[Contents]CHAPTER IXCHAPTER IXOUR FIRST NARWHALAfter crossing Melville Bay again for the third time, and without stopping at Cape York, we arrived in Thule. Coming up, on the other side of Melville Bay, I got entirely cheated out of one stop. It was very early morning and I was sound asleep and they didn’t wake me.As the boats came out to meet theMorrisseythe men waved their hats in greeting. But when they came near and saw that Rasmussen was aboard they started shouting and cheering. The man running the engine in the little power boat was so excited that he forgot to stop the motor and ran the boat full speed and head on into the side of the vessel[101]so hard that most of the people in his craft fell down.We brought Rasmussen to this trading station of his where he had not been for five years and Dad had agreed to take away for him to New York the fox skins they had traded from the Eskimos during the winter. Also Mr. Rasmussen’s manager, who is also his cousin, had been promised that he could go back to Denmark this year. He had been at Thule continuously for six years. The first time we were there an apple Dad gave him was the first he had eaten in all that time.We also took from Thule a native girl called Nette, who has been studying to be a nurse and is going back to Denmark to complete her education, living with Mrs. Rasmussen there. We will take them to Holsteinsborg where they will get a steamer for Denmark.Hans Nielsen is Rasmussen’s manager and he of course is very pleased at the chance to get away. He brought his own kayak on[102]theMorrisseyso that he can help us in hunting.While in Thule, early in the morning, Dad, Dan, Bob Peary and I went out in the motor boat with two Eskimos to look for seal. We went up the fjord about five miles inland to the foot of a glacier and saw about six, but couldn’t get near enough to shoot them. We took several long shots, without success.We had to go back then, for as soon as Nielsen and Nette were ready we were leaving for Whale Sound. During that morning while they were packing up we had quite a dance outside in front of Mr. Nielsen’s house. Kel took movies of the party. We had a pail of candy and when it was passed around the Eskimos would dig in with both hands. But really they are most awfully polite and these nice people in the North never take anything without being asked first. And I think they never steal. It’s interesting to know what Mr. Rasmussen tells me,[103]that in the Eskimo language there are no swear words. They just don’t use bad language. The worst thing to call a man is to say he is lazy or a bad hunter.From Thule we took a bunch of Eskimos, including one older man who had been with Peary and was very sick. He said to Cap’n Bob: “I wish for the good days of Pearyarkshua when we had plenty to eat and to wear.”Of course the Captain knew him well and told me that he used to be about the strongest Eskimo of the whole lot they had and one of the very best hunters. His name is Ahngmalokto. Doctor Heinbecker gave him some medicine, and the skipper gave him tea and bread and jam, but he wasn’t able even to eat that. It was very sad.Thule itself is at the head of North Star Bay, on a rocky beach that sweeps around like a crescent. Out at the sea end, on one side, is a huge hill with a flat table-like top with steep walls at the top then sloping[104]down evenly in great rock slides which are called talus slopes. It’s a lot like a mesa or tableland in our own west. The name of this queer mountain is Oomunui. There are four frame buildings, the trading station, the furthest north in the world. And about a mile away, across the rock peninsula, is the native settlement, a scattered lot of tupiks, the summer skin houses of the Eskimos, with the stone winter houses nearby along the shore. I suppose there are about forty people.Since 1910 Rasmussen has run this trading station. It is to help these northern Eskimos, called the Smith Sound tribe. They are the furthest north people in the world. Before, they never had any regular chance to get things, or to trade their skins, except to whalers once in a while, or explorers. Before Peary commenced coming about thirty years ago they had no guns or steel or anything else except what they made and found themselves. They used to make arrow heads[105]out of meteorite chips, and made fire from flint they found. And about all their weapons and knives were made from ivory. The walrus tusk is very fine for this sort of thing.Even today they have very little, compared with the poorest people of the world we know. But they are healthy and happy and very good natured and kind. And of course they are great hunters. They have to be, to live.At Thule Rasmussen, and the Danish committee which works with him in running the thing, have a regular kingdom. Dad calls it a benevolent dictatorship, which means that Rasmussen is just about a king, but runs everything for the good of the people. They have money of their own, round pieces with holes in the middle, of three different values. The Station pays with these for the furs, and then the Eskimos use them in getting supplies from the store. Goods are sold at very low figures and the idea is, Mr. Rasmussen says, to make the[106]Station just pay its own way. As I have said in another chapter, we brought up a lot of stores from New York. And now we are taking back the fox skins of the winter’s catch.Early that afternoon, August 15th, we left Thule.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.The next morning when I came on deck we were just off Northumberland Island and I saw the very place where we had been wrecked and so nearly spent quite a time at.I was on the crosstrees on the lookout for walrus and saw some seals and two that might have been walrus. When I got cold Bob Peary took my place. Soon afterward we stopped running on account of fog, and most everyone turned in to sleep, for with the all-the-time sunlight we never seem to find time to get enough sleep.I was down in the main cabin when Mr. Nielsen came down and said to Carl, who speaks Danish, that there was a dead white[107]whale near. I got Dad and told him about it. In a few minutes they had a boat over and went out to get him. When they reached the floating animal they called back that it was a female narwhal, and not a white whale after all.They towed it in and we put two or three tackles on it and started to get it aboard. It was about fifteen feet long and weighed I suppose over a ton. It had been dead quite a time and smelt pretty bad, so we decided to open it as it hung beside the boat and get the intestines out and some of the blubber off. The inner meat proved to be sound and all right.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.We fixed a rowboat alongside and Harry Raven and Fred got in it and did the cutting up, with their oilskins on, for it was pretty messy. With the narwhal Harry found a little one. And he wasn’t so little either. He measured five feet seven inches. This was carefully embalmed. That is, Harry[108]pumped into its veins a fluid which preserves the flesh. It is to be taken back to the Museum just exactly as it is. I think a baby narwhal is a very rare specimen, and we all hope this one gets back in good condition.[109]
[Contents]CHAPTER IXCHAPTER IXOUR FIRST NARWHALAfter crossing Melville Bay again for the third time, and without stopping at Cape York, we arrived in Thule. Coming up, on the other side of Melville Bay, I got entirely cheated out of one stop. It was very early morning and I was sound asleep and they didn’t wake me.As the boats came out to meet theMorrisseythe men waved their hats in greeting. But when they came near and saw that Rasmussen was aboard they started shouting and cheering. The man running the engine in the little power boat was so excited that he forgot to stop the motor and ran the boat full speed and head on into the side of the vessel[101]so hard that most of the people in his craft fell down.We brought Rasmussen to this trading station of his where he had not been for five years and Dad had agreed to take away for him to New York the fox skins they had traded from the Eskimos during the winter. Also Mr. Rasmussen’s manager, who is also his cousin, had been promised that he could go back to Denmark this year. He had been at Thule continuously for six years. The first time we were there an apple Dad gave him was the first he had eaten in all that time.We also took from Thule a native girl called Nette, who has been studying to be a nurse and is going back to Denmark to complete her education, living with Mrs. Rasmussen there. We will take them to Holsteinsborg where they will get a steamer for Denmark.Hans Nielsen is Rasmussen’s manager and he of course is very pleased at the chance to get away. He brought his own kayak on[102]theMorrisseyso that he can help us in hunting.While in Thule, early in the morning, Dad, Dan, Bob Peary and I went out in the motor boat with two Eskimos to look for seal. We went up the fjord about five miles inland to the foot of a glacier and saw about six, but couldn’t get near enough to shoot them. We took several long shots, without success.We had to go back then, for as soon as Nielsen and Nette were ready we were leaving for Whale Sound. During that morning while they were packing up we had quite a dance outside in front of Mr. Nielsen’s house. Kel took movies of the party. We had a pail of candy and when it was passed around the Eskimos would dig in with both hands. But really they are most awfully polite and these nice people in the North never take anything without being asked first. And I think they never steal. It’s interesting to know what Mr. Rasmussen tells me,[103]that in the Eskimo language there are no swear words. They just don’t use bad language. The worst thing to call a man is to say he is lazy or a bad hunter.From Thule we took a bunch of Eskimos, including one older man who had been with Peary and was very sick. He said to Cap’n Bob: “I wish for the good days of Pearyarkshua when we had plenty to eat and to wear.”Of course the Captain knew him well and told me that he used to be about the strongest Eskimo of the whole lot they had and one of the very best hunters. His name is Ahngmalokto. Doctor Heinbecker gave him some medicine, and the skipper gave him tea and bread and jam, but he wasn’t able even to eat that. It was very sad.Thule itself is at the head of North Star Bay, on a rocky beach that sweeps around like a crescent. Out at the sea end, on one side, is a huge hill with a flat table-like top with steep walls at the top then sloping[104]down evenly in great rock slides which are called talus slopes. It’s a lot like a mesa or tableland in our own west. The name of this queer mountain is Oomunui. There are four frame buildings, the trading station, the furthest north in the world. And about a mile away, across the rock peninsula, is the native settlement, a scattered lot of tupiks, the summer skin houses of the Eskimos, with the stone winter houses nearby along the shore. I suppose there are about forty people.Since 1910 Rasmussen has run this trading station. It is to help these northern Eskimos, called the Smith Sound tribe. They are the furthest north people in the world. Before, they never had any regular chance to get things, or to trade their skins, except to whalers once in a while, or explorers. Before Peary commenced coming about thirty years ago they had no guns or steel or anything else except what they made and found themselves. They used to make arrow heads[105]out of meteorite chips, and made fire from flint they found. And about all their weapons and knives were made from ivory. The walrus tusk is very fine for this sort of thing.Even today they have very little, compared with the poorest people of the world we know. But they are healthy and happy and very good natured and kind. And of course they are great hunters. They have to be, to live.At Thule Rasmussen, and the Danish committee which works with him in running the thing, have a regular kingdom. Dad calls it a benevolent dictatorship, which means that Rasmussen is just about a king, but runs everything for the good of the people. They have money of their own, round pieces with holes in the middle, of three different values. The Station pays with these for the furs, and then the Eskimos use them in getting supplies from the store. Goods are sold at very low figures and the idea is, Mr. Rasmussen says, to make the[106]Station just pay its own way. As I have said in another chapter, we brought up a lot of stores from New York. And now we are taking back the fox skins of the winter’s catch.Early that afternoon, August 15th, we left Thule.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.The next morning when I came on deck we were just off Northumberland Island and I saw the very place where we had been wrecked and so nearly spent quite a time at.I was on the crosstrees on the lookout for walrus and saw some seals and two that might have been walrus. When I got cold Bob Peary took my place. Soon afterward we stopped running on account of fog, and most everyone turned in to sleep, for with the all-the-time sunlight we never seem to find time to get enough sleep.I was down in the main cabin when Mr. Nielsen came down and said to Carl, who speaks Danish, that there was a dead white[107]whale near. I got Dad and told him about it. In a few minutes they had a boat over and went out to get him. When they reached the floating animal they called back that it was a female narwhal, and not a white whale after all.They towed it in and we put two or three tackles on it and started to get it aboard. It was about fifteen feet long and weighed I suppose over a ton. It had been dead quite a time and smelt pretty bad, so we decided to open it as it hung beside the boat and get the intestines out and some of the blubber off. The inner meat proved to be sound and all right.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.We fixed a rowboat alongside and Harry Raven and Fred got in it and did the cutting up, with their oilskins on, for it was pretty messy. With the narwhal Harry found a little one. And he wasn’t so little either. He measured five feet seven inches. This was carefully embalmed. That is, Harry[108]pumped into its veins a fluid which preserves the flesh. It is to be taken back to the Museum just exactly as it is. I think a baby narwhal is a very rare specimen, and we all hope this one gets back in good condition.[109]
CHAPTER IXCHAPTER IXOUR FIRST NARWHAL
CHAPTER IX
After crossing Melville Bay again for the third time, and without stopping at Cape York, we arrived in Thule. Coming up, on the other side of Melville Bay, I got entirely cheated out of one stop. It was very early morning and I was sound asleep and they didn’t wake me.As the boats came out to meet theMorrisseythe men waved their hats in greeting. But when they came near and saw that Rasmussen was aboard they started shouting and cheering. The man running the engine in the little power boat was so excited that he forgot to stop the motor and ran the boat full speed and head on into the side of the vessel[101]so hard that most of the people in his craft fell down.We brought Rasmussen to this trading station of his where he had not been for five years and Dad had agreed to take away for him to New York the fox skins they had traded from the Eskimos during the winter. Also Mr. Rasmussen’s manager, who is also his cousin, had been promised that he could go back to Denmark this year. He had been at Thule continuously for six years. The first time we were there an apple Dad gave him was the first he had eaten in all that time.We also took from Thule a native girl called Nette, who has been studying to be a nurse and is going back to Denmark to complete her education, living with Mrs. Rasmussen there. We will take them to Holsteinsborg where they will get a steamer for Denmark.Hans Nielsen is Rasmussen’s manager and he of course is very pleased at the chance to get away. He brought his own kayak on[102]theMorrisseyso that he can help us in hunting.While in Thule, early in the morning, Dad, Dan, Bob Peary and I went out in the motor boat with two Eskimos to look for seal. We went up the fjord about five miles inland to the foot of a glacier and saw about six, but couldn’t get near enough to shoot them. We took several long shots, without success.We had to go back then, for as soon as Nielsen and Nette were ready we were leaving for Whale Sound. During that morning while they were packing up we had quite a dance outside in front of Mr. Nielsen’s house. Kel took movies of the party. We had a pail of candy and when it was passed around the Eskimos would dig in with both hands. But really they are most awfully polite and these nice people in the North never take anything without being asked first. And I think they never steal. It’s interesting to know what Mr. Rasmussen tells me,[103]that in the Eskimo language there are no swear words. They just don’t use bad language. The worst thing to call a man is to say he is lazy or a bad hunter.From Thule we took a bunch of Eskimos, including one older man who had been with Peary and was very sick. He said to Cap’n Bob: “I wish for the good days of Pearyarkshua when we had plenty to eat and to wear.”Of course the Captain knew him well and told me that he used to be about the strongest Eskimo of the whole lot they had and one of the very best hunters. His name is Ahngmalokto. Doctor Heinbecker gave him some medicine, and the skipper gave him tea and bread and jam, but he wasn’t able even to eat that. It was very sad.Thule itself is at the head of North Star Bay, on a rocky beach that sweeps around like a crescent. Out at the sea end, on one side, is a huge hill with a flat table-like top with steep walls at the top then sloping[104]down evenly in great rock slides which are called talus slopes. It’s a lot like a mesa or tableland in our own west. The name of this queer mountain is Oomunui. There are four frame buildings, the trading station, the furthest north in the world. And about a mile away, across the rock peninsula, is the native settlement, a scattered lot of tupiks, the summer skin houses of the Eskimos, with the stone winter houses nearby along the shore. I suppose there are about forty people.Since 1910 Rasmussen has run this trading station. It is to help these northern Eskimos, called the Smith Sound tribe. They are the furthest north people in the world. Before, they never had any regular chance to get things, or to trade their skins, except to whalers once in a while, or explorers. Before Peary commenced coming about thirty years ago they had no guns or steel or anything else except what they made and found themselves. They used to make arrow heads[105]out of meteorite chips, and made fire from flint they found. And about all their weapons and knives were made from ivory. The walrus tusk is very fine for this sort of thing.Even today they have very little, compared with the poorest people of the world we know. But they are healthy and happy and very good natured and kind. And of course they are great hunters. They have to be, to live.At Thule Rasmussen, and the Danish committee which works with him in running the thing, have a regular kingdom. Dad calls it a benevolent dictatorship, which means that Rasmussen is just about a king, but runs everything for the good of the people. They have money of their own, round pieces with holes in the middle, of three different values. The Station pays with these for the furs, and then the Eskimos use them in getting supplies from the store. Goods are sold at very low figures and the idea is, Mr. Rasmussen says, to make the[106]Station just pay its own way. As I have said in another chapter, we brought up a lot of stores from New York. And now we are taking back the fox skins of the winter’s catch.Early that afternoon, August 15th, we left Thule.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.The next morning when I came on deck we were just off Northumberland Island and I saw the very place where we had been wrecked and so nearly spent quite a time at.I was on the crosstrees on the lookout for walrus and saw some seals and two that might have been walrus. When I got cold Bob Peary took my place. Soon afterward we stopped running on account of fog, and most everyone turned in to sleep, for with the all-the-time sunlight we never seem to find time to get enough sleep.I was down in the main cabin when Mr. Nielsen came down and said to Carl, who speaks Danish, that there was a dead white[107]whale near. I got Dad and told him about it. In a few minutes they had a boat over and went out to get him. When they reached the floating animal they called back that it was a female narwhal, and not a white whale after all.They towed it in and we put two or three tackles on it and started to get it aboard. It was about fifteen feet long and weighed I suppose over a ton. It had been dead quite a time and smelt pretty bad, so we decided to open it as it hung beside the boat and get the intestines out and some of the blubber off. The inner meat proved to be sound and all right.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.We fixed a rowboat alongside and Harry Raven and Fred got in it and did the cutting up, with their oilskins on, for it was pretty messy. With the narwhal Harry found a little one. And he wasn’t so little either. He measured five feet seven inches. This was carefully embalmed. That is, Harry[108]pumped into its veins a fluid which preserves the flesh. It is to be taken back to the Museum just exactly as it is. I think a baby narwhal is a very rare specimen, and we all hope this one gets back in good condition.[109]
After crossing Melville Bay again for the third time, and without stopping at Cape York, we arrived in Thule. Coming up, on the other side of Melville Bay, I got entirely cheated out of one stop. It was very early morning and I was sound asleep and they didn’t wake me.
As the boats came out to meet theMorrisseythe men waved their hats in greeting. But when they came near and saw that Rasmussen was aboard they started shouting and cheering. The man running the engine in the little power boat was so excited that he forgot to stop the motor and ran the boat full speed and head on into the side of the vessel[101]so hard that most of the people in his craft fell down.
We brought Rasmussen to this trading station of his where he had not been for five years and Dad had agreed to take away for him to New York the fox skins they had traded from the Eskimos during the winter. Also Mr. Rasmussen’s manager, who is also his cousin, had been promised that he could go back to Denmark this year. He had been at Thule continuously for six years. The first time we were there an apple Dad gave him was the first he had eaten in all that time.
We also took from Thule a native girl called Nette, who has been studying to be a nurse and is going back to Denmark to complete her education, living with Mrs. Rasmussen there. We will take them to Holsteinsborg where they will get a steamer for Denmark.
Hans Nielsen is Rasmussen’s manager and he of course is very pleased at the chance to get away. He brought his own kayak on[102]theMorrisseyso that he can help us in hunting.
While in Thule, early in the morning, Dad, Dan, Bob Peary and I went out in the motor boat with two Eskimos to look for seal. We went up the fjord about five miles inland to the foot of a glacier and saw about six, but couldn’t get near enough to shoot them. We took several long shots, without success.
We had to go back then, for as soon as Nielsen and Nette were ready we were leaving for Whale Sound. During that morning while they were packing up we had quite a dance outside in front of Mr. Nielsen’s house. Kel took movies of the party. We had a pail of candy and when it was passed around the Eskimos would dig in with both hands. But really they are most awfully polite and these nice people in the North never take anything without being asked first. And I think they never steal. It’s interesting to know what Mr. Rasmussen tells me,[103]that in the Eskimo language there are no swear words. They just don’t use bad language. The worst thing to call a man is to say he is lazy or a bad hunter.
From Thule we took a bunch of Eskimos, including one older man who had been with Peary and was very sick. He said to Cap’n Bob: “I wish for the good days of Pearyarkshua when we had plenty to eat and to wear.”
Of course the Captain knew him well and told me that he used to be about the strongest Eskimo of the whole lot they had and one of the very best hunters. His name is Ahngmalokto. Doctor Heinbecker gave him some medicine, and the skipper gave him tea and bread and jam, but he wasn’t able even to eat that. It was very sad.
Thule itself is at the head of North Star Bay, on a rocky beach that sweeps around like a crescent. Out at the sea end, on one side, is a huge hill with a flat table-like top with steep walls at the top then sloping[104]down evenly in great rock slides which are called talus slopes. It’s a lot like a mesa or tableland in our own west. The name of this queer mountain is Oomunui. There are four frame buildings, the trading station, the furthest north in the world. And about a mile away, across the rock peninsula, is the native settlement, a scattered lot of tupiks, the summer skin houses of the Eskimos, with the stone winter houses nearby along the shore. I suppose there are about forty people.
Since 1910 Rasmussen has run this trading station. It is to help these northern Eskimos, called the Smith Sound tribe. They are the furthest north people in the world. Before, they never had any regular chance to get things, or to trade their skins, except to whalers once in a while, or explorers. Before Peary commenced coming about thirty years ago they had no guns or steel or anything else except what they made and found themselves. They used to make arrow heads[105]out of meteorite chips, and made fire from flint they found. And about all their weapons and knives were made from ivory. The walrus tusk is very fine for this sort of thing.
Even today they have very little, compared with the poorest people of the world we know. But they are healthy and happy and very good natured and kind. And of course they are great hunters. They have to be, to live.
At Thule Rasmussen, and the Danish committee which works with him in running the thing, have a regular kingdom. Dad calls it a benevolent dictatorship, which means that Rasmussen is just about a king, but runs everything for the good of the people. They have money of their own, round pieces with holes in the middle, of three different values. The Station pays with these for the furs, and then the Eskimos use them in getting supplies from the store. Goods are sold at very low figures and the idea is, Mr. Rasmussen says, to make the[106]Station just pay its own way. As I have said in another chapter, we brought up a lot of stores from New York. And now we are taking back the fox skins of the winter’s catch.
Early that afternoon, August 15th, we left Thule.
Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.
Harry Raven, Zoölogist, Shows how to Clean a Narwhal Skull.
The next morning when I came on deck we were just off Northumberland Island and I saw the very place where we had been wrecked and so nearly spent quite a time at.
I was on the crosstrees on the lookout for walrus and saw some seals and two that might have been walrus. When I got cold Bob Peary took my place. Soon afterward we stopped running on account of fog, and most everyone turned in to sleep, for with the all-the-time sunlight we never seem to find time to get enough sleep.
I was down in the main cabin when Mr. Nielsen came down and said to Carl, who speaks Danish, that there was a dead white[107]whale near. I got Dad and told him about it. In a few minutes they had a boat over and went out to get him. When they reached the floating animal they called back that it was a female narwhal, and not a white whale after all.
They towed it in and we put two or three tackles on it and started to get it aboard. It was about fifteen feet long and weighed I suppose over a ton. It had been dead quite a time and smelt pretty bad, so we decided to open it as it hung beside the boat and get the intestines out and some of the blubber off. The inner meat proved to be sound and all right.
Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.
Working on a Narwhal Skeleton.
We fixed a rowboat alongside and Harry Raven and Fred got in it and did the cutting up, with their oilskins on, for it was pretty messy. With the narwhal Harry found a little one. And he wasn’t so little either. He measured five feet seven inches. This was carefully embalmed. That is, Harry[108]pumped into its veins a fluid which preserves the flesh. It is to be taken back to the Museum just exactly as it is. I think a baby narwhal is a very rare specimen, and we all hope this one gets back in good condition.
[109]