The Democratic advocate., 1885-07-18

were we upon it for our daily supply of
food, that to increase our chances of secur-
ing it we separated into parties, one and
two days journey apart from each other
(although travelling the same trail, and
thus each space between camps was gone
over twice or three times, and our chances
of seeing reindeer or musk oxen increased
proportionally. Occasionally my sledge
would be in the rear, and before we started
in the morning it would sometimes be use
full to know if the party ahead had moved
on, and Toolooah, my sledge driver, would
climb a near hill, and if the weather was
intensely cold and clear was almost sure to
be able to tell me, although the measured
sledge journey to the snow house that he
had discerned by its ascending vapors was
often eight and ten miles, and probably
three-fourths as much in a straight line.
Whenever the sledge was travelling along,
its iced runners, dragging over the fine
gritty SHOWS, would give forth clear musi-
cal ring in the bitter cold air that sounded
very much like the drawing of rosined
bow over a tuning fork, well-known ex-
pertinent in acoustic lectures Many of
my readers who live, or have lived, in
countries where the thermometer gets down
to zero and 200 below in the Winter have
heard this sound coming from the iron
runners of the swift-gliding sleighs, and
especially upon clear quiet night with but
single sleigh within hearing. Could you
imagine that clear frosty ring as much
louder as the whistle of a steamboat is above
the whistle of man, or certainly multi
piled manifold times, you could realize how
the iced sledge runners fairly sing with
their polished surface dragging over the
marble-like SHOWS of the intense arctic cold
By holding the ear near to the snow this
music of the cold can be heard two miles
away, and at this great distance sounds
like the soft murmurings of an Eolian
harp or distant minglings of guitars.
Sometimes when breathing this extreme
ly cold air my tongue felt as if it was
freezing in my mouth, but could readily
rid myself of this uncomfortable feeling by
breathing through the nostrils for minute
or two. Naturally you will ask "Why not
breathe through the nostrils all the time 2"
as you have SO often heard advocated
This bitter cold air passing through the
nostrils keeps up an irritation so that the
consequent catarrh makes it desirable to
use the mouth nearly altogether in breath
ing. Also, the nose is more liable to freeze
when breathing through it. These freez-
ings of the nose and cheeks are very COM
mon affairs, occurring over dozen times
day in very low temperatures, and espec-
tally if there be any wind blowing in the
face. The Esquimaus cure these slight
frost bites by applying the hand, warm
from the reindeer mitten, directly to the
spot. They knew nothing of rubbing frost
bites with snow, so extolled in our own
cold climates, and l doubt its efficacy my
self in those extremely low arctic tempera-
lures, when the snow is like sand if loose
and ike granite rock if in mass. Another
fallacious idea exploded by my Esquimau,
at least to great extent, was the use of
snow to quench thirst, which every arctic
writer has been so unanimous in condemn
ing as hurtful. Ny Esquimaus used it at
all temperatures to alleviate their thirst,
first breathing on the piece of snow few
times before putting it in the mouth. |
have often seen Esquimau boys place
steel snow knife to their tongue and let it
freeze fast, and then swing it backward and
forward until it fell, and try and make it
stick upright in the snow.