, "you are a genius."

He shrugged his shoulders modestly.

"In more ways than one," he conceded.

The plan was simple of execution. My only problem was Whinney,
Sausalito and Triplett who commonly stuck around home. This I solved
by sending Sausalito off for a day's picnic with Whinney so that the
Captain followed, as a matter of course. Since Reginald had been unable
to see Sausalito and only heard her vibrant voice, he had become
dangerously fond of her, a fact which Triplett's one eye was quick to
notice. They, therefore, departed, Sausalito leading Whinney with
Triplett trailing. The others had gone long ago. Swank and I at once
began our preparations.

Twenty feet from the foot of the cairn I spread my M.F.H. coat on the
snow. Its vivid scarlet with the Derby brown collar and turn-back cuffs
made a vivid spot amid the surrounding whiteness. Swank meanwhile was
burrowing into the back of Dr. Pease. A moment later I was enclosed in
Volstead, a disguise which I had never thought to assume. The air was
suffocating inside and to fortify myself I nibbled a fragment of A-P
with ironic appreciation of the contrast between the outer man and the
inner. Swank, not to be outdone, solaced himself with a smoke which
must surely have irked the cold semblance of the arch anti-cigarettist.
But I hissed a warning and the blue smoke spiral ceased.

From then on we waited. The time was interminable. It was probably not
more than thirty minutes, but it seemed hours. My A-P was exhausted and
I began to think of quitting.

Then, with a suddenness that nearly caused me to fall through
Volstead's abdomen, things began to happen. I glanced at Dr. Pease; he
was trembling slightly, or maybe it was my own excitement.

  DINNER IS SERVED

  The closeness of primitive man to the abysmal brute is strikingly
  illustrated in the accompanying photograph. Makuik at mealtime must
  surely remind the reader of the Bronx Park Zoo at that time which the
  poet beautifully describes:

 "Between the dark and the daylight,
 When the lions release their lung-power,
 Comes a pause in the day's occupation
 Which is known as the feeding-hour."

  Eskimo diet varies with the season. During the long winter it
  consists mainly of the fatty overcoats worn by seal, walrus and
  otary. Another favorite _plate_ is made, en casserole, with alternate
  layers of whale-blubber and seal-flippers. The result tastes very
  much like stewed tennis-shoes. These wobbly dishes, garnished with
  seal-eyes, are served on squares of hide and are scraped-up with
  flippers or guppy-fins. Both hide and flipper are eaten at the close
  of the meal which eliminates the tedious dish-washing, wiping and
  putting-away of so-called civilized housekeeping. These blubberous
  foods supply the calories (about 2000 to the square inch) necessary
  to combat the absurd temperature of the winter season.

  When the sun re-appears in the spring and the song of the first
  lapwing is heard, the Eskimo begins to think intently of raw meat.
  "_Ukuk matok tomatok_," he mutters to himself. "I must have some
  vitamines."

  The scent of a bear two miles to windward crazes the native huntsman
  and speedily sets him to sharpening his spears and knives to
  razor-keenness. Yet so strict is his observance of Kryptok law that
  when a kill has been made he will touch no morsel until the meat has
  been divided according to the custom, for the chief the sirloins and
  porterhouses, for the lesser men the second and third joints and for
  the women the ribs, rump, neck and feet or whatever else is left.

  According to Makuik bear's-meat is greatly prized because of its
  toughness. It is considered effeminate to eat tender meat. The sound
  of an Eskimo meal is not unlike a Red-Cross bandage-tearing session.

  A study of the photograph under the microscope clearly shows the
  vitamines winding their curiously spiral course up and down the meal.

  The absence of table manners is not remarkable when one considers the
  absence of tables.

[Illustration: Dinner is Served]

Swiftly and noiselessly a large block of snow at the base of the cairn
itself moved to one side disclosing a laughing face, the same lovely
countenance upon which I had gazed several weeks before. The wearer
listened for a full minute with bird-like intentness, then leaped
lightly out and straightened up, a long-limbed, graceful creature
wearing the conventional summer furs of the Northern Eskimo. Her hood
was thrown back showing a glimpse of entrancing shoulder but what
dazzled me most were the starry blue eyes, fair skin and wealth of
molten, golden hair!

Her first act was to circumnavigate the cairn which she did with the
same silent rapidity that marked her every motion. She then made
directly for the lure, bending over it, touching it cautiously and
finally raising it and burying her face in its scarlet folds, while her
laughs rang out muffled but intoxicating.

This was my chance!

Bursting through my prison walls I rushed toward her while Swank, by
arrangement, crashed out of Pease, darted to the entrance, slid the
block into place and sat on it. I was upon her before she had a chance
to move.

"_Akalok!_" I cried (the Northern dialect for "friend"), as we rolled
over and over in the snow. My old football training stood me in good
stead for I had made a perfect diving tackle. Inwardly blessing the
name of Ted Coy, I pinned the lithe, palpitating body to the snow,
repeating more tenderly the soft appellation, "_Akalok, Akalok_."

But my triumph was shortlived.

For the first time her lips moved and from between them burst a wild,
frantic cry, strangely familiar to my ears.

"Makuik! Makuik!"

At the repetition I heard a shriek of pain from Swank and glanced over
my shoulder in time to see him rise in the air. The ice block was
shattered beneath him and I saw an ugly stub of seal-spear, thrust
accurately where he had formerly sat. Directly back of him leaped
an ape-like figure as swart and scowling as a Japanese war mask. He
carried a terrific weapon, a keen-edged blubber cutter, with which he
made directly at me.

At ten paces I recognized him but too late to stop the impending blow.
Firing over my shoulder, a tricky shot at best, I shattered the bone
blade into a thousand fragments, at the same instant jumping to my feet
and shouting--"Makuik! Tapok!"

I had given my name, "Tapok," the Icelandic pronunciation, and at the
sound he stopped like a man shot.

"Makuik!" I cried again.

His ferocious scowl faded through stupefaction to astonishment and
gleeful recognition.

"Tapok!" he rumbled, spreading his arms wide. "_Kata pokok_ Ikik
_nakatok_!"

I regret that I cannot translate his remark which was highly improper
and referred definitely to the woman, Ikik, who stood trembling beside
us. She had raised her oomiak and now, to hide her blushes, folded her
glorious hair across her face so that she resembled some divine being,
half goddess, half skye-terrier. Back of the screen I saw her blue eyes
shining and caught a suppressed gurgle of mirth. All, then, was not
lost.

In the meantime the cairn was humming like a mighty hive while through
a re-opened aperture crawled other individuals, first a younger Eskimo,
a mere stripling, followed by four other Eskimos, all radiant blondes.
One of them carried a child, slung over her shoulder in her oomiak.

At a command from Makuik, Swank was helped to his feet, the spear being
extracted from his person by Snak, a slender maiden with a mischievous
smile who deftly poulticed the wound with a handful of snow.

If the reader is astounded at the sudden turn of events he can imagine
my feeling when my eyes rested on Makuik, mighty hunter of the Kryptok
tribe, whom I had last seen twenty years ago when we had fought our way
four hundred miles across broken ice from Ki, an uncharted speck north
of Iceland, to Archangel. It is a long story. Suffice it to say that
I had saved his life twelve times during the trip while he had done
nearly as well by me. We had sworn eternal blood-brotherhood and the
word of an Eskimo is as good as his bond; better, in fact.

The Kryptok tongue came back to me fluently and I quickly assembled the
family group--for such it was--in our dugout where a distribution of
A-P and such small presents as I could lay my hands on transformed what
had been two hostile camps into one joyous assemblage.

While the women gurgled their satisfaction over their new fly swatters
and empty herring boxes, vying with each other in their attempts to
ease Swank's pain, Makuik explained the situation.

The women were all his wives, fruits of victorious battle. They were of
the Klinka tribe, perfect blondes, as I have noted. The young man was
his oldest son by an Iceland mother.

"Too old. I eat. No good wife ... good eat," he explained frankly.

The infant was his youngest. There would be others. His party had been
caught at the Pole by an unexpectedly early summer. For protection from
the heat they had taken to the cairn, there to await the winter freeze
which would make travel comfortable and possible.

"But why did you hide?" I asked.

"Me not know," he said, smiling craftily. "You have trees."

"Trees?" I mused, then burst out laughing. Of course! He referred to my
imperial and goatee, which I have worn since my service in the Bodansky
Zouaves, and which he had never seen!

It was as clear as day.

Chuckling with delight, the old warrior showed me over their living
quarters while I marvelled at his vigor, preserved in this world of
ice. The interior of the cairn was astounding. Instead of entering a
domed chamber, similar to the many igloos I have inhabited, we went
down, down for a surprising distance. The entire habitation was hewn
from the eternal ice to depths far beyond the reach of sun or storm.
It was a three-room-and-bath arrangement, the latter consisting of a
trough, at a slightly lower level than the main floor, filled with
lucent seal oil. The rooms were respectively, living-room (which also
served as kitchen and dining-room), bedroom, simply furnished with
community sleeping-bag, etc., and storeroom, piled high with blubber,
fur-steaks, walrus eyes and other Eskimo dainties. The temperature
was slightly below freezing, a delightful change from the prostrating
heat we had been enduring, though I will confess that I began to think
longingly of mittens and bear-skins and was glad when we once more
ascended into warmer atmosphere.

I reached the surface just in time to meet the returning members of my
party who, needless to say, were faint with astonishment at the change
in conditions.

General introductions were in order and a blithe evening meal was soon
under way. But how different a feast from the man-made orgy that had
disgraced our arrival. How completely the presence of these gentle
savage women had altered the complexion of our enjoyment.

Sprawling about Ikik and Snak, and the other three, Yalok, Klikitok and
Lapatok (whose babe had been placed in its cold storage niche), my
companions engaged in all sorts of innocent foolery. Though they spoke
not a word of each other's language a subtle understanding had sprung
up between them. Was it the common strain of Caucasian blood or simple
sex calling to even simpler sex? I cannot answer.

Frissell had produced a lavish supply of toys from his pack which made
an enormous hit. Ikik had a colored doll which she nursed affectingly.
Lapatok joyfully wound a police rattle, while Snak, Klikitok and Yalok
sucked rubber teething-rings with evident relish.

Makuik reserved for himself a monkey-on-a-stick which he regarded as a
sceptre, the mechanism of which pleased and mystified him.

At nine o'clock Whinney announced triumphantly that his radio was
working. He switched it on and we listened in awe while a far-away
voice, introduced as Miss Anita Scatchett of the New Jersey State
Normal School, told a Bedtime story, "How the Animal Crackers Came
Alive."

I say "we listened in awe." I must amend that statement. For a
few moments I was mildly impressed. It did seem odd to think of a
gentle spinster in Newark, thousands of miles away, speaking to
these children of nature. But as far as our guests were concerned, the
feature was a dud. The subject matter soon began to bore us all and we
shut it off, to Whinney's disgust.

  A FAR-OFF FASHION-PLATE

  In the charming scene herewith depicted, Yalok, the beautiful Klinka
  belle, is posing as if she were a mannequin on parade in some
  lovely _al fresco fête_, as indeed she is. The background in itself
  is interesting, showing, at stage right, the Tarpaulin Tea-House
  erected and conducted during the Summer months by Herman Swank, Dr.
  Traprock's artistic fellow-voyager. To this picturesque châlet the
  Eskimo maidens turned with womanly instinct and its accommodations,
  limited to two, were in great demand. Mr. Whinney, when not
  entertaining a personal guest, sat outside. But these intimate
  details need not detain us.

  The principal figure is Yalok who, for the purposes of photography,
  has donned the very latest 1922 Spring-model sports-suit. She wears,
  it will be noted, "a woman's crowning glory"--her own hair. The other
  glories are supplied by the hair of various animals indigenous to the
  Arctic.

  Reading from North to South this snappy get-up consists of the otary
  over-smock or slip-in with sliding sleeves of unborn-seal, the
  roomy "roamers" of polar bearskin and the pliant _chassures_. The
  sleeves, another loose seal effect, modestly cover the entire arm
  or arms and flare back vehemently from the gauntlets, which may be
  eider-down or up. The roamers, again, cut loose from conventional
  lines and melt suavely into the retroussée wading slippers. The last
  mentioned articles are fashioned from the pelt of the Amok, which
  usefully grows hair on both sides of its hide. The fore-and-aft apron
  or windshield is nattily edged with ermine and at the back runs
  smartly into a train. A last-minute accessory is the fly-swatter, Dr.
  Traprock's gift to the lady, which is held at the correct angle of
  45°.

  More important, however, than mere costume is the art of wearing it,
  an art in which this lovely model is evidently entirely at home.
  Her position is that demanded of a debutante in the most exclusive
  Eskimo society, when she is presented to a distinguished foreigner,
  the head modestly bowed, the eyes downcast, the arms in an alluring
  come-and-get-me position and the feet gracefully parted in the middle.

  A final touch of chic unreproduceable by photography but which has
  all the allure of a truly Parisian _pomboire_, is the perfume (Eau de
  Musk-ox) which adds its ineffable odor to this arctic rose, a hovery
  halo, and exquisite ectoplasm.

[Illustration: A Far-off Fashion Plate]

A few moments later I rose with a start. Something in the air chilled
me with horror. Glancing toward the horizon I gasped, then quickly
caught myself.

The sun was half hidden below the horizon! The light was distinctly dim!

I thought no one had noticed my involuntary start, but Makuik, though
seemingly absorbed in his monkey, leaned toward me and whispered,
"Night come."

Night! My God! It had stolen upon us unaware. We would be caught,
trapped in the deadly grip of the North King who had claimed so many
brave men before us.

The darkened atmosphere suggested but one thought.

"Bed," I said. "Sleep."

My oblivious companions took it as a signal for dispersal. They rose
reluctantly. Good-byes were said. Noses were rubbed affectionately.

Then an embarrassing episode took place.

Makuik, who had marshalled his flock before him, suddenly seized the
lovely Ikik by the shoulder and thrust her into my arms.

"You take," he said, smiling broadly. "Me give."

Her warm body pressed against me, not unwilling. It is the Kryptok
custom, as usual as giving a man a drink.

Confused and inefficient, I stood there. But my perplexity was
shattered by another surprise. A compact, wiry form hurled itself
between us. It was Sausalito, her face livid with fury!

"You let that woman be!" she shrieked, panting, glaring.

Makuik shrugged his shoulders and pushed the Eskimo woman roughly
toward her fellow wives. Then, turning, he glanced contemptuously at
Sausalito.

"No good ... you eat." He leered, swinging off toward his sub-cellar.

"Dog-face!" screamed Sausalito. "Pig's-foot...."

Triplett's great hammer fist struck her squarely on the jaw and she
sank limp in his arms.

Late that night I lay tossing on my blankets, prey to a thousand
conflicting emotions, fear, joy, and sickening anxiety, beneath which,
like the burden of a refrain, ran the overwhelming thought: "She loves
me. Sausalito loves me. What shall I do?"

It was the first time such a proposition had ever daunted me.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 17: Literally.

 "When the wine of his love
 Is the grave of his wit."

See "The Song of Beer-wolf," trans. by Ola Ramberg.]

[Footnote 18: Puvis de Bloue says, in his "Voyages Blageux" (Flammarion
ed., 1918) "les yeux sont l'enemie de la verité."]

[Footnote 19: A variant of the always interesting skunk family,
distinguished by the constant orientation of its physical peculiarity.
It is perfectly safe to capture these little fellows from the south.
The Arctic type has been found as far south as Lake Wayagamac.

(See "Among the Moufette." J. Pell, Col. Coll., N.Y.) The pair captured
by Plock had been nullified by the usual method. Author.]




Chapter VII

  _Still procrastinating. Our pastimes at the Pole. An exchange of
  love-tokens. Ikik's avowal. Caught in the embrace of the Aurora._




Chapter VII


The longer I live the more of a fatalist I become. Looking back on
the weeks which followed our meeting with Makuik and his family I see
myself powerless in the grip of a force superior to my own. How else
can I account for the procrastination which, day after day, week after
week, held me in my perilous location. For that it was perilous my
brain told me clearly.

Seven previous trips into the Arctic had taught me that its climate
could be treacherous as well as friendly. If I have seemed to expatiate
on the tropical warmth of an exceptional summer, the hottest on record
in the meteorological archives of Iceland (which are the oldest in the
world), rest assured that it is with no wish to encourage ill-equipped
pleasure-parties to venture forth into these icy solitudes. I have been
warned by an eminent polar authority that it would be dangerous and
wrong to instill this idea. I thoroughly agree with him. Woe betide
the week-end tripper or basket-picnicker who fares beyond eighty-six
with no protection other than a warm sweater and a quart thermos of
coffee! He is doomed before he starts or immediately thereafter. When
the short summer wanes the thermometer plunges without warning to
incredible depths and almost certain disaster results.

  A NIMROD OF THE NORTH

  A large volume might be written about this illustration alone.

  Big game hunting, in the last analysis, is usually a feeble sort
  of sport. The stalking of itself is a beneficial form of exercise
  but when at last the two strong brutes, human and animal, stand
  face to face it is an odds-on bet on the human. An express-bullet
  takes little account of hide or hair. Compared with this form of
  target-practice, fly-swatting and mosquito-slapping are gallantry
  itself.

  We may learn something from Makuik, the Kryptok huntsman who is seen
  _en face_ in the act of capturing part of his winter's meat-supply
  in the person of a magnificent specimen of the _ursus polaris_.
  The method universally employed by the Eskimo is that of the
  surprise-onslaught. Polar bears, for some reason, do not expect to be
  attacked by men from the air.

  Perched on a rocky eyrie the native huntsman warily scans the floe
  for his victim. The path beneath the precipice is baited with small
  cubes of seal and pemmican meat along which the prey is led by
  appetite just as children at birthday parties are led through the
  mazes of a peanut-hunt. When the bear is directly below him, the
  hunter springs silently into the air and descends like a falling
  archangel on the creature's back. A hunter's prowess is measured by
  the height from which he dares to jump. Makuik holds the Kryptok
  record in this event is 40 Kyaks (approximately 520 ft.). At the
  termination of a successful jump the bear breaks the fall and the
  fall not infrequently breaks the bear. But the risk is great and in
  case of a miss the Nimrod becomes forthwith data for the actuaries
  and food for the bear. As in all aerial feats the important part is
  the landing.

  In the incident portrayed the result was the not unusual one of a
  glancing blow. Striking the bear's shoulder Makuik was thrown for a
  loss of seven yards, not, however, before he had pinned one of the
  bear's paws to the ice with his keen-edged ratak. From then on the
  fight was a fierce hand-to-paw affair, one round to a finish with the
  incessant in-fighting, knife against claw, brain against brain.

  Makuik won the decision after forty-three minutes of gruelling
  and growling work, not without considerable damage to his person.
  Throughout the battle he consistently placed his knife-thrusts where
  they could later be made into buttonholes by his beautiful wives,
  beginning at the lowest button and working upward to the lapel. The
  bear was thus actually tailored during the process of destruction.
  _Forest and Stream_ please copy.

[Illustration: A Nimrod of the North]

And yet, knowing these things, I stayed. Discarding all plans,
scrapping all schedules, denying all reasons, I delayed, lingered and
waited. For what? Death, perhaps, but before death, Love! Ah, love!
love! mad will-o'-the-wisp, flaming with tragic intensity in the very
core of a berg, destroying passion, paralyzing my will-power even as
the spirit of winter laid his icy hand on my shoulder.

My companions, fatally influenced by my example, were no longer
restless but completely satisfied with their surroundings and with the
society of the Klinka women who, as the light waned and the temperature
dropped, ventured more and more into the open.

Nowhere in the world will one find such gaiety, friendliness, and
generosity as among these child-like denizens of the North. I do not
except even the glorious Filbert Islanders who were my own discovery.
During many a long twilight I sat with Whinney, Triplett and Swank
about the Primus stove which we now found comfortable, chatting of
our Polynesian friends and evoking many a tender memory. Of all who
made that famous cruise only our former crew was missing, Thomas, the
sailor-man whom we left behind. But I could not find it in my heart to
envy him.[20]

Compared with northern tribes all Polynesians are slow and lethargic.
Nothing could exceed the swift grace of these glorious Klinkas, and
many a day of rare sport we had while there was still light. Our
contribution to the program usually consisted of an American game
adapted to local conditions: tennis, using the native snowshoes
for rackets and balls of inflated fish-membrane, or golf over a
sporty nine-hole course with constantly shifting snow-bunkers and
water-hazards. This variable quality in the links made play extremely
interesting and likewise supplied a much needed alibi for our scores.
Frissell's inventiveness created extraordinary good clubs out of parts
of our cooking utensils lashed to whale-bone shafts, with which it was
no unusual thing to drive upwards of seven hundred yards. The idea is
covered by patents.

To my amusement Makuik and his entire family were deathly afraid of
the pogo-sticks. In their simple minds this contrivance was endowed
with life of its own. When I finally forced one on Ikik she planted
it fervently on a little cairn where it was worshipped as a God. How
strangely the idea of the totem-pole persists! And speaking of poles,
no outdoor sport proved more popular than tether-ball, with the ball
tethered to the Pole itself.

The Eskimos were far from lacking in amusements of their own, though
these naturally had a direct bearing on some ulterior object such as
blubber for food-supply or furs for warmth. It has remained for the
superior white races to invent games which are of no use whatever.

Time and again Makuik thrilled us by his long distance harpooning of
seals which now sought the floes in large numbers.

The perfect poise, the powerful thrust, the long trajectory and the
final, squashing hit just behind the ear were enough to excite the envy
of an Olympic javelin thrower.[21] The feat was the more remarkable
when it is considered that a seal's ear is on the inside and,
therefore, invisible.

Some of the novices in my party were slightly overcome by the mad rush
of Makuik's family toward the stricken carcass from which they tore and
devoured long strips of blubber, but needless to say this was an old
story to me. Fresh seal's eyes are a coveted tid-bit, and I was much
touched when Ikik brought me one, warm and quivering, in the palm of
her hand. It was plainly a love offering as I saw when I looked from
her eyes to that of the seal. One should chew them, not gulp them down,
in order to get the full flavor which is not unlike a Cape Cod oyster,
though more salty and slightly oily.

The women were particularly fond of leading us on searching parties in
quest of seal roe, which we found in large quantities in the shallow
nests lined with the yellow wax which exudes from the pores of the
mother. Both roe and wax are highly prized by the natives who spread
them, mixed, on squares of seal hide, forming sandwiches. In winter
the seal fur is also included on account of the extra warmth which is
provided.[22]

It was a happy thought of mine to present Ikik with an enormous church
candle which, having been blessed, had been presented to me by the
Bishop Metaxis Polyphlosboios in Constantinople. Ikik and I were alone
when I offered it, in return for the eye she had given me. I wish my
readers could have seen her divine smile as she touched, smelled and
finally tasted the white cylinder, which was so much more refined than
the fresh fat and tallow which had been daily pabulum.

"_Tapok, Ataki!_ Traprock, I adore you!" she cried, throwing herself at
my feet and chewing the uppers of my moccasins, the native expression
of complete devotion.

"Enough!" I murmured, raising her by her hair; "here come the others."

Though my "affaire de cœur" was progressing satisfactorily, I was
forced to walk warily. Some of my fellows were infernal busy-bodies and
Sausalito, poor wretch, watched over me with furious jealousy.

Innumerable were the diversions of those happy, happy days, the mad
pursuit of an occasional musk-ox, of which the women were insanely fond
because of the perfume derived from its peripatetic gland, and the
absorbingly interesting observations of the Arctic guppys, those unique
fish which bear their live and full-formed young on the ice without
the tedious formality of laying an egg. The mother guppy immediately
eats her offspring and the race between her and the Eskimo audience to
see which could get the most, was not the least amusing phase of this
quaint accouchement.

And then the long, twilight evenings, snuggled down in the deep furs
of our friends, sharing the warmth of our tiny Primus under the Kawa's
lee, crooning our songs, passing our plugs and our gay banter. I feel
sure than I shall never be nearer heaven.

On an immemorial date, for our watches had long ago run down, we sat
thus in our little Arctic circle listening languidly to a number on
Whinney's radio,--"What the Sunday Schools of Kansas are Doing," I
believe it was,--no; "The weather a hundred years ago today," that
was it,--when I suddenly realized that it was dark; not twilight, but
actually dark!

Can you realize what that meant to me? Startled, I withdrew my thumb
from Ikik's soft lips and raised myself on my elbow. About me in the
gloom were vague bundles, Swank and Yalok, Frissell and Snak, Whinney
and Lapatok, Wigmore and Klipitok, Triplett and Sausalito, silent,
rapturous, oblivious. But a strange thing was happening.

All about the circumference of the great ice bowl, of which we were the
center, rose trembling, blue flames. I could hear their fluttering hiss
and crackle. Now they leaped higher, shooting out giant arms toward
the zenith, waving lambent fingers, shivering, interlocking, melting.
My companions, aroused, sat up and I could see their startled faces
lighted by an unearthly light.

The noise and glare increased. Swishing waves of fuchsia-pink swept
up the sky; muffled explosions were followed by writhing snakes of
lemon-yellow and far-flung globes of purple and crimson gleamed in the
sky while, directly overhead, millions of miles away, the North Star
looked down indifferently.

At times the wall of encircling flames, now approximately ten miles
high, leaped in unison, to a diabolical rhythm; again they moved about
us in procession, gigantic, towering, flapping, hissing, whistling,
rippling, a night-mare of glorious colors which have no names. The very
ice below me, cracking and groaning, was shot with fiery veins.


  AN ARCH ARCHEOLOGIST

  One of the most pathetic figures in the author's startling "exposure"
  is that of Bartholomew Dane, the Egyptologist who is here shown with
  Snak, his Klinka assistant, pursuing his speciality of comparative
  archeology.

  A word as to Dane's previous record may bring some information
  to the few Americans who have not made archeology, with emphasis
  on Egyptology, a hobby. Born of Nordic stock (his maternal
  Grandmother was one of the Iceland Krakkens), educated in the
  more-than-usually-common schools of South Bend, young Dane showed
  early aptitude in geography, history and kindred studies. His
  passion for research work was early in evidence his every leisure
  moment being spent in the examination of abandoned cellar-holes,
  cisterns, wells, rubbish-heaps and public dumps. His parents,
  fearful lest their son turn out to be a rag-picker secured for him
  an under-janitorship at the Natural History Museum of New York City,
  doubtless hoping to thereby shift the blame for his development
  from South Bend to the Metropolis. From then on his rise was rapid.
  Working his way up from the cellar we next hear of him as Secretary
  to Prof. Thurston Mudgett of the Extinct Civilizations Dept. His
  course from there to the Nile delta was clearly indicated.

  Six months later the young archeologist disappeared, only to
  reappear six months later laden with honours conferred by the
  Egyptian government, a full-professor in the College of Alexandria,
  a recognized authority abroad belatedly received with equal honors
  at home. His great work on Scarabs among the Arabs is in itself an
  enduring monument.

  What led Dane northward is a mystery. That he hoped to find the
  missing link in the almost completed itinerary of the lost tribes of
  Israel we know. That he failed in this dream is a sad fact. But there
  is solace in the thought that amid the snowy wildernesses of the Pole
  he found in the companionship of the sympathetic Snak a love which
  could never have reached him over the hot sands of Sahara.

  Due to overwork, exposure and an unavoidable blow on the head,
  his mind has failed considerably of late but in his lucid moments
  he hints darkly at having made certain interesting discoveries
  which have nothing whatever to do with archeology. His earlier
  achievements, his protracted sojourn in the Tomb of Put, his
  discovery of the Temple of Murad, all these he lightly dismisses.
  "The first year was the pleasantest," he laughs; the rest is silence,
  and the silence is, we trust for this courageous spirit--rest.

[Illustration. An Arch Archeologist]

The Eskimos had buried their heads in their oomiaks, my companions lay
face downward.

Desperately frightened, I still resolved to face the end, to see what
my dazed senses told me was the final conflagration of the world.

Staggering to my feet, I glared about me, taking in the picture with
all its ghastly details, the Pole and its flags, the cairn, the Kawa,
every block and halyard of which was etched on this field of flame. How
insignificant it all seemed.

The world had finished its trick; it was as a tiny bead, cast away by
the Creator, a cinder in the eye of God!

Suddenly the flames turned incandescently white, rushed toward me and,
on an overwhelming wave of siren wailing, I was swept away, billions of
miles beyond the Pole-star, to Eternity....

       *       *       *       *       *

Ikik was rubbing my forehead with a cool tundra sponge and her face
above me was that of an angel.

"Did you see?" she asked. "It was beautiful."

The Eskimos were discussing the display critically.

"Too green," said Makuik. "No good. Cold come."

Peering through the darkness I saw the dim outline of the Kawa. The
Pole stood intact. Nothing was harmed, nothing singed.

The astounding truth burst upon me, astounding and important to me
though nothing to these ages-old Aryans.

We had been in the exact center of the aurora borealis.

Another milestone for American science!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 20: William Henry Thomas, cook, valet and foremast-hand who
refused to leave the Islands, where he now rules with the title of
Filbert the First, under an individual mandate conferred by the Paris
Conference. See "Cruise of the Kawa," Chap. 9, p. 133.

W.E.T.]

[Footnote 21: For an interesting account of Eskimo games see the
essay by Dr. R. Petersen. "In Lintinwinger i Kippenskabssel-skabet i
Christiania," delivered April 3, 1920. W.E.T.]

[Footnote 22: I tried to eat one of these fur-bearing sandwiches in
1898 and nearly died laughing. T.]




Chapter VIII

  _The Arctic Night. The temptation of Traprock. The pros and cons
  of falling. We solve an age-old riddle. Our Polar Christmas. The
  love-philtre. Abandonment._




Chapter VIII


"Eighty-six below," announced Captain Triplett the next morning, "an' a
fine, starry night."

Old Ezra was right. Night had fallen while we slept. The long Arctic
blackness had followed our twilight sleep, and we were now in the grip
of its intense cold.

How strangely fate works her miracles! But for my first glimpse of
Ikik and our subsequent meeting, we should inevitably have perished,
clad as we were in our light linen-mesh and flannels. But the Eskimos
had foreseen our peril and supplied us with roomy garments from their
own abundant store. No gift in their possession was withheld by these
warm-hearted people. Gauntlets, socks, boots and great hooded oomiaks
were pressed upon us in which, as soon as we had become accustomed to
their overpowering odor, we were extremely comfortable and were able to
go about during the less severe weather without danger of being frozen
unawares, a very real risk for the novice.[23]

Makuik was insistent that both parties join in sharing the protection
of his sub-surface home.

"My meat, yours ... my woman, yours ... you know."

His words were accompanied by the Kryptok sign of blood-brotherhood
reserved for members of the clan. Were I to divulge it here I should
some day feel the thrust of Makuik's salmon-spear between my shoulder
blades. It was a dramatic feature of Kryptok ritual that a sin against
blood brotherhood may only be washed out by the blood of the offending
brother.

But though I realized the closeness of the tie which bound me to this
furry friend, though every fibre of my being cried out to accept the
gift which he offered so gladly, a gift which meant warmth, happiness,
love!--knowing all this, I was firm in my refusal.

In the face of a temptation, the greatest perhaps of my life, I
resisted, I fought, I struggled.

My reasons were many and complicated. If they were right or not I do
not know, but they seemed so at the time.

To begin with I knew in my heart that the beginning of close clan
relations with these magnificent Klinkas meant the end of the Traprock
Expedition! That we should ever again return to civilization was
absolutely unthinkable. Here, in this winter solitude, I saw the
first glimmerings of the truth over which the scientific world has so
long puzzled. Here was the answer to the old, old, question, "Why do
explorers leave home?" Why have so many never returned?

They have been absorbed by, and eventually into, one of these
magnificent tribes. They have disappeared, or if they have found
their way back to civilization, having proved failures in their new
environment, they are tongue-tied, evasive, ashamed.

If I accepted Makuik's hospitality, in full, I saw another inevitable
result. He would eventually have to die at my hands. There is room in
a small nomadic tribe for but one leader, one "Kalok" or "Strong man."
This is the ancient law of evolution. Bound as I was to Makuik I
hesitated to take the first step which spelt his doom.

  THE BATTLE ON THE BRINK

  Students of the text of this volume will recall that a distinct
  rivalry existed between two of the principal characters, Sausalito
  and Ikik. The author makes what to us seems a delicate distinction
  regarding the object of this rivalry. "It was," he says, "not so much
  me as my love." There is something almost astral in this subdivision.
  Be that as it may, a strong feeling of competition existed between
  the two ladies which vented itself in frequent passages between them
  similar to that illustrated.

  In this case the struggle started, as usual, in the most friendly
  manner, its object being the possession of a stub of candle, the
  last of the great dip presented to Ikik by Dr. Traprock. Developing,
  as such things do, from playful wrestling to rough-house, it was
  not long before the Klinka maiden found that she was struggling for
  her life. Sausalito's experience in catch-as-catch-can work, gained
  up and down the Barbary coast, was an equal match for the supple
  strength of her adversary and there is little doubt that the result
  would have been fatal to one or both participants had it not been for
  the timely intervention of Makuik who, seeing how things were going
  and fearing possible damage to one of his favorite wives, kicked over
  the icy stage upon which the drama was being enacted, at the same
  instant throwing the carcass of a bull-seal where it would intercept
  the fall of the contestants. Had it not been for the skill of Makuik
  in throwing the bull we can well imagine what would have happened.
  The animal weighed 220 poks or "meals," that is, approximately 2200
  lbs., a "meal" being reckoned as 10 lbs. of any form of food-supply.

  After the fall described above a temporary truce was patched up but
  the feeling of rivalry remained acute. As the philosophical author
  observes, "Being in love with two women is one thing: being loved by
  them is another."

[Illustration: The Battle on the Brink]

A final consideration, though not one which bore much weight, was that
there were not enough Klinkas to go round. I have, perhaps, indicated
in my previous chapter, that the process of natural selection, though
far from home, had not ceased to operate. The Klinka women, while
filled with joyous camaraderie, clearly had their favorites and the
pairing which I noted most often was that of Swank and Yalok, Frissell
and Snak, and Whinney and Lapatok.

Frissell amused Snak immensely with his outlandish noises and
imitations, and Lapatok, who stayed near the cairn more than the others
in order to care for little Kopek, her boy, found in the now helpless
Whinney another child upon whom to lavish her affection.

Makuik smiled tolerantly at these innocent relations. The women were
his, when all was said, and I have no doubt that had the faintest wave
of jealousy stirred his primitive heart he would have calmed it by
the old tribal method of holding the offender under water for the few
seconds necessary to allow the ice-opening to freeze over.

Unfortunately the other members of the expedition did not accept the
situation so calmly. Plock, Miskin and Sloff were by no means satisfied
with an arrangement which so plainly left them out of it. Dane was not
by nature a ladies' man, though he took the color of the others' mental
attitude. On numerous occasions I was forced to intervene when a sudden
minor crisis developed. Miskin took umbrage because Snak gave Frissell
the largest piece of blubber, or some other tom-foolery, and before one
could stop it the air was hot with suppressed antipathy.

This state of affairs frankly worried me and I was not anxious to make
it worse by accentuating it in the intimacies which were bound to
develop in Makuik's igloo.

I therefore issued the strictest orders that all my men should bunk on
the Kawa, a regulation which I forced myself to adhere to in spite of
the most terrific temptations. We had completely overhauled our running
gear during the warm weather and now found that by running the Tutbury
at quarter speed, thus charging the batteries, we were able to generate
just the right amount of heat required to keep us comfortable.

We soon adapted ourselves to our new mode of life. All outside
thermometers were hung upside down in order to read properly and
whenever the temperature was above forty below we sallied forth into
the night, on pleasure or profit bent.

An early inspection was made by Miskin, Sloff and myself of the rim
of the ice bowl, immediately following the stupendous display of the
aurora borealis, which had ushered in the winter. Makuik accompanied
us and it was from the naive comments of this child of the north that
we arrived at a solution of a large part of the problems in connection
with this phenomenon.

As we travelled about the circumference of the bowl I was at once
struck by a deep trench or moat which followed its outline. The sides
of this moat, which averaged approximately 200 yards in width, were
glazed with freshly formed ice which appeared at first to be black in
color. A closer inspection showed that this color was derived from a
sub-surface stratum of finely powdered carboniferous deposit similar to
coal or cinders. At no place were we able to reach this deposit owing
to the shortness of our ice picks, but both Miskin and Sloff agreed
that the buried material was clearly a metallic slag which had been
subjected to extreme heat.

It was at this point that Makuik injected his interesting personality
into our deliberations. Observing our puzzled looks he stooped and
gathered up a handful of loose snow crystals which he thrust into his
mouth, at once expelling them with a mighty gust of breath. Then he
clapped his stomach and said--

"Ice ... sick ... so ... pouf!" another great blast.

My mind flashed back instantly to the claims of an old scientist of
whom I had heard my friend Waxman speak, one John Cleves Symmes. As far
back as 1819 Symmes had advanced the theory that the earth was hollow.
His exact statement reads "the earth is hollow and habitable within,
being composed of a number of solid, concentric spheres." Unfortunately
Symmes was unable to travel further north than the site of what is now
Racine, Wis.,[24] so that his theory remained only a theory and he was
eventually laughed out of court.

Now, over a century later, I was to verify a part of his suspicion.
That the earth was hollow we could not doubt. Subsequent excavations
in the great polar ditch confirmed what we had begun to realize.
The entire section of earth crust at this end of the axis was loose!
Deep in the bowels of Mother Earth still burned the terrific primal
fires, occasionally venting themselves in some such upheaval as we
had witnessed. Whinney later corroborated the findings of Sloff and
Miskin regarding excavated specimens of the slag, namely, that they
were composed of rhyolite rocks, pulverized lime and other building
materials plainly produced by volcanism. The ceaseless whirl of the
earth on its axis naturally throws these expanding substances toward
the Pole until the bung, or world stopper, is loosened. As soon as the
terrific pressure is relieved the ice cap sinks back and the melted
snow at once seals the circular fissure.

It is the discovery of such long-sought truths as this which more than
repays me for the hardships involved. As I pen these lines I can but
bow my head in humble thankfulness to Him who knew too well to fashion
this Earth without a safety valve.

The exact date of this and other discoveries is indeterminate. Since
the stopping of our chronometers we had gone mainly by guesswork. I was
fully aware, from the advent of the polar night, that time had slipped
on to approximately September 20th. Knowing our exact position (Lat.
90°, Long. 0) it was a simple matter for Triplett to re-establish a
definite day schedule by the theodolite-hygrometer method combined with
astronomy. The weather was now clear and excellent views of the stars
were obtainable from any given point. Altair, Vega and Betelgeuse were
particularly visible, but Triplett's favorite constellation was the
Dipper, the handle of which he usually triangulated with Cygnus and
ourselves. Three successive observations gave Saturday, September 28th
as the correct answer and I forthwith posted notices of this fact,
which was celebrated by a joint feast.

Night, it is said, is the time for reflection and I now had ample
opportunity for this exercise. Unfortunately for the philosophic calm
which might have resulted from thought, Ikik, my lovely northern
sweetheart, had other ideas as to the proper disposal of the nocturnal
hours. The glances which she levelled at me across the Primus were, to
say the least, importunate. Little by little I felt my icy resolution
thawing beneath her tropic influence.

It was an odd situation. About me the wastes of berg and floe, the
mercury skulking in the basement of the thermometer, while in my heart
burned an increasing glow that would not be extinguished. Yet I fought
on, a St. Anthony of the North.

Christmas came, as it will even in this distant clime. The event was
marked by a general celebration. As I went about the preparations for
the feast I little realized how tragically the date was to stand out in
my memory.

Morning dawned dark and clear. We used the Pole for our tree, having
fashioned branches of oars, pogo-sticks and other suitable materials.
During what would have been the fore-noon we groped our way to the edge
of the ice bowl, in groups of two or three. I was in one of the groups
of two. The other half was Ikik.

Sitting in silence on the edge of the earth crater, I mused sadly. How
wonderful, I thought, if the great safety valve would but open and bear
my love and me away in its flaming arms. But the conflagration was to
be of a more human and dangerous character.

"See," whispered the maiden. "I have brought my present for you."
How like her it was, to steal away from the others for this sacred
presentation. I peered at the object in her hand. It was a small sack
of translucent fish membrane filled with a viscous liquid.

  ODE TO THE AURORA

  No more poignant moment in the history of American literature has
  ever been recorded by the camera than that shown with this text which
  portrays Whinney, the poet-scientist, in the very act of creating his
  immortal poem "Ode to Aurora," which John Farrar, the veteran critic,
  pronounces "the best classic ode ever written north of the arctic
  circle."

  As a poet Whinney resembles Milton, in that he is blind. Though this
  was only a temporary affliction,--snow-blindness,--its immediate
  effects were heartrendingly pathetic. Not only did the unfortunate
  traveller miss seeing the Pole and the polar fireworks but he was
  also forced to master the most difficult of all literary exercises,
  that of operating a typewriter with mittens on. The ancient pastime
  of catching a flea while wearing boxing-gloves is child's-play
  compared with this achievement. Hour after hour, day after day, the
  persistent poet practised his sightless-touch system.

  "What does it look like?" he would ask, submitting a page
  to Sausalito who had good-naturedly assumed the duties of
  nursing-secretary.

  "Nothing," would be the invariable reply.

  But with dogged perseverance Whinney struggled on, gaining a comma
  here, and a colon there, until he had mastered his instrument. The
  result all the world knows,--those deathless lines beginning:

 "O Aurora!
 Not only East, but North as well,
 And West! and South!
 Th' extraordinary tidings tell!
 Flash thy bright beams
 And wave thy lambent paws,
 Clap thou thy rays
 In luminous applause."

  For sheer glory of color the description of the aurora which forms
  the main part of the ode has never been equalled. And then the solemn
  close, touching in its modesty.

 "Tell thou the world,
 That it remember shall
 The names of Traprock!
 Whinney! Swank! et al."

  Since returning to this country Mr. Whinney has taken out a regular
  poet's licence and is now turning out verse of the very highest
  standard.

[Illustration: Ode to the Aurora]

"What is it?" I asked tenderly.

I could feel her flush against my cheek.

"Walrus tears."

"Walrus tears?" Ah, yes, I remembered. Years ago an old woman in
Bjarkoi had told me that the tears of a male walrus if caught fresh,
were an infallible love potion.[25]

"Like Tristan and Isolde," I murmured. She shook her head,
uncomprehendingly.

"Drink!" she whispered.

Smiling at the superstition, yet unwilling, unable, in fact, to resist
the pleading look in her eyes, I loosed the thong and placed the sack
to my lips.

The next instant she was in my arms!

My brain reeled. The stars danced dizzily overhead and were then
blotted out. A moment later I became aware of a ludicrous and
embarrassing circumstance. Locked in each other's embrace we were
sliding down the icy incline of the bowl!

We struck fairly in the midst of a group composed of Triplett, Makuik
and several others who greeted our arrival with roars of laughter;
surely a strange ending to a "crise d'amour."

At four-thirty we lighted our tree and had carols, presents and
general dancing. At six the feast was served, the heaping ice slabs
being placed along the counter of the Kawa which was decked with
her full suit of colors and all her extra riding-lights. Pemmican,
blubber-steak, seal- and walrus-eyes, hide-salad and guppy-croquettes
were supplemented from our waning stores of biscuit, herring, ham,
candles and A-P. Even little Kopek was not denied a place and sat near
his mother sipping a soapstone cup of modified whale's milk.

Swank had compounded a new drink for the occasion which he called
"Traprock tea," consisting of A-P shavings dissolved in salad oil with
a number of live guppys flapping about on the surface, "to give it
animation" as the inventor explained.

The animation was certainly not lacking and the fun waxed fast and
furious.

At an earlier date, late in November, an all night poker game had been
instituted by Wigmore, with whom this sport was a ruling passion.
Warned by me, the participants had signed an agreement to quit promptly
on the 15th of March, in order to avoid the bickering which might be
expected when some loser inevitably insisted that they play "just a
week" or a "month more." The gaming element now drifted away, one by
one, toward the table in the Kawa's cabin. Most of the others had also
withdrawn into the obscurity. Little Kopek had long ago been put to
bed. Makuik, I regret to say, was helpless.

It was then that I noticed for the first time the absence from my side
of Ikik. She had stolen off, unobserved. Rising, I lurched steadily
around the cairn. My head was aching, my heart full of unspeakable
longing and sorrow. Was it the Traprock tea or the love philter?
Probably both.

Resolutely turning my back on the camp I walked to the far edge of the
ice bowl where I sat down. One by one the lights of the celebration
flickered and went out. I heard the card players shouting their maudlin
good-nights to each other. Once a voice shouted "Traprock!" and,
following a remark I could not catch, came a burst of coarse laughter.
Then all was silence.

An hour later I arose with a slight shiver; it was 38 below. Though my
hands and feet were numb, in my veins throbbed liquid fire. Remorse
gnawed at my heart. What had I said to Ikik that had turned her from
me on this, of all nights, our first Christmas together?

Reaching the side of the Kawa, where all lay plunged in slumbers a
sudden thrilling resolution flooded over me. I must see her!

I must whisper a tender good-night to the one who had grown to mean
more to me than all the rest of the world.

Turning abruptly, my brain reeling, I made directly for the entrance to
the igloo.

The door-block slid back noiselessly. A moment later I stood in the
low room, hesitant. The single tundra wick gave a dim light through
which I saw Makuik's beady eyes fixed on me. With a sweeping gesture he
indicated a vacant space in the line of deep breathing figures. Then he
too sank back and instantly began snoring.

With infinite care I crept over the human mounds until I sank into the
space Makuik had pointed out.

Touching the figure next me I whispered in the lowest of tones.

"Dear one, I have come to say good-night."

She turned toward me, her face shadowed in her oomiak, soft arms twined
stealthily about me as a vibrant voice murmured "Walter!"

I bounded to my feet with a cry of dismay that caused the sleepers to
stir uneasily.

The woman followed me as I hurdled my way to the stairway. In the
entrance I glanced back for a second on a face livid with passion.

It was the face of Sausalito!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 23: In 1906, off Trollebotn in Helgeland, I saw an
inexperienced Niblick fisherman overtaken by a cold snap. He nearly
froze to death as he was endeavoring to reach our ship (The Primrose),
his motions becoming gradually slower until he finally came to a
standstill, with one foot raised in act of taking a step. We got him
aboard with nothing more serious than the loss of one arm which broke
off as we were lifting him over the side.]

[Footnote 24: The Case Harvester Co. has meritoriously placed a
monument to Symmes on the front lawn of its subsidiary plant, The Belle
Terre Mfg. Co. The monument consists of a large hollow ball of local
granite. Keys at res. of John Reid, Jr., Caretaker.]

[Footnote 25: The Walrus's habit of weeping when one of their number is
captured is one of the most pathetic sights in the world. I once caught
a small calf in the Greely Straits and was immediately surrounded by
the herd which burst into tears as they rose about me. An old bull,
who had hooked his tusks over the gunwhale, cried so copiously that my
kayak was half full of tears which, being ignorant of their value, I
foolishly gave to the natives.]




Chapter IX

  _Sausalito's strategy. Orders must be obeyed. We turn southward. The
  parting. Mutiny and desertion. In the grip of the Ice King. A fight
  to the finish. Victory._




Chapter IX


She came directly to me in the morning. Sleep had calmed her somewhat.
She was cool, but determined. In her hand she held a packet of papers,
sealed with the seal of the E.U.

"Your orders," she said briefly and turned to leave the cabin.

"One moment," I said. "You others, kindly leave us. Sausalito, remain."

She sat down limply.

Plock grinned malevolently as he thumped up the companion-way. He knew
what was coming, the blackguard.

As I took the packet I saw at a glance that the seal had been broken
and clumsily repaired.

Walking to the hatchway I closed it.

"Where did you get these?"

"I f--f--found them," she stammered.

"Sausalito," I said gently, "you lie."

My tenderness disarmed her. Throwing herself on her knees she burst
into a flood of hysterical weeping.

  A MOMENT MUSICAL

  It is not surprising that Triplett and Traprock were amused by the
  reaction of Yalok, the Klinka maiden, to the miracle of the radio.
  The author tells us that the "_morceau_" picked-up at the moment
  this photograph was taken was a harmonica-solo by F.P. Adams of New
  York. Mr. Adams holds all records for plain and fancy harmonica-work,
  triple-tonguing, echo-effects, vox-humana and choir-invisible. The
  _maestro_ was accompanied at Newark, by D.T. Smeed on the pianoforte.
  Had the great artists known the joy they were bringing to the far-off
  ice-maiden, while they could not have put their backs into their work
  more thoroughly, they would doubtless have felt more amply repaid
  than they did when they left the offices of the Westinghouse Company.

  The number tried and rendered on this particular occasion was
  Tristan's song from Der Erl-Kœnig, the immortal lyric beginning:

  "Childe Hassam to a dark tower came," and ending with that pathetic
  musical fiasco

 "Placing the slughorn to his lips,--
           He blew!"

  The hitherto-unheard and unheard-of sound of a B flat slughorn,
  reaching into these frozen fastnesses, stirred the very depths of
  the Eskimo auditor, while the white strangers, unconscious of the
  emotional tumult they had aroused, assisted by Messrs. Adams and
  Smeed, laughed uproariously at the scene. Dr. Traprock's demeanor,
  especially, is positively mephistophelian. Can it be that he thinks
  of playing the satanic rôle to Triplett's Faust?

  Dr. Traprock assures us that we are too imaginative. "It was a
  glorious performance"; he says: "Long may its frozen echoes hover
  'round the Pole, to thaw out in successive Springs as the years roll
  on. I shall not be there to hear them but I shall be happy to think
  that they persist."

[Illustration: A Moment Musical]

"No, no!" she wailed. "I found them. I was putting your brief-case in
order, and then my curiosity got the better of me and I opened them.
But read, read!"

Obeying her injunction I unfolded the papers, and sat back,
thunderstruck. The orders were brevity itself. They said simply. "Sail
south, at once." My face must have expressed my bewilderment for she
continued. "You see! You see! the moment I read them I knew these
orders were a plot, a plot to make you turn back, a plot to discredit
... the man ... I love."

Her voice sank to a low moan and her shoulders were again racked by
sobs. I saw it all now. Consumed by jealousy, knowing the contents of
the papers, she had withheld them until her woman's nature could stand
no more. In the dim light of the cabin, her face transfigured with
tenderness, she was actually beautiful.

I raised her gently from the floor. "That will do," I said.

"I am sorry ... sorry," she moaned.

I pointed to the companion-way and she went out silently.

In the quarter hour which followed I wrestled with a temptation more
terrible than any trial of the flesh, the trial of my honor. Once, my
hand, holding the orders, stretched toward the cabin lamp; a few ashes,
and all would be solved. Then I hastily drew back as if the flame had
scorched my soul. When I finally arose, spent and trembling, I could
proclaim myself the victor.

"Traprock must be true," I muttered. Then striding to the hatchway I
threw it open and stepped on deck.

"All hands aboard to receive orders," I bellowed.

Amid confused murmurs the company assembled.

"Sick?" asked Captain Triplett peering at my white face.

"No; well," I answered. "Men, stow your dunnage at once. We leave in
four hours for New York."

Makuik was surprised, but, I think, not displeased to see us depart.
Though imperturbable, he had felt the responsibility of so large a
tribe. His own way lay toward Iceland, via Ginnunagap and Nivlheim.
Perhaps he felt that as the spring hunting-season opened his movements
would be hampered. He must soon be on the march in order to reach his
destination over the solid ice before he was cut off in the land of
enemy tribes from whom he had ravished their loveliest possessions.

At any rate he worked with a will to speed our departure. Though he
must surely have counted on the probability of none of us ever reaching
safety he remained generous, bright and smiling to the last, insisting
on dividing what remained of his food supply and heaping a monumental
pile of oomiaks, spears and other equipment on the Kawa's deck.

When we had turned our little craft about and cast off our moorings I
stepped into the space between the two parties. It was a trying moment.
I had prepared a short speech for the occasion but found I could not
trust myself to deliver it.

Advancing toward Makuik I silently gave the Kryptok brotherhood sign,
which he returned. I had not seen Ikik since the previous evening but
I now perceived her in the background and noticed that wise old Makuik
had made fast one of her ankles to a large block of ice.

Approaching her quietly I hung an oil skin tobacco pouch about her
neck. It contained a book-plate bearing the Traprock arms[26] and the
device "Traprock must be true." On the back of this I had written, in
Klinka script, "I could not love thee, dear, so much, loved I not honor
more."

Blinded with tears, I turned and for the first time in many blissful
weeks, gave the old, old, command, "Mush!"

       *       *       *       *       *

On February twelfth, we had reached eighty-five. Progress in the
cold and dark was infinitely slower than it had been during the warm
northward journey. The absence of mosquitoes was a compensation but on
the whole travel was much more arduous. The mean temperature from Jan.
1st to Feb. 10th was 68° below, the meanest I have ever encountered.

But I was in no hurry. We were very comfortable on our admirable
craft and a careful reckoning of supplies gave me no cause for alarm.
According to my list, we should be able to hold out for another year if
worst came to worst.

It came to worse than that.

My rude awakening came on February 17th.

It had been a wretched day with alternating snow and blizzard gales.
The thermometers had gone their limit (100 below) and would have gone
further if they had been longer. Cooped up in the cabin, worn with
toil, frazzled with the bickering of the card players to whom I had
given one week of grace for final rounds of roodles, my nerves were
taut and jumpy. I ordered Swank to step aft and fetch me a plug of A-P.
He was gone an unconscionable time and when he returned his face was
blanched with terror.

"The bin's empty, Sir," he reported.

Empty!

I stared at him in amazement. Far into the night I went over my bills
of lading promising myself a thorough stock-taking in the morning.

But the disaffected element on board were ahead of me. When I came on
deck the following day, they were grouped in the waist of the ship.
The only greeting I got was black looks. Bulky haversacks and walking
gear lay piled behind them. Plock stepped forward and began speaking
nervously and rapidly.

"Traprock," he said, "this is where we quit. We've had enough of your
damned seal-skin ship and your pulling and hauling. It's dogs' work,
not men's. If you want to come with us, come. If not, stay here and
freeze to hell. We've taken our share of the chow, and we're off. We
can make better time without you than with you."

I was unarmed and practically alone. The only other man I could count
on, on deck, was Whinney and he was still half blind. But I did not
hesitate a second.

Reaching upward I grasped a heavy icicle which hung from the main stay
sail block and raised it high above my head. "Mutiny!" I cried. Plock
dodged and treacherously thrust in front of him Dane, who received the
full force of the blow. At the same instant the crack of a revolver
rang out and I fell senseless to the deck.

When I regained consciousness four hours later, my first act was to
stagger to my feet. The bullet had inflicted only a bone-bruise, just
grazing my head, and thanks to Sausalito's prompt skill, I was still
alive. She, poor creature, in her humble way, had shown naught but
subservience since we had started southward.

"Where are they? Did you get them?" I shouted.

"No, sir," replied Triplett, shame-facedly. "They got away. Took most
'er the grub, too. You see we wuz unprepared. I was in my nighty."

"So was I," echoed Swank.

"Fools!" I blazed. "Idiots! Cowards! Follow me."

It took their combined efforts to hold me in the cabin. I was still too
weak to put up much of a fight. But the following morning we started.

Leaving Whinney alone, with instructions to fire an answering signal
if he heard our shots, I divided our party into two groups. Dane, I
might mention, still lay senseless in the lazarette. Frissell went
with Triplett, Swank and Sausalito, who refused to be left behind,
accompanied me.

My instructions were to circle the Kawa with a half mile radius
increasing this distance each time the two parties met. Five times this
toilsome operation was repeated. Hundreds of times I paused to scan the
horizon with my glasses. The murky daylight, of which we were beginning
to have a scant two hours, was fading and I was in despair. A short
distance from the ship what there had been of a trail became confused.
The fugitives appeared to have separated. Perhaps dissension as to
direction had already broken out. We stumbled on in despair.

Suddenly a cry from Sausalito brought me up, standing. Her sharp eyes
had detected nearly a mile away, a black figure moving across the ice,
the bulky form of Plock. He was running toward a narrow lead of open
water of which we had encountered several on the previous day. I saw
at once that his plan was to leap the intervening water and trust to
the widening breach to cut off pursuit. There was not an instant to
lose.

Adjusting both hind and fore sights, I took careful aim and fired.

He pitched forward in the act of jumping and lay on the very edge of
the floe. So great was the impetus of his huge carcass, that, to my
horror, I saw his heavy pack slide over his head and disappear into the
inky waters. It sank instantly. He was stone dead when we came up to
him, his body already rigid with cold.

"We shall have to take him back," I said. In my mind was a fear, born
of past experience, that we might _need_ him.

Dragging our loathsome burden we made a slow trip toward the supposed
location of the Kawa. Black night had fallen and we could see nothing.
A fine snow set in. I at once fired the danger signal and was immensely
relieved to hear answering shots from a direction at right angles to
that in which we had been travelling. Such are the narrow squeaks of
polar travel.

We found that Triplett and Frissell had gotten in before us bringing
the half frozen Wigmore, whom they had stumbled across by pure luck.
He was without supplies or oomiak and must have perished in another
five minutes. When he had recovered sufficiently to speak he confirmed
my suspicions. Two hours out from the Kawa a bitter quarrel had broken
out and the deserters had separated but not before Sloff and Plock had
despoiled him of his food and protecting garments. "Another mouth to
feed," I thought bitterly.

Sloff and Miskin were never heard of again. Somewhere in the heart of
the floe their bodies lie, intact. But there can be no hell hot enough
for their souls.

Of our supplies were left two cases of herring and a bale of shredded
wheat, for seven men and one woman.

       *       *       *       *       *

Now if ever had come the time for me to prove to my comrades the value
of what the North had previously taught me, namely, how to live off
the ice. As has been proven by travellers before me, this can be done.
But the reader is asked to remember that we had embarked on our cruise
with no suspicion that it would ever be necessary. Our equipment was
designed for a mode of life from which only the treachery of a
human element had forced us to depart.

  DIRTY WORK AT THE IGLOO?

  No, there is really nothing wrong with this picture. Dr. Traprock
  explains that a scene of this sort, while unusual is not
  extraordinary.

  North of Eighty-six a man's rights are what he takes, a woman's
  what she can get. The facts of this particular case are as follows:
  Lapatok had captured a young pemmican in a snare of her own devising.
  Unaware that she was being observed by the all-seeing eye of her
  husband, Makuik, she began stripping off the bird's feathers and
  scales (with which its underside is covered) with her teeth,
  apparently preparatory to eating it. This is absolutely contrary to
  Kryptok law. All food is the common property of the family and must
  be instantly brought before the Aklok or Strong Man to be cached by
  him in the community food bin. Failure to do this means death.

  Makuik was quick to act. The expression on his face leaves no doubt
  that he would speedily have exacted the extreme penalty (partial
  as he was to Lapatok) had she not been able, with her next-to-last
  breath, to gasp out the time-honored words "Na-pok!"--"our child."

  In the few moments allowed her she explained that her intention had
  been merely to masticate the bird, giving the first share to Kopek,
  her infant, who was at that very moment desperately stricken with the
  teething-sickness, and bringing the remainder to her lord and master.
  With true womanly ingenuity she likewise pleaded that as the latest
  of Makuik's wives and a member of the Klinka tribe she knew nothing
  of Kryptok law. She thus appealed both to her husband's heart and
  head with the result that he let her off with nothing more serious
  than a severe beating which was terminated by the stern injunction,
  "Kapok Fakalok ook."--"A woman's place is in the Igloo." The pemmican
  in the meanwhile escaped and may be seen as illustrated, winging his
  way out of focus.

  As if touched by his wife's plea and anxious to re-establish both her
  good-will and his own authority, Makuik later killed the fowl on the
  wing with sling-dart thrown from a distance of forty salmon-spears.
  (Approximately 280 ft.)

[Illustration: Dirty Work at the Igloo?]

And now we were to experience that fatal lack of living game which as
I have noted, seems to haunt the foot steps of the hunter to whom game
is a dreadful necessity. The season was still early and bird life was
practically extinct north of the circle. Occasionally we sighted an
isolated pemmican or a tiny lapwing, too distant or too small to be
shot at. Our store of ammunition was much too scarce to be wasted in
pot shots. Of seals and walruses we saw absolutely none.

Day after day, in the grisly dawn of the new season, we crept on. Day
after day we tightened our belts and stared each other in the face. And
in the face of each stared a spectre more grisly still.

A few entries from my diary will best record the harrowing tale of what
followed.

"Feb. 23rd. Ate the last of herring this noon. Reduced wheat ration to
1/2 cake for person. Sorted extra clothing (Plock's) for possible food.

Feb. 27th. Shredded-wheat supply fast diminishing. S. busy all day
cleaning Plock's oomiak and leggins. Will it come to him?

March 3rd. Last of leggins for lunch. Whinney slightly ill, but
eyesight improving. A good day's hauling. Crossed two open leads but
saw no seal.

March 4th. A great day! Sighted seal herd two miles away, the first we
have seen on the floe. Stalked them carefully, taking Frissell with me.
By "playing seal," yooping and crawling, succeeded in getting into the
very center of herd where we killed two with atomizers. A great saving
of ammunition. Seal gorge tonight.

March 5th. All hands ill.

March 6th. Same.

March 12th. Finished last of seal. Plock's oomiak tomorrow.

March 14th. No food whatsoever. Very weak.

March 15th. Same. Weaker.

March 16th. (The writing is almost illegible) Plock.

March 19th. Finished Plock. Tough, as always."

March 20th dawned as a day of despair. My companions, weakened by
starvation, refused to pull another ounce. We had come to a standstill.
Scarcely able to stand, desperate, but still unwilling to admit myself
beaten, I set forth alone.

Swank would have accompanied me but fell as he attempted to climb down
to the ice and was unable to rise.

"Don't go," he pleaded.

"Herman," I said, "if the Traprock expedition perishes, Traprock will
be the first man to go."

I wrung his hand and departed. Four miles from the ship I fainted.
Regaining consciousness I crawled on, on my hands and knees. Another
spasm of dizziness seized me and I sank down to rest. As I did so, a
far-off sound reached me, the faint roaring of a bull seal. Peering
across the floe I saw him dimly. He must have been slightly over a mile
away. At 6000 yards I fixed him tremblingly on the crossed wires of
my telescopic sight. Even then his image was vague, but it was now or
never.

Bang! A louder roar reached me and I saw the great brute raise himself
convulsively. But would he still escape me? No! He lay still.

When I reached him two hours later I saw, somewhat to my chagrin, why
he had not moved. He was a giant chap of the "phoca barbata" family,
the bearded seal. His beard was frozen in the ice.

My shot had been wasted.[27]

Fate seems sometimes to play her last trick on a man and, finding she
cannot down him, suddenly gives up and turns to helping him. So it was
in my case.

Fortified by a draught of warm seal oil, which was like nectar to my
lips, I made my way back to the Kawa with as much of the great carcass
as I could carry. The rest was speedily brought aboard. The effect of
the physical reinforcement was magical.

Not only did my comrades' spirits revive but such minor ailments as had
put in an appearance were immediately dissipated. Triplett got well
of a touch of his old scurvy which had been bothering him. Whinney's
eyes cleared up completely and Wigmore who had been quite daffy since
his rescue, became suddenly sane again and, I am glad to say, devoutly
thankful to me for having preserved him from the fate of his companions.

The weather, too, favored us. Constantly increasing light and rising
temperature brought at last the wonderful realization that we had
entered the zone of spring! Never did Spring dawn so gloriously in my
life.

Our progress was now rapid with the Tutbury running magnificently on a
mixture of whale and seal oil, with both main and jigger drawing to a
quartering breeze, we were making approximately twelve knots. A school
of porpoises gamboled about us as merrily as if, as Frissell said,
"school were out!" Whales and walruses spouted under our lee. The date
was April third.

Sausalito, indomitable soul, who had never faltered, had climbed to
her favorite place in the crow's nest. From this high perch I suddenly
heard her voice, shrill with excitement.

"Land ho! Land ho!"

A sturdy cheer went up to meet her and we all scanned the low-lying
cloud on the southern sky line while Sausalito modestly descended.

It was indeed land. Eight hours later we dropped anchor in a sheltered
bay. The sun had sunk below the horizon and violet dusk seemed to rise
from the still water.

Three miles away the lights of an eskimo village twinkled through the
haze and on the falling breeze we caught the sound of the sweetest
singing that had ever fallen on human ears.

It was the song of the workers in the ice fields, harvesting the new
crop for our own America!

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 26: A cerf-volant, argent, springing over a barbican, on a
field, or. The whole surrounded by a garter. See Peluchet, Hist. des
Armoires.]

[Footnote 27: On all my trips I have carried the gun I refer to, a
Mannlicher-Schopenhauer, 6 MM, extra heavy. There is nothing compares
with it for long range fire. W.E.T.]




Chapter X

  _In home waters. The celebration in our honor. And what of my
  companions? Reveries and Recollections. The End._




Chapter X


The balance of my story is briefly told. On April twenty-third, we
picked up Fire Island light and two hours later had received a clean
bill of health from the quarantine station.

The trip back through Baffin Bay had been uneventful. We had come as
we had gone, in a direct line. At Triplett's request we put in at
St. John's. He went ashore, taking Sausalito with him. Late in the
afternoon he returned, alone. His stony eye forbade cross examination,
but I questioned him that night in the cabin.

"She's went back to Californy" he said. "You see, I got kinder tired of
her. Besides I'm headin' back ter Noo York."

Again his slow wink expressed volumes.

I have not seen that strange woman since. She sends me a picture post
card occasionally, usually a winter scene, with mica snow. It is her
inarticulate way of asking forgiveness for the blow she dealt me.

  THE CONSULTATION

  Nothing was more characteristic of the candor and co-operative
  spirit of the Commander of the Traprock Expedition than his constant
  willingness to discuss matters with his fellow-travellers. One of the
  most moot of all moot questions which frequently presented itself was
  that of route. Having arrived at a certain or uncertain point in the
  vast snowfields, someone was sure to ask, "Where do we go from here?"
  or "Where do you think you are now?"

  From the outset Dr. Traprock realized the desirability of an answer
  to such interrogations. His experience during numerous previous
  Arctic voyages convinced him that most of the bitterness of feeling
  which almost inevitably disrupts polar-parties springs from the
  unwillingness, to put it mildly, of the leader to satisfy the
  natural curiosity of his men in this regard. In order to avoid this
  difficulty he had carefully prepared maps showing the progress made
  during each day with the projected itinerary, points of interest, and
  probable weather conditions. Colored crayons added a decorative value
  to the charts.

  We here see him explaining to Wigmore, the somewhat belligerent
  snow-and-ice-expert, the proposed return route. Instead of confusing
  the rather unscientific man with a mass of latitudinal and
  longitudinal figures, the Doctor states the whole matter clearly by
  saying, "We simply follow the green line."

  The fatal results of disregarding this injunction are embodied in the
  text. Needless to say they fully prove the value of the Commander's
  cartographical skill. An interesting sidelight is the fact that their
  daily charts were equally accurate when based on solar observation
  or during the long Arctic night when the only basis of authority was
  Captain Triplett's amazing bump of locality, which was about the size
  of a hen's-egg.

[Illustration: A Consultation]

Just inside the three mile limit we were boarded by revenue officers
from the patrol boat, W.H. Anderson. They made a careful search for
liquor.

"Back to abnormalcy!" carped Swank who was panting to get ashore.

My wires from Grant Land (via Indian runners to Moose Factory) had
warned the scientific world of our arrival. Further details, giving
brief accounts of the deaths of Plock, Miskin and Sloff had been
telegraphed from St. John's.

The same gala array and marine salutation which had sped our departure
welcomed our return. But it was with a heavy heart that I stepped on
the Yacht Club landing stage. My mysterious orders were still to be
explained, orders which, had they reached me when intended, would have
brought me ignominiously home, empty of honors and achievement.

A number of strange faces surrounded me in the club room among which
I recognized Harris, the E.U. secretary, "Harmless" Harris we used to
call him.

"Where is Waxman?" I asked coldly.

A shadow of pain flitted across his face.

"Of course," he murmured. "You haven't heard ... it was very sudden ...
poor Waxman ... heart failure, you know ... the day after we heard of
your safe arrival."

So my old friend Waxman was gone. With the receipt of this news
I instantly dismissed all unkind thoughts I may have had of this
benevolent old man. As I look at his photograph now, on my mantelpiece,
bland and serene, it seems to breathe a benediction upon me. The
pleading look in his eyes seems still to ask for peanuts. May I cherish
always, as he did, a love for other explorers and an interest in their
exploits.

If anything was calculated to further soften my heart it was the more
joyous occasion which followed, the grand banquet given in my honor at
the Hotel Commodore. That entire, mighty hive hummed with explorers and
noted travellers. Overflow meetings were held in the Biltmore, Yale
Club, Grand Central Station and on nearby subway platforms.

The scene in the ballroom beggared description. On the dais with me sat
representatives of all the National scientific bodies and distinguished
guests from abroad. Publishers, artists and editors were present by
the hundreds. Famous actors forced their way to my chair, above which
blossomed the words "Traprock must be true" done in thousands of
Bougainvilleas and snowdrops.

The colleges of the country had sent their delegations, my own Alma
Mater surpassing all with a group of two hundred bright-faced lads
whose merry songs and cheers made the welkin ring. They had come by
special train from New Haven, accompanied by members of the faculty,
for whom the affair was a great junket, you may be sure. Harvard stood
officially aloof owing to their recent ban on Eskimos, but the great
sister university, as well as Princeton, was represented by individuals
who made up in enthusiasm what they lacked in numbers.

When my brothers in the Phi Chapter of D.K.E. arose and sang our
fraternal anthem I felt obliged to remain seated. Let me here explain
that curious action. It was because my mind went back to that period of
terrific strain when I had actually _eaten_ a Brother!

But the thing which touched me most deeply[28] was the presence, at
adjoining tables of the combined Boards of Trade of Derby and Shelton,
sister cities of the Housatonic, and the Derby Fencibles, forty strong,
accompanied by their fife and drum corps wearing the old continental
uniforms. My eyes dimmed as I thought of the stirring times when I
had stepped to that same inspiring music, as we practised our secret
marches back of the old Sterling Melodeon factory.

The chairman of the evening was my life-long friend Irving T. Grosbeak,
R.O.T.C. who was introduced by Luther Slattin the new president of the
E.U. Other addresses were made by Professor Phineas A. Crutch,[29]
F.P.A., S.O.S., Col. Woodwark of the Canadian Mounted and Lord
Beaverboard of the South African Game Commission. The principal
forensic display was by Ex-senator Wicklefield of Wyoming whom Dr.
Grosbeak characterised brilliantly as "The Aurora Borealis of Oratory,
the most dependable geyser in the world since Old Faithful blew up and
became a brook."

But the climax of the evening came when an old man in a red shirt and
fire helmet tottered to my side and with tears streaming down his face,
quavered, "The world may claim Walter Traprock but _we_ own him."

It was old "Shelly" Smith of Naugatuck Hose Co. No. 1. His father used
to spade our garden.

Of course I was called upon for a speech but for the first time in my
life I begged to be excused. My heart was too full. Captain Triplett
stood up in my place and embarrassed me by pointing his horny finger in
my direction and saying repeatedly, "He done it."

Grammatical errors in public always annoy me.

The rest is history. I shall never return to the North. I feel that I
have seen all that it can offer. My work in that direction is done.

Of those who returned with me all but one has carved his niche in the
rocks of time. The exception is Dane, who has never fully recovered
from the blow dealt him, by my arm indeed, but due to the cowardly
shove of Plock. His work in comparative ethnology, however, was
accomplished before he was stricken. His object in making the trip was
to discover the similarities, if any, between the surviving Eskimo
tribes and the early civilization of the Nile dynasties. The only
entry I find in his note books is the rather pathetic one "no report."

He is now occupying a comfortable room in the Shadyside Retreat, Walnut
St., Philadelphia, where he busies himself cutting out paper dolls of
Egyptian character, and where I occasionally visit him.

Frissell remains the same blithe spirit as ever. The horrors of our
return voyage left no more lasting impression on this debonair youth
than a passing fit of seasickness.

Swank and Whinney naturally show spiritual scars, especially the
latter, though he is greatly cheered by the royalties received from the
sale of his sprightly journal, written in total darkness.[30] My two
close companions and I, with the occasional addition of Triplett when
we can lure him from his own diggings often dine together at a cosy
little tea house in Forty-fifth Street. There we plan new ventures and
discuss the old. What stirring memories flock about us, what tender
visions neath Tropic sun and Arctic stars!

Kippiputuona, Babai, Ikik, Lapatok, their names are a sentimental
rosary, a succession of lovely chords, lost chords, but, let us hope,
not the last!

At a recent meeting the recollection of Whinney's affliction evoked
from him this brave comment.

"Just think!" he mused, "to love a woman, to lose her, and to never see
her."

"Whinney," I said, raising my glass in his direction, "there is more in
life than merely seeing."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 28: Excepting, perhaps, the long telegram from my old friend
Capt. Peter Fitzurse, explaining that he was unavoidably detained
correcting the proof of his forthcoming autobiography. See appendix
for further light on Fitzurse's claim that the three fingers missing
from his right hand _actually were frozen off when he grasped the North
Pole_. W.E.T.]

[Footnote 29: Author of "The Queen of Sheba."]

[Footnote 30: Light on the Pole, by R. Whinney. $5.00 net, $4.50 in
lots of six. Post. prep. Intr. by Prof. C. Towne, Nyack University.]




APPENDIX


In reference to a note on page 180, it seems desirable to reprint below
(1) a paragraph which recently appeared in a New York newspaper over
the signature of Don Marquis, and (2) a copy of the letter written by
Dr. Traprock to Mr. Marquis clearing up the point in question. Ed.

       *       *       *       *       *

A great deal of doubt is cast by his strange reticences upon the recent
claim of Dr. Walter E. Traprock that he reached the North Pole. Did he,
or did he not, find three fingers at the Pole which were frozen off of
the hand of Capt. Peter Fitzurse when the Captain grasped the Pole,
more than forty years ago, being the first man to lay his hand upon
it? If he did not find these fingers, he did not reach the Pole. If he
found them, and has said nothing about it, his object in concealing
the fact can be nothing else than an unworthy jealousy. Who is this
Traprock, anyhow? Capt. Fitzurse intimates that at the proper time he
has startling revelations to make. It is significant that Traprock was
first heard of a year or two after Dr. Cook ceased to figure in the
public prints.

 On Board "Kawa"
 Peck's Slip, N.Y.
 July 21, 1922.

 Don Marquis, Esq.
 Park Row,
 New York City.

  Dear Sir:--

  A number of my friends have called my attention to recent remarks
  published over your signature which by insinuation cast a veil of
  ambiguity over my identity. I am not used to having veils cast over
  me and I resent the practice.

  "Who is this person, Traprock?" you ask. "Has he ever been to the
  North Pole?"

  Let the ice-bergs answer! Let the Polar-pack groan its reply. I scorn
  to.

  You also ask if by any chance I discovered three fingers frozen to
  the Pole. I _did_ find three fingers not frozen to the Pole, but
  preserved in an otherwise empty gin bottle. They were cached in a
  rude cairn, mute memorials of some brave man who had ventured north
  of eighty-six. Of course I at once thought of my friend Fitzurse.
  Could they be his? The nails were not black enough, but I could not
  be sure.

  I took them with me to the Pole, purposing to leave them with my
  records, but my plans were modified by the extraordinary attraction
  which the fingers had for Ikik, Snak and Yalok, three Eskimo women
  whom I found living at the Pole, or to be exact, under it.

  How, finally, to preserve peace I divided the fingers giving one to
  each to wear as a talisman is an enlivening memory. A few days later,
  noticing that Ikik was not wearing her finger I questioned her as to
  its whereabouts. "Me eat" she said. The others had done likewise. I
  trust that any doubts you may have had in regard to my identity etc.
  will be dissipated by these circumstantial details.

 Yours,
 Walter E. Traprock




 The
 Cruise of the Kawa

 By
 Dr. Walter E. Traprock,
 F.R.S.S. E.U.

A delicious literary burlesque--superlatively amusing. Here are found
the _wak-wak_, that horrid super-seamonster; the gallant _fatu-liva_
birds who lay square eggs; the flowing hoopa bowl, and the sensuous
_nabiscus_ plant; the tantalizing, tatooing, fabulous folk music; the
beautiful, trusting Filbertine women and their quaint marriage customs,
as well as the dread results of the white man's coming--all described
with a frank freedom, literary charm and meticulous regard for truth
which is delightful.

The Cruise of the Kawa stands unique among the literature of modern
exploration. Nothing like it has ever come out of the South Seas. It is
_the_ travel book of years. Strikingly illustrated, too, from special
photographs, it tells pictorially, as well as verbally, the exciting,
amusing and entertaining story of an exploration in the South Seas.


 G.P. Putnam's Sons
 New York      London




*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "My Northern Exposure: The Kawa at the Pole" ***

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