The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1890-02-18

reach for certain surveying purposes.
They evidently believed what they
told US, for two of them were willing tc
go with US. Accordingly they were en-.
listed in the crew. which otherwise con-
sisted of four white men.
1t was a beautiful, still day as we
started in the early morning. The long
swells from the bay looked like pol
ished glass. Had the weather not
changed we should have had but little
trouble even in the wabbling boat that
bent from side to side as we walked
along its bottom as If it were in torture
with every step and writhing in agony
therefrom. The best efforts we could
make with the rough paddles We had
could not force us forward more than a
mile an hour against an incoming tide.
Arctic storms frequently come with
the suddenness of a Dakota blizzard,
and the one that overlook us on that
day when we were about halfway across
TO the island could be seen coming over
the placid water like black cloud of
destruction, and at a rate of speed that
: nearly CapsiZed our frail structure,
which stuck high cut of water like an
old-line battle ship.
The two ESkimoS sank TO the bot
I tom of the scow, and were really quite
valuable as ballast, the only use 10
+hnv cnuld h., ~
: Our course was obllque 10 the waves
: that the high wind soon produced. and
! SO loose was the framework Of the Scow,
which was merely bound together by
whalebOne strips, that ii took the shape
OF the water like lot of floating saw
dust. rather than IS rigid body, as
boat should do.
The motion was enough TO have made
pirate Seasick. but / suppose the hard
work and the peril of the position pre-
vented our thinking of such thing, or
we should have been rendered helpless.
Some idea of the labor we had to per-
form may be formed by the fact that We
were three and a-half hours in going the
, last mile, although. of course. in SO long
a time and with such hard work some of
Us were frequently lying exhausted in
the bolt. of the boat, helping the
Eskimos TO keep it from upsetting," as
one member expressed it.
When we reached the island at $50
, O'clock-having started from the main
land at five in the mOrning-we were
thoroughly exhausted and wet to the
skin. and threw ourselves on the beach
and hardly stirred for four or five hours.
1t was our first and. probably it is I'M
necessary To state, our last trip in an
Eskimo skin boat. and to this day it
seems marvellous TO me that it did not
upset in the high waves. Had it done so
we would have either drowned or got TO
the shore sooner than we did, for any
thing could have swan faster than our
clumsy craft.
The records of Arctic exploration TEEN
with tight pinches in the way of depri-
walton of food. and hardly an expedition
is well known that has not gone through
some severe ordeals of this character.
Indeed. it is the pivot on which hangs
the fact whether an Arctic expedition
will be well known or not more than
any other, as many tnat have had long
series OF such misfOrtUneS are publicly
much better known than those which
have done more, but have not any record
of severe and sensational suffering.
am glad TO say that our tight pinches
in that way were more interesting from
the manner by which we just eluded
them through the sagacity of our hunt
ers than in any other way. Several
times they saved us in this manner, and
one of the incidents | must relate.
We were in camp with not pound Of
meat for the next meal, which surely
thought was a long way off, for fog
had settled over every thing, so thick
hunter would have had to stumble over
a reindeer to see it at all.
If the fog had been little bit thicker
we would have eaten it, or if it had
been a great deal thinner we might
have seen how to get something to eat;
but it was just at the right stage to de-
, prive us of meal either way.
My best hunter, Toolooah, got out his
Winchester rife, however, and prepared
for a hunt, which 1 thought was folly,
but he told me he thought he would get
deer or two. His opinion was too
) good to be rejected off-hand. He har-
messed up two dogs-a step which great
. ly surprised me, for the Eskimo never
use dogs in hunting the deer, or had
| not done so IN my long experience Win
them-and l thought the fog was OBJ
! stacle enough to overcome without the
, encumbrance of dogs.
He disappeared in the fog. A snAall
! boy followed him leading the two dogs,
and then another hunter told me how
they worked in such weather. The
dogs sense of smell is used instes{ OF
! the hunters sense of sight. Going to
the windward of the game locality the
hunter watches his dogs, and when their
noses 60 up into the air he knows that
game is to the windward, and he follows
in that direction. When the actions OF
the dogs warn him that he is near, and
that they may frighten the game, he
leaves the animals with the boy, and
creeps forward on whatever may be In
! h;c front The ESnimo huntinv-dOR