The North Pole, Robert E. Peary [e book reader android .TXT] 📗

This was the first time in all my arctic expeditions that I had been at headquarters through May and June. Hitherto there had always seemed to be something more to be done in the field; but now the principal work was completed, and it remained only to arrange the results. In the meantime the energies of the Eskimos were largely employed in short journeys in the neighborhood, most of them for the purpose of visiting the various supply depots established between the ship and Cape Columbia and removing their unused supplies to the ship. Between them these various small expeditions did some interesting work. Most of this supplementary work in the field was accomplished by other members of the expedition, but I had plenty of work on board the Roosevelt. Along about the 10th of May we began to get genuine spring weather. On that day Bartlett and myself began spring housecleaning. We overhauled the cabins, cleared out the dark corners, and dried out everything that needed it, the quarter-deck being littered with all kinds of miscellaneous articles the whole day. On the same day spring work on the ship was also begun, the winter coverings being taken off the Roosevelt's stack and ventilators, and preparations being made for work on the engines.

A few days later a beautiful white fox came to the ship and attempted to get on board. One of the Eskimos killed him. The creature behaved in an extraordinary manner, acting, in fact, just like the Eskimo dogs when those creatures run amuck. The Eskimos say that in the Whale Sound region foxes often seem to go mad in the same way and sometimes attempt to break into the igloos. This affliction from which arctic dogs and foxes suffer, while apparently a form of madness, does not seem to have any relation to rabies since it does not appear to be contagious or infectious.

The spring weather, though unmistakably the real thing, was fickle on the whole. On Sunday, May 16, for example, the sun was hot and the temperature high, and the snow all about us was disappearing almost like magic, pools of water forming about the ship; but the next day we had a stiff southwest gale with considerable wet snow. On the whole, it was a very disagreeable day.

On the 18th the engineer's force began work on the boilers in earnest. Four days later two Eskimos returned from MacMillan, whom they had left at Cape Morris Jesup on the Greenland coast. They brought notes from him giving some details of his work there. On the 31st MacMillan and Borup themselves arrived from Greenland, having made the return trip from Cape Morris Jesup, a distance of 270 miles, in eight marches, an average of 34 miles per march. MacMillan reported that he got as far as 84° 17´ north of Cape Jesup, had made a sounding which showed a depth of 90 fathoms, and had obtained ten days' tidal observations. They brought in as many of the skins and as much of the meat as the sledges could carry of 52 musk-oxen which they had killed.

Early in June, Borup and MacMillan continued their work; MacMillan making tidal observations at Fort Conger; and Borup erecting at Cape Columbia the monument which has been already described.

MacMillan while taking tidal observations at Fort Conger on Lady Franklin Bay, to connect our work at Capes Sheridan, Columbia, Bryant, and Jesup with the observation of the Lady Franklin Bay expedition of 1881-83, found still some remains of the supplies of the disastrous Greely expedition of 1881-84. They included canned vegetables, potatoes, hominy, rhubarb, pemmican, tea, and coffee. Strange to say, after the lapse of a quarter of a century, many of these supplies were still in good condition, and some of them were eaten with relish by various members of our party.

One of the finds was a text book which had belonged to Lieutenant Kislingbury, who lost his life with the Greely party. Upon its flyleaf it bore this inscription: "To my dear father, from his affectionate son, Harry Kislingbury. May God be with you and return you safely to us." Greely's old coat was also found lying on the ground. This also was in good condition and I believe that MacMillan wore it for some days.

All hands were now beginning to look forward to the time when the Roosevelt should again turn her nose toward the south and home. Following our own housecleaning, the Eskimos had one on June 12. Every movable article was taken out of their quarters, and the walls, ceilings, and floors were scrubbed, disinfected, and whitewashed. Other signs of returning summer were observed on all sides. The surface of the ice-floe was going blue, the delta of the river was quite bare, and the patches of bare ground ashore were growing larger almost hourly. Even the Roosevelt seemed to feel the change and gradually began to right herself from the pronounced list which she had taken under the press of the ice in the early winter. On June 16 we had the first of the summer rains, though the next morning all the pools of water were frozen over. On the same day Borup captured a live musk calf near Clements Markham Inlet. He managed to get his unique captive back to the ship alive, but the little creature died the next evening, though the steward nursed him carefully in an effort to save his life.

On the summer solstice, June 22, midnoon of the arctic summer and the longest day of the year, it snowed all night; but a week later the weather seemed almost tropical, and we all suffered from the heat, strange though it seems to say it. The glimpses of open water off Cape Sheridan were increasing in frequency and size, and on July 2 we could see a considerable lake just off the point of this cape. The 4th of July as we observed it would have pleased the advocates of "a quiet Fourth." What with the recent death of Marvin and the fact that the day was Sunday, nothing out of the ordinary routine was done except to dress the ship with flags, and there was scarcely enough wind even to display our bunting. Three years ago that very day the Roosevelt got away from her winter quarters at almost the same spot in a strong southerly gale; but the experience on that occasion convinced me that it would be best to hang on in our present position just as late in July as possible, and thus give the ice in Robeson and Kennedy Channels more time to break up.

It almost seemed as if the Roosevelt shared with us our anticipation of a speedy return, for she continued gradually to regain an even keel, and within four or five days she had automatically completed this operation. On the 8th we put out the eight-inch hawser and made the ship fast, bow and stern, in order to hold her in position in case she should be subjected to any pressure before we were ready to depart. On the same day we began in real earnest to make ready for the homeward departure. The work began with the taking on of coal, which, it will be remembered, had been transferred to shore along with quantities of other supplies when we went into winter quarters, in order to make provisions against the loss of the ship by fire, or ice pressure, or what not, in the course of the winter. The process of getting the ship ready for her homeward voyage does not require detailed description. Suffice it to say that it furnished the entire party with hard work and plenty of it for fully ten days.

At the expiration of that period Bartlett reported the ship ready to sail. Observation of conditions off shore revealed the fact that Robeson Channel was practicable for navigation. Our work was done, success had crowned our efforts, the ship was ready, we were all fit, and on July 18, with only the tragic memory of the lost lamented Marvin to lessen our high spirits, the Roosevelt pulled slowly out from the cape and turned her nose again to the south.

Off Cape Union the Roosevelt was intentionally forced out into the ice to fight a way down the center of the channel in accordance with my deliberate program.

For a ship of the Roosevelt's class, this is the best and quickest return route—far preferable to hugging the shore.

The voyage to Battle Harbor was comparatively uneventful. It involved, of course, as does any journey in those waters, even under favorable conditions, unceasing watchfulness and skill in ice navigation, but the trip was without pronounced adventure. On August 8 the Roosevelt emerged from the ice and passed Cape Sabine, and the value of experience and the new departure of forcing the ship down the center of the channel instead of along shore will be appreciated from the fact that we were now thirty-nine days ahead of our 1906 record on the occasion of our previous return from Cape Sheridan, although we had left Cape Sheridan considerably later than before. The voyage from Cape Sheridan to Cape Sabine had been made in fifty-three days, less time than in 1906.

We stopped at Cape Saumarez, the Nerke of the Eskimos, and a boat's crew went ashore. It was there I first heard of the movements of Dr. Frederick Cook during the previous year while absent from Anoratok. We arrived at Etah on the 17th of August. There I learned further details as to the movements of Dr. Cook during his sojourn in that region.

At Etah we picked up Harry Whitney, who had spent the winter in that neighborhood