The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1885-06-26
SELECT STORY.
seventy-0n Below Zero.
LIFE IN TIE ARCTIC REGIONS.

There are few places in the United
States proper (the word "proper" being
put in to exclude our colony of Alaska,
almost a third of which lies in the
Arctic regions) where the winter
weather is intensely cold and where
even the summer is SO cool that both
seem like the polar regions, but these
few places are so far in the West,
among the high mountains, and so
thinly populated, that | feel quite sure
| that the mere mention of seventy
| degrees below ztrn-or 1O3 degrees
below the freezing pont-will make
the chils run over my leaders, and If
it be warm day when they peruse it
they will be cordially thankful, and, l
hope, will not cast it aside with mere |
glance at the heading if it be not.
| The author was in a heavy storm, |
lasting some two or three hours, on
July 8, 1876. while elk hunting in the
hig gh spurs of the Big Horn Mountains
of Montana, and when returning to
camp learned that another hunting party
had crossed their horses on the ice OF
a lake on the 4th of July at a still
higher level, the ice not having melted
from the winters deep freezing. The
14th of August the same year ice form
ed on the water in our complexities
and buckets, and in short, in that por
tion of the country it is cold enough
to give person who may live there
long chance TO see a snowstorm
every month in the year-as the auth
or has-but it is not of these districts
we will write in describing seven
ty-one degrees below zero.
1t was in the Arctic regions, not far
from Backs Great Fish river, when
the author was conducting homeward
sledge journey to Hudson Bay in the
depth Of an Arctic winter-November,
December, January, February and
March. Severe weather, that ls, in
tensely cold, lad set in just before
Christmas in 1879, the thermometer
sinking down to sixty-tive and sixty
eight degrees below zero, and never
getting above sixty degrees below,
and we have a very hard time with our
sleedging along the river, our camps at
night almost in sight of those we had
left in the morning, so close were they
together and so slowly did we labor
along Reindeer, on which we were
relying on for our daily supply OF food,
were not found near the river, and
being seen some ten or fifteen miles
backfrom it | determined to leave its
bed and strike straight for home in
Hudson Bay.
We had been gone three or four
days, and as we assembled the higher
levels the thermometer commenced
lowering, and on the 80 of January,
1880, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon,
reached II degrees below zero, the
coolest we experienced on our sledge
Journey of nearly year in length, and
the coolest ever Encountered by white
men travelling out OF doors; Tor that
day we moved our camp some ten OF
twelve miles to the southeastward
The day was not at all disagreable,
must say, until long toward the early
night, when a slight zephyr, the mer
est kind of motion of the wind, that
would hardly rutfle the leaves on a
tree, or even sufficient to cool the face
on warm day, sprang up from the
southwark, and, slight and insignificant
as it was, it cut to the bone every par
of the body that was exposed, anc
which fortunately was the face from
the eyebrows to the chin and abou
half of the cheeks, We turned ou
backs toward it as much as possible
and especially after we got into CAM
and got to work building our snow
houses and digging through the thicl
- ice in the lake for fresh water, and 81
lazily did our breath that congeale(
~ into miniature clouds float away to tn
Is Is northward like the little light cirru
100 clouds of summer sky that we knew
10 well enough how terribly cold it mus
,.SS be withon. looking a. the thermometer
80 that stood at II degrees below zero
'oo Fahrenheit.
IN 1t is not so much the intensity OF tn
" cold expressed in degrees on the ther
- mometer, that determines the disagree
ableness of Arctic winter weather as
is the force and relative direction o
the wind. | have found it far pleas
anter with the thermometer at 80, 6C
\ or even 70 degrees below zero, Fahrer
,rs bei;. with little or no wind blowing
at the time, than to face rather Still
breeze when the little tell-tale Shove
so degrees warmer temperature. Eve
I, an Arctic accimated white man ta(
ing a good strong wind blowing at 2
- or 25 degrees below zero is almost sur
Y TO freeze the nose and cheeks and tn
i thermometer does not have to sink owe
' A or 5 degrees to induce the Esqu
'N maux themselves to keep within the
snug snow houses under the same ci
cumstances unless want or famine d.
mands their presence in the stora
= With plenty in the larder for all tn
mouths, brute and human, none {
!, them venture out in such weather.
1t is very consoling TO add howeve
IL that the intensely cold temperature
the Arctic are nearly always ac3on
panied by calms, or at least by ligl
winds and such was the case on OF
memorial 3rd of January, 1880.
ms fact, with the exception of a very fe
'es quiet days during the warmest weat
- er of the polar summer, these clea
quiet, cold ones of the Arctic wint
are about the only times when Il
wind is not blowing vigorously fro
some part of the compass, or so it seer
ed at least in that part of it where II
travels were cast. | doubt, howevt
if there are as many fearful storr
during low temperatures IN the Arc'
as in the far northwestern part OF o
own country where they are known
"blzzards." Certainly in proporti'
to the ability Of withstanding extrel
cold, and the methods the polar inhal
tants have of combating it, there q
no such dangers run by them of i
or discomfort as by our brethren
the far northwest when the "northel
come down on them in the dead
winter
There were few exceptions to 4