The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-07-20

stove that reared day and night, a bill
lad table and a number Of benches an,
chairs. This was the clubroom of tn
sixty or seventy officers of the fleet, AM
mere they congregate to play billiards
and Whist or sit about through the Ions
| Arctic evenings, while the wind hoWieC
| outside, smoking and spinning yarns O.
| many seas, or of boyhood days at New
| Bedford, New London and Martha's
| Vineyard. There We're veterans who
| had Whaled on every ocean, and haC
| been in nearly every portion of the
| globe; men who recollected well the
raid of the cruiser Shenandoah when
| she burned the fleet on the coast of ST.
| IBERIA thirty years before, and who had
| been in the Point Barrow disaster,
| when nearly score of ships were
crushed in the ice foe. The sailors and
firemen of the fleet did not have the
privilege of this house, but contented
themselves with games and amuse-
| ments of their own. They had an or
4 chestra that played long and vocifer-
ously, and their was an amateur dram
attic troupe that gave entertainments
during the winter. But it was on the
great national game of baseball that
officers and men most depended to break
the tedium of their long Imprisonment
and furnish needed exercise.
A large number of bats and balls had
been brought up from San Francisco by
one of last summers arrivals, and as
soon as the ships had gone into quar-
tArc cavap oIllhS wara orpapi1ad and
formed into a league to play for the
Arctic Whalemens Pennant," which
was a strip of drilling nailed to
broomhandle. One nine was composed
entirely of officers, another of seamen, a
third of firemen a fourth of cooks and
walters, and so on--the seven mines
constituting the "Herschel Island
League" A set of written rules pro-
vided that the series of games should
begin after a months practice and con-
tinue throughout the winter and that
all must be played on schedule time re-
CARELESS Of weather. Another provision
was that on the diamond all ship rank
was obliterated, and sailor called
boss" even venerable Capt Murray
without fear of reproof. No sooner had
the harbor frozen over than the dia-
mond was laid out and practice begun.
Salt water ice is not quite so slippery as
that from fresh water; but great care
had to be used by the players.
After a season OF practice, during
which there was much speculation as
to the merits of the various mines and
no end Of chaff and banter, the first
game of the series was played, and in
the brief twilight of an arctic December
day, with the mercury 3S degrees below
zero, the Roaring Gimlets" vanquished
the pig Stickers' by a score Of 60 to 49,
All winter, regardless of billiards. and
of bitter cold, the games went on, three
or four each week, until the schedule |
was exhausted, and by this time the
rivalry was so intense that playing was
continued, the clubs challenging each |
other and club refusing to |
play on account of weather forfeited it's |
position caused one game to be played |
al AZ degrees below zero, and often dur
ing billiards the air was so full of fly
ing snow that the outfielders could not |
be seen from the homeplate. Even
after the sun had disappeared for the
first time and the long arctic night had |
begun, games were played in the few |
hours of twilight at midday but were
usually United to four innings, as by 2 /
o'clock it would be too dark to see the
Dall.
All the whalemen were dressed in the
Esquimau fur costume, only the face
1eng exposed and on their hands wore
heavy fur mittens, These clumsy nit
ems, together with the fact that one
vas apt to fall on the ice unless he gave
large part of his attention to keeping ;
lis feet underneath him, made good
.atching practically impossible. "Muffs'
we're the rule, and the man who caught
Ind held the ball received an ovation.
rot only from the whalers, but from
he Esquimaux who were always
rowded about the rope. With the ball
rozen hard as a rock, no one was apt
o repeat an experiment Of catching
With bare hands. One of the center
ielders was a corpulent Orkney Island
L, whose favorite method of stopping
lot erounder was to lie down in front
t it, The Esquimaux considered him
he star player of the fleet. Sliding was
he only thing done to perfection, the
re offering excellent facilities for dis
inction in that line; and there was
lways wild cheer when a rnner, get
ing too much Roadway, knocked the
aseman off his feet and both came
own together: The scores were rdicu-
,usly large, seldom less than fifty on
ide, and sometimes twice that On the
nooth ice a G Cd hit meant home run.
A most amusing feature of the games
'as the interest shown by the Esqui-
lauX. With the fleet there were nearly
hundred of these people from Behring
trait and Point Barrow and there
ere several villages in the vicinity of
Ierschel Island These latter were
-ogmulliks, the largest Esquimaux in
and the presence of the fleet
ad drawn them from all along the
}ast. Men, women and children be-
ame typical baseball cranks, and there
as never a game without a large at
ndance of Esquimaux, who stood
bout, eyes and mouth wide open, and
alled frantically whenever there was
brilliant catch or a successful slide.
t first dozens of them would break I
yer the line and try to hold a runner
ntl the baseman could get the ball,
I'd it was only by vigorous cuttings
,at thew yyara toIpht tba spactatorc' |