Wild Adventures round the Pole

They had seen something, though, from the hill-top that had very much astonished them. In the centre of this curious island, and entirely surrounded by mountains, was a lake of open water, as black as ink it looked in contrast with the snow-clad braeland around it, and right in the centre thereof played an enormous geyser, or natural fountain. It was evidently of volcanic origin.

The days got longer and longer, and in five months from the time they had entered the cave day and night were about equal.

But I must not omit telling you of the strange experiment that had suggested itself to McBain while gazing upwards at the birds – lured from afar – circling round the electric light. It was nothing more nor less than that of paying a visit, by means of a diving-bell and the electric light, to the denizens of the deep – the creatures that lived in the ocean under the ice.

Everything was got ready under the supervision of the aeronaut, ably assisted by the carpenter and crew and little Ap. The bell itself was an immense one, and most carefully constructed to float or sink at will. Inside it was quite as comfortable as the room in the lift of some of our large hotels.

Ralph seldom went far out of his way in search of adventure, but this new and wonderful experiment seemed to possess an irresistible charm even for him.

As for Rory, he was, as Sandy McFlail said, “half daft” over the idea.

McBain was most careful in seeing that everything was in working order; and the bell was sunk and re-sunk empty a dozen times in the water before he would allow any one to venture down in it. The snow had been previously cleared away all from and around the ship, and an immense ice-hole made for the purpose of conducting the experiment.

When all seemed safe, and it was found that the bell, sunk to a depth of forty feet, was acted on by no current, but rose straight to the surface of the ice-hole when wanted, then the captain himself and De Vere ventured down. They remained beneath for fully twenty minutes – and anxious minutes they were to those on the surface; then the signal to hoist was given, and presently up bobbed the bell, and was raised to the level by the derrick, when out stepped De Vere and McBain.

“Smiling all over, sure!” said Rory, “and looking as clean and sweet and pretty as if they’d just popped out of a band-box.”

The diving-bell was called “the band-box” after this.

But it was after dark that the real experiment was to take place.

“Troth!” said Rory at dinner that day, “will you fellows never have done eating? It’s myself that is longing to get away down to the bottom of the sea.”

The four of them entered the band-box – Allan, Ralph, the doctor, and Rory; then they were slowly lowered down – down – down amid a darkness that could be felt. But presently a green glimmer of light shone in through the strong window of the bell; they could see each other’s faces. The light got stronger and stronger as the electric ball came nearer and nearer, till at last it stopped stationary about twelve yards from their window, making the sea all round, beneath, and above it as bright as noon.

“Yonder is the stage, boys,” cried Rory; “but where are the performers?”

They had not long to wait for these. Fish, first of the smaller kinds, came sailing round the light; presently these fled in all directions, and a monster shark took up the room. He soon had company, for dozens of others came floating around, and not sharks only, but creatures of more hideous forms than anything even Rory could have imagined in his wildest dreams.

“Oh!” cried the young poet, “if Gustave Doré were only here to see this terrible sight!”

“It beats,” said Sandy, “the Brighton Aquarium all to pieces. Oh?” he screamed, shrinking into a corner of the band-box, as a huge hammer-headed shark sidled up to the window, crooked his awful eyes, and stared in. “Oh, Rory, man, signal quick! I want to get up out o’ here. No more divin’-bells for me, lad.”

For nearly six weeks it became the regular custom to visit this submarine vivarium every night after dinner.

“It was just as good,” Ralph and Allan said, “as going to a show.”

“And a deal better,” added Rory. Even the mates and the crew begged for a peep at the wonders displayed in the depths of the illuminated sea.

“Well,” said Ted Wilson, when he ascended after his first view, “I’m a sadder and a wiser man, and I’ll dream of what I’ve seen this night as long as ever I live.”

They found the mouth of the mammoth cave, near which lay all that was mortal of poor old Magnus and his son, after days and days of digging; but when at long last they succeeded in forcing an entrance, one glance around them proved that they had indeed fallen upon riches and wealth untold. Those vast tusks and teeth of the mighty monsters of an age long past and gone were of the purest ivory, more white and hard than any they had ever seen before.

“Why, sure,” said Rory, “the cave of Aladdin was nothing to this!”

“The next thing, gentlemen,” said the captain, “is to transport our treasure to the good ship Arrandoon. Seth, old friend, your dogs will be wanted now in good earnest.”

“I reckon,” replied Seth, “they’re all ready, sir, and just mad enough to eat each other’s collars, ’cause they don’t get anything to do.”

What a change it was to have sunshine and a comparative degree of warmth again. Rough and toilsome enough was the road between the ship and the mammoth cave, but the snow was crisp and hard. The dogs were wild with delight, and so were our heroes, and so hard did everybody work all day that no one thought any more about the diving-bell and the denizens of the deep. After dinner they needed rest. Rory took his boat, or canoe, with him once or twice, and, all alone, he embarked on the volcanic lake and paddled round the geyser.

In three weeks from the day they had found the entrance to the cave they had transported all the ivory to the Arrandoon. They were now what Silas would have called a “bumper ship.” If they should succeed in regaining their own country, Rory would be able to live all his days in peace and comfort, independent of the whims of his Irish tenantry, and Allan – ah, yes, poor Allan! – began to dream of home now. Already, in imagination, he saw Glentruim a fair and smiling valley, every acre of it tilled, comfortable cottages sending their blue smoke heavenwards from the green birchen woods, a new and beautiful church, and the castle restored, himself once more resuming his rights of chief of his clan, and his dear mother and sister honoured and respected by all.

“I’ll roast an ox whole, boys!” he cried, one evening, jumping up from the sofa in the snuggery, where he had been lying thinking and dreaming of the future. “A whole ox; nothing less!”

Rory and Ralph burst out laughing.

“A vera judeecious arrangement!” cried Sandy. “But where will ye get the ox? I’m getting tired o’ bear-beef, and wouldn’t mind a slice out of a juicy stot’s rump.”

“Oh, dear!” said Allan, smiling; “I forgot you hadn’t been following the train of my thoughts. I was back again in Arrandoon.”

“Hurrah!” cried Rory. “Gather round the fire, boys; sit in, captain; sit in, Sandy; let us talk about home and what we all will do when we get there.”

Little, little did they know then the hardships that were in store for them.

Summer had fairly set in, but as yet there were not the slightest signs of the ice breaking up. Several balloon flights were made, the aeronaut always making most careful calculations for days before starting, and generally succeeding in catching a favourable time.

Then the principal adventure of the whole cruise was undertaken – a great sledging journey towards the Pole itself.

The sledges, specially prepared for the purpose, were got out and carefully loaded with everything that would be found necessary.

For a time the Arrandoon was to be left with but a few hands, or “ship-keepers,” as they are called, on her.

The great snowstorm of the previous winter McBain judged, and rightly too, would be in favour of the expedition; it smoothed the roughness of the ice, and made sledging even pleasurable. De Vere had two sledges, devoted to carrying his balloon and the means wherewith to inflate it.

Ted Wilson was left in charge of the ship, with little Ap, the cook, and carpenter’s crew, to say nothing of little Freezing Powders and Cockie.

“If you do find the North Pole,” cried Ted Wilson, as a parting salutation to one of his companions, “do fair Johnick, Bill, fair Johnick – bring us a bit.”

I have to tell of no terrible hardships or sufferings experienced by our heroes during this memorable sledge journey. They accomplished on an average about twelve miles a day, or seventy miles a week, and they invariably rested on the Sabbath, merely taking exercise on that day to keep up the warmth of their bodies.

They suffered but little from the cold, but it must be remembered that by this time they had become thoroughly inured to the rigours of the Arctic regions. It was easy to keep warm trudging along over the snow, and helping to drag the sledge by day.

The dogs they found were a great acquisition. Under the wise and judicious management of Trapper Seth they were most tractable, and their strength seemed something marvellous. They were fat and sleek, and comfortable-looking, too, and had entirely lost the gaunt, hungry, wolfish appearance they presented when Captain Cobb first sent them on board. Well did they work for, and richly did they deserve, the four Spratts’ biscuits given to each of them daily; that, followed by a mouthful of snow, was all they cared for and all they needed to make them the happiest of the happy.

A short halt was made for luncheon every noon, and at six o’clock they stopped for the night, and dinner was cooked. This was Seth’s duty, and, considering the limited means at his command, he succeeded wonderfully. The tent was erected over a large pit in the snow, the sledges being drawn up to protect it against the prevailing wind. But of this there was but little.

After dinner they gathered around a great spirit-lamp stove, wrapped in skins and blankets, and generally talked themselves to sleep. But Seth always slept with the dogs.

“I like to curl up,” he explained, “with the animiles. They keeps me warm, they do; and, gentlemen, Seth’s bones ain’t quite so young as they used to be.”

For weeks our heroes journeyed on towards the Pole, but they came to the end of what McBain called the snowfields at last, and all farther progress by sledge was practically at an end. Before them stretched away to the utmost limits of the horizon The Sea of Ancient Ice, a chaos of boulders, over which it would take a week at least to drag the sledges even a distance of ten miles, Now came the balloon to the rescue, but who were to go in it? Its car would, big as it was, contain but four. The four were finally selected; they were McBain, the aeronaut himself, Allan, and Rory.

Upwards mounted the great balloon, upwards but sailing southwards; yet well had De Vere counted his chances. Ballast was thrown out, and they rose into the air with inconceivable rapidity, and McBain soon perceived that the direction had now changed, and that the balloon was going rapidly northwards.

To those left behind on the snowfields the time dragged on very slowly indeed, and when four-and-twenty hours had gone by, and still there was no sign of the return of the aeronauts, Ralph’s anxiety knew no bounds. He seemed to spend most of his time on the top of a large iceberg, gazing northwards and skywards in hopes of catching a glimpse of the balloon. But all in vain, and so passed six-and-thirty hours, and so passed forty-eight and fifty. Something must have happened. Grief began to weigh like lead on poor Ralph’s heart. A hundred times in an hour he reproached himself for not having gone in the balloon instead of Rory. He was strong, Rory was not, and if anything had happened to his more than brother, he felt he could never forget it and never forgive himself. Despair was slowly taking the place of grief; he was walking up and down rapidly on the snow, for he could not rest, – he had taken neither food nor sleep since the balloon departed, – when there was a shout from the man on the outlook.

“Something black on the northern horizon, sir, but no signs of the balloon.”

“Hurrah?” cried Ralph. “Now, men, to the rescue. Let us go and meet them, and help them over this sea of boulders.”

In three hours more McBain and party were back in camp, safe and sound, terribly tired, but able to tell all their story.

“We’ve planted the dear old flag as far north as we could get,” said McBain, “and left it there.”

“Ay,” said Rory, “and kissed and blessed it a hundred times over.”

“And but for the accident to the balloon, which we were obliged to abandon, we would have been back long ere now.”

“But we have not seen de open sea around de Pole,” said De Vere.

“No,” said McBain; “there is no such sea; that is all a myth; only the sea of ancient ice, and land, with tall, cone-shaped mountains on it, evidently the remains of extinct volcanoes. Oh! it was a dreary, dreary scene. No signs of life, never a bird or bear, and a silence like the silence of death.”

“It was on one of those hills,” added Rory, “we planted the flag – ‘the flag that braved a thousand years the battle and the breeze.’ It was a glorious moment, dear Ralph, when we saw that bit of bunting unfurled. How Allan and myself wished you’d been with us. It was so funny, too, because, you see, there was no north, no east, and no west; everything was south of us. The whole world lay down beneath us, as it were, all to the south’ard, and we could walk round the world, so to speak, a dozen times in a minute.”

“Yes, it is curious,” replied Ralph, musing in silence for a moment. Then he stretched out his hand and grasped Rory’s. He did not speak. There was no need, Rory knew well what he meant.

“Now, boys and men,” cried the captain, “we have to return thanks to Him who has safely guided us through all perils into these distant regions, and pray that He may permit us to return in safety to our native land. Let us pray.”

A more heartfelt prayer than that of those hardy sailors probably never ascended on high. Afterwards a psalm was sung, to a beautiful old melody, and this closed the service; but next morning, ere they started to return to the Arrandoon, another spar was erected on the top of the biggest and highest iceberg. On this the English colours were nailed, and around it the crew assembled, and cheer after cheer rent the air, and, as Sandy McFlail afterwards observed, hats and bonnets were pitched on high, till they positively darkened the air, like a flock o’ craws.

Then “Give us a good bass and tenor, boys,” cried Rory, and he burst into the grand old National Anthem, —

“God save our Gracious Queen,Long may Victoria reign,God save the Queen.”

Chapter Thirty Three.

Another Winter at the Pole – Christmas Day – The Curtain rises on the Last Act – Sickness – Death – Despair

The summer was far advanced before Captain McBain and his crew returned to where their vessel lay off the island of Alba. They had fully expected to see some signs of the ice breaking up, so as to allow them to get clear and bear up for home, but the chance of this taking place seemed as far off as ever. If the truth must be told, the captain had counted upon a break-up of the sea of ice shortly after midsummer at the very latest. But midsummer went past, the sun each midnight began to decline nearer and nearer to the northern horizon, and it already seemed sadly probable that another winter would have to be passed in these desolate regions. McBain could not help recalling the words of old Magnus, “Open seasons do not come oftener than once in ten years.” If this indeed were true, then he, his boys and his crew, were doomed to sufferings more terrible than tongue could tell or pen relate – sufferings from which there could be no escape save through the jaws of death. Provisions would hardly last throughout another winter, and until the ice broke up and they were again free, there could be no chance of getting those that had been stored on the northernmost isle of Spitzbergen.

The sky remained clear and hard, and McBain soon began to think he would give all he possessed in life for the sight of one little cloud not bigger than a man’s hand. But that cloud never came, and the sun commenced to set and the summer waned away. The captain kept his sorrow very much to himself; at all events he tried to talk cheerfully and hopefully when in the company of any of our young heroes; but they could mark a change, and well they knew the cause.

The ice-hole was opened, but, strange to say, although they captured sharks and other great fish innumerable, neither seal nor walrus ever showed head above the water.

Bears were pretty numerous on the ice, and now McBain gave orders to preserve not only the skins but even the flesh of those monsters. It was cut in pieces and buried in the ice and snow, well up the braeland near to the mouth of the cave, in which they had found shelter during all the dark months of the former winter.

The fact that no seals appeared at the ice-hole proved beyond a doubt that the open water was very far indeed to the southward of them.

How they had rejoiced to see the sun rise for the first time in the previous spring; how their hearts sank now to see him set!

“Boys,” said McBain one day, after he had remained silent for some time, as if in deep thought – “boys, I fear we won’t get out of this place for many months to come. How do you like the prospect?”

He smiled as he spoke; but they could see the smile was a simulated one.

“Never mind,” said Ralph and Allan; “we’ll keep our hearts up, never fear; don’t you be unhappy on our account.”

“I’ll try not to be,” said McBain, “and I’m sure I shall not be so on my own.”

“Besides, captain dear,” added Rory, “it’s sure to come right in the end.”

McBain laid his hand on boy Rory’s head, and smiled somewhat sadly.

“You’re always hopeful, Rory,” he said. “We must pray that your words may come true.”

And, indeed, besides waiting with a hopeful trust in that all-seeing Providence who had never yet deserted them in their direst need, there was little now to be done.

As the days got shorter and shorter, and escape from another winter’s imprisonment seemed impossible, the crew of the Arrandoon was set to work overhauling stores. It was found that with strict economy the provisions would last until spring, but, with the addition of the flesh of sharks and bears, for a month or two longer. It was determined, therefore, that the men should not be put upon short allowance, for semi-starvation – McBain was doctor enough to know – only opened the door for disease to step in, in the shape perhaps of that scourge called scurvy, or even the black death itself.

When the sun at last sank to rise no more for three long months, so far from letting down their hearts, or losing hope, the officers and crew of our gallant ship once more settled down to their “old winter ways,” as Seth called them. They betook themselves to the cave in the hillside, which, for sake of giving the men exercise, McBain had made double the size, the mould taken therefrom and the rocks being used to erect a terrace near the entrance. This was surrounded by a balustrade or bulwark, with a flagstaff erected at one end, and on this was unfurled the Union Jack. Watches were kept, and meals cooked and served, with as much regularity as if they had been at sea, while the evenings were devoted to reading, music, and story-telling round the many great fires that were lighted to keep the cave warm.

Where, it may be asked, did the fuel come from? Certainly not from the ship. The coals were most carefully stored, and retained for future service; but tons on tons of great pine-logs were dug from the hill-sides. And glorious fires they made, too. It was, as Rory said, raking up the ashes of a long-past age to find fuel for a new one.

Once more the electric light was got under way, and twice a week at least the diving-bell was sunk. This was a source of amusement that never failed to give pleasure; but so intense was the frost at times that it was a matter of no small difficulty to break the ice on the water.

The captain was untiring in his efforts to keep his men employed, and in as happy a frame of mind as circumstances would admit of.

There was no snowstorm this winter, and very seldom any wind; the sky was nearly always clear, and the stars and Aurora brighter than ever they had seen them.

Christmas – the second they had spent together since leaving the Clyde – passed pleasantly enough, though there was no boisterous merriment. Songs and story-telling were in far greater request than dancing. Never, perhaps, was Rory in better spirits for solo-playing. He appeared to know intuitively the class of music the listeners would delight in, and his rendering of some of the old Scottish airs seemed simply to hold them spell-bound. As the wild, weird, plaintive notes of the violin, touched by the master fingers of the young poet, fell on their ears, they were no longer ice-bound in the dreary regions of the pole. It was no longer winter; it was no longer night. They were home once more in their native land; home in dear auld Scotland. The sun was shining brightly in the summer sky, the purple of the heather was on the moorland, the glens and valleys were green, and the music of merle and mavis, mingling with the soft croodle of the amorous cushat, resounded from the groves. No wonder that a few sighs were heard when Rory ceased to play; he had touched a chord in their inmost hearts, and for the time being had rendered them inexpressibly happy.

It is well to let the curtain fall here for a short time; it rises again on the first scene of the last act of this Arctic drama of ours.

Three months have elapsed since that Christmas evening in the cave when we beheld the crew of the Arrandoon listening with happy, hopeful, upturned faces to the sweet music that Rory discoursed from his darling instrument. Only three months, but what a change has come over the prospects of sill on board that seemingly doomed ship! Often and often had our heroes been face to face with death in storms and tempests at sea, in fighting with wild beasts, and even with wild men, but never before had they met the grim king of terrors in the form he now assumed. For several weeks the men had been falling ill, and dying one by one, and already no less than nine graves had been dug and filled under the snow on the mountain’s side.

The disease, whatever it was, resisted all kinds of treatment, and, indeed, though the symptoms in every case were similar at the commencement, no two men died in precisely the same way. At first there was an intense longing for home; this would be succeeded in a few days by loss of all appetite, by distaste for food or exertion of any kind, and by fits of extreme melancholy and depression. The doctor did his best. Alas! there are diseases against which all the might of medical skill is unavailing.

Brandy and other stimulants were tried; but these only kept the deadly ailment at bay for a very short time; it returned with double force, and poor sufferers were doubly prostrated in consequence.

There was no bodily pain, except from a strange hollow cough that in all cases accompanied the complaint, but there was rapid emaciation, hot, burning brow, and hands and feet that scorched like fire, and while some fell into a kind of gentle slumber from which they awoke no more in this world, others died from sheer debility, the mind being clear to the last – nay, even brighter as they neared the bourne from which no traveller ever returns.

As the time went on – the days were now getting long again, for spring had returned – matters got even worse. It was strange, too, that the very best and brightest of the crew were the first to be attacked and to die. I do not think there was a dry eye in the ship when the little procession wound its way round the hillside bearing in its unpretending coffin the mortal remains of poor Ted Wilson. All this long cruise he had been the life and soul of the whole crew. No wonder that the words of the beautiful old song Tom Bowling rose to the mind of more than one of the crew of the Arrandoon when Ted was laid to rest: