Ungava, R. M. Ballantyne [best authors to read .txt] 📗

When the young Esquimau began to recover from the lethargic state into which his wound had thrown him, he found himself lying at the bottom of the women’s oomiak with his old grandfather by his side, and a noisy crew of children and dogs around him. Raising himself on his elbow, he brushed the clotted blood and hair from his temples, and endeavoured to recall his scattered faculties. Seeing this, the old crone who had saved his life laid down her paddle and handed him a sealskin cup of water, which he seized and drank with avidity. Fortunately the wound on his forehead, although it had stunned him severely at first, was trifling, and in a few minutes after partaking of the cool water, he recovered sufficiently to sit up and look around him.

Gradually his faculties returned, and he started up with a troubled look.

“Where are the Allat? Where is my wife?” he exclaimed vehemently, as his eye fell on the prostrate form of his still insensible grandfather.

“Gone,” answered several of the women.

“Gone!” repeated the youth, gazing wildly among the faces around him in search of that of his wife. “Gone! Tell me, is she in one of the other oomiaks?”

The women trembled as they answered, “No.”

“Have the Allat got her?”

There was no reply to this question, but he did not need one. Springing like a tiger to the stern of the oomiak, he seized the steering paddle, and turning the head of the boat towards the shore, paddled with all his energy. Nearly two hours had elapsed since they had commenced their flight, and as all danger of pursuit was over the moment the Indians turned their backs on the sea, the Esquimaux had gradually edged in-shore again, so that a few minutes sufficed to run the prow of the oomiak on the shingle of the beach. Without saying a word, the young man sprang over the side, drew a hunting-spear from the bottom of the boat, and hurried back in the direction of the deserted village at the top of his speed. The women knew that nothing could stop him, and feeling that he was quite able to take care of himself, they quietly put to sea again, and continued their voyage.

The limbs of the young Esquimau, as we have already said, were gigantic and powerful, enabling him to traverse the country at a pace which few of his fellows could keep up with; and although a stern-chase is proverbially a long one, and the distance between two parties travelling in opposite directions is amazingly increased in a short space of time, there is no doubt that he would have overtaken his Indian foes ere many hours had passed, but for the wound in his head, which, although not dangerous, compelled him more than once to halt and sit down, in order to prevent himself from falling into a swoon. Hunger had also something to do with this state of weakness, as he had eaten nothing for many hours. In his hasty departure from the boat, however, he had neglected to take any provisions with him, so that he had little hope of obtaining refreshment before arriving at the village, where some scraps might perhaps be picked up.

Slowly, and with a reeling brain, he staggered on; but here no relief awaited him, for every scrap of food had been either taken away or destroyed by the Indians, and it was with a heavy sigh and a feeling akin to despair that he sat down beside the blackened ruins of his late home.

But Esquimaux, more than other men, are accustomed to reverses of fortune, and the sigh with which he regarded the ruins of his hut had no reference whatever to the absence of food. He knew that about this time the mouth of the river would be full of ice, carried up by the flood-tide, and that seals would, in all probability, be found on it; so he started up, and hastening along the beach soon gained the floes, which he examined carefully. A glance or two sufficed to show him that he was right in his conjecture. On a sheet of ice not more than a couple of hundred yards from shore were two seals fast asleep. These he prepared to stalk. Between the floe and the shore ran a stream of water twenty yards broad. Over this he ferried himself on a lump of loose ice; and, on reaching the floe, he went down on his hands and knees, holding the spear in his right hand as he advanced cautiously towards his victim.

The Esquimau seal-spear is a curious weapon, and exhibits in a high degree the extraordinary ingenuity of the race. The handle is sometimes made of the horn of the narwal, but more frequently of wood. It has a movable head or barb, to which a long line of walrus hide or sealskin is attached. This barb is made of ivory tipped with iron, and is attached to the handle in such a way that it becomes detached from it the instant the animal is struck, and remains firmly imbedded in the wound with the line fastened to it, while the handle floats away on the water or falls on the ice, as the case may be.

When the Esquimau had approached to within a hundred yards, he lay down at full length and slowly worked himself forward. Meanwhile the seals raised their heads, but seeing, as they imagined, a companion coming towards them, they did not make for their holes, which were a few yards distant from them. Having drawn near enough to render the animals suspicious, the young giant now sprang up, rushed forward, and got between one seal and its hole just as its more active companion dived into the water. In another moment the deadly lance transfixed its side and killed it. This was a fortunate supply to the Esquimau, whose powers of endurance were fast failing. He immediately sat down on his victim, and cutting a large steak from its side, speedily made a meal that far exceeded the powers of any alderman whatsoever! It required but a short time to accomplish, however, and a shorter time to transfer several choice (junks) chunks to his wallet; with which replenished store he resumed his journey.

Although the man’s vigour was restored for a time, so that he travelled with great speed, it did not last long, owing to the wound in his head, which produced frequent attacks of giddiness, and at last compelled him, much against his will, to halt for a couple of hours’ repose. Glancing round, in order to select a suitable camping ground, he soon observed such a spot in the form of a broad, overhanging ledge of rock, beneath which there was a patch of scrubby underwood. Here he lay down with the seal blubber for a pillow, and was quickly buried in deep, untroubled slumber. In little more than two hours he awoke with a start, and, after a second application to the contents of the wallet, resumed his solitary march. The short rest seemed to have quite restored his wonted vigour, for he now stalked up the banks of the river at a rate which seemed only to accelerate as he advanced. As has been already said, these banks were both rugged and precipitous. In some places the rocks jutted out into the water, forming promontories over which it was difficult to climb; and frequently these capes terminated in abrupt precipices, necessitating a détour in order to advance. In other places the coast was indented with sandy bays, which more than doubled the distance the traveller would have had to accomplish had he possessed a kayak. Unfortunately in his hasty departure he neglected to take one with him; but he did his best to atone for this oversight by making almost superhuman exertions. He strode over the sands like an ostrich of the desert, and clambered up the cliffs and over the rocks—looking, in his hairy garments, like a shaggy polar bear. The thought of his young and pretty bride a captive in the hands of his bitterest foes, and doomed to a life of slavery, almost maddened him, and caused his dark eye to flash and his broad bosom to heave with pent-up emotion, while it spurred him on to put forth exertions that were far beyond the powers of any member of his tribe, and could not, under less exciting circumstances, have been performed even by himself. As to what were his intentions should he overtake the Indians, he knew not. The agitation of his spirits, combined with the influence of his wound, induced him to act from impulse; and the wild tumult of his feelings prevented him from calculating the consequences or perceiving the hopelessness of an attack made by one man, armed only with knife and spear, against a body of Indians who possessed the deadly gun.

Alas! for the sorrows of the poor human race. In all lands they are much the same, whether civilised or savage—virtue and vice alternately triumphing. Bravery, candour, heroism, in fierce contest with treachery, cowardice, and malevolence, form the salient points of the record among all nations, and in all ages. No puissant knight of old ever buckled on his panoply of mail, seized his sword and lance, mounted his charger, and sallied forth singlehanded to deliver his mistress from enchanted castle, in the face of appalling perils, with hotter haste or a more thorough contempt of danger than did our Esquimau giant pursue the Indians who had captured his bride; but, like many a daring spirit of romance, the giant failed, and that through no fault of his.

On arriving at the rocky platform beside the spring where we first introduced him to the reader,