CHAPTER XIXFAREWELL TO GREENLAND

Alarm about Mr. Verhoeff—A Search Instituted—Alone with Matt and the Native Women—No News—Return of the Search-parties—Poor Verhoeff—Packing up—I play Lady Bountiful—Pennsylvania’s Gifts to the Natives—Farewell to Redcliffe—Fossil-hunting at Atanekerdluk—Godhavn revisited—Godthaab—Eskimo Kayakers—Fire-swept St. John’s—Arrival at Philadelphia—Home again.

Thursday, August 18. When we rejoined our men at midnight we learned from Dr. Cook that Verhoeff, who left us at Bowdoin Bay, had not yet returned, and that Gibson and Mr. Bryant, the second in command of Professor Heilprin’s party, were in Five-Glacier Valley searching for him. Verhoeff, after having joined Gibson, left him at the valley for a further search after minerals, and his last words were, “If I am not here don’t be worried; I may be gone till Tuesday or Wednesday.”

Before retiring Mr. Peary sent a note on board the “Kite,” informing Professor Heilprin of our return, and stating that we should be ready to say farewell to Redcliffe the next day. Soon after breakfast this morning Mr. Peary began getting the boxes and barrels of specimens ready for shipment, whileI took charge of the household effects, provisions, etc. While we were thus occupied our boat was seen coming from Five-Glacier Valley. When it had approached near enough for us to distinguish the occupants, we saw there were only two white men in it—Gibson and Mr. Bryant. Gibson told us that they had waited at the appointed place until their provisions gave out, and then had taken a scout up the valley for some distance, but had seen no sign of Verhoeff. They left a note for him, intending to return for a further search.

We now began to feel grave apprehensions regarding the missing man, and a vigorous search was immediately determined upon. Mr. Peary set to work to provision the boat; then, summoning about him all the native men, who are as expert as our Indians in following a trail, he told them that they must go with him to Five-Glacier Valley and look for Verhoeff, promising a rifle and ammunition to the man who should first discover him. Professor Heilprin then suggested that while Mr. Peary and his men went up McCormick Bay to the mouth of the valley, he and his party should go round in the “Kite” to the head of the valley in Robertson Bay; and it was so decided, and the Eskimos were divided between the two parties. I remained at Redcliffe with Matt and the native women and children.

At two o’clock the search-parties left, and I turned my attention once more to packing. The women stood around me, devoured with curiosity as to what I would do with all these things, and plying me with questions as to whose husbandwould win the coveted prize. They would not believe that I did not know, because I had known that Mr. Peary and Astrup would return from the inland ice.

Friday, August 19. The day is not a promising one; dark clouds are gathering and the air seems oppressive. I trust that the search-parties will find Mr. Verhoeff to-day, for he must be running short of provisions by this time. We calculated that what he had could by economizing be made to last him through Wednesday, and to-day is Friday. There is no sign of boat or ship.

Most of our provisions are stowed away on the “Kite,” among them all the fresh meat; in the excitement we forgot to get any out for our use, and to-day we are living on crackers and coffee.

Sunday, August 21. When this morning’s fog lifted at noon, the “Kite” was seen off Five-Glacier Valley. All day yesterday we watched for her and waited for some news, but heard and saw nothing. Seeing the vessel, I supposed of course that Verhoeff had been found, and the “Kite” had gone round to the valley to pick up the rest of the party.

After hours of watching we saw the “Kite” get up steam and head down the bay toward Redcliffe, and late in the afternoon she stopped opposite our house, and the professor came off to me in a boat, only to bring the distressing news that nothing had been seen or heard of Verhoeff. Mr. Peary was then exploring the shore from the mouth of the valley around Cairn Point to the head of Robertson Bay, where itwas intended that the “Kite” should join him. Another party were making thorough search through the valley. After leaving me some provisions the “Kite” continued on her way to Robertson Bay.

Tuesday, August 23. We have had no tidings from the search-parties since the “Kite” left us Sunday evening. I am very much afraid that we shall never see our lost companion alive again. The weather since he has been in the field has been exceptionally cold, raw, and wet, and he was clothed very lightly; besides, his food must have given out some days ago. The natives all agree that no one could have slept without shelter in the furious gales which we have had lately, clothed as lightly as Verhoeff was; and as they have the experience which we lack, I cannot help feeling that there is truth in what they say, so to-night I go to bed with a heavy heart. With the dark winter night passed in safety and comfort, and the long sledge journey accomplished successfully, it seems sad indeed that we should now, on the eve of our departure, meet with so great a loss.

Wednesday, August 24. About two o’clock this morning Mané came running in to me with the news that the ship was coming, and I at once went out on the beach to await her. In half an hour she dropped anchor, and Mr. Peary, with the other members of our party, came ashore bringing the sad tidings that Verhoeff’s footprints had been found and traced upon a great glacier which was cut by numberless wicked-looking crevasses, and there lost. After searching the glacier in everydirection without success, there was no doubt left that poor Verhoeff had lost his life in an effort to cross the ice-stream. Mr. Peary cached enough provisions to last one man a year, at Cairn Point, in case Verhoeff should, in some miraculous way, return after the “Kite’s” departure.

It was with a feeling akin to homesickness that I took the pictures and ornaments from the walls of our little room, pulled down the curtains from the windows and bed, had Matt pack the books and nail them up, sorted the things on the bed, and packed those I wanted to keep. The tins and cooking utensils I put on the stone and turf wall just outside of my room previous to distributing them among the natives.

My trunk packed and removed, the carpet up and the curtains down, the improvised bookcase taken to pieces, and it was hard to imagine that this dismantled room had once been as snug and comfortable as any boudoir in the world. Could the walls talk they would tell of some very pleasant hours spent there by the members of the North Greenland Expedition of 1891–92, and of many months of real solid comfort and happiness enjoyed by the woman who, when she left home and friends, was told over and over again that she must expect to endure all kinds of hardships, to suffer agony from that dreaded Arctic enemy, scurvy, etc.

Receiving Gifts of Charity.

I next turned my attention to the various articles put aside for the Eskimos, and after sorting them over I called all the women in the settlement to me, and stood them in a row. There were nine among them, including the two brides (mere children), Tookymingwah, wife of Kookoo, and Tungwingwah, wife of Kulutingwah. When they had grasped the idea that I was about to present them with these things they fairly danced with joy, shouting to their husbands, and laughing and talking with each other. I took care that Mané and M’gipsu, who had been with us constantly sewing and curing skins, should have the more desirable articles, while the others shared equally. After the distribution the professor, with a few members of his party, rowed off to the “Kite,” and in a short time returned with their boat laden with pots, kettles, knives, scissors, thimbles, and needles for the women, and long ash-poles, timber cut suitable for kayaks, lances, saws, gimlets, knives, etc.—in fact, everything in the hardware and lumber line that could be of any possible use to the men. Then all the natives were collected on the beach and the differentarticles distributed among them. I know if the good Pennsylvanians who sent these gifts could have seen the pleasure these poor natives derived from them they would have felt amply repaid.

We spent a couple of hours in taking photographs of the natives, their tupics, our poor little abandoned house and its surroundings, and then bade farewell to Redcliffe. It had been my home for thirteen months—some of them had seemed more than twice as long as any ordinary month—and I felt sorry to leave it to the mercy of wind and weather and Eskimo. Mané asked me if she might pitch her tupic in my room, saying it would be so nice and dry, and the wind could not strike it and blow it over; then, too, no matter how cold it might be, her ikkimer would be sufficient to heat it comfortably. I told her she might do so, but she must take good care of the house and not allow others to destroy anything about it, until the return of the next sun, when, if we did not come back, it should belong to Ikwa and herself to do with as they wished.

It was about noon when I left the settlement with the last boat-load, and as soon as we were safely on board the “Kite” the work of raising the anchor was begun. In the meantime Ikwa and Kyo in their kayaks were paddling round and round the “Kite,” calling to us their last good-byes. Ikwa asked if he might come aboard just once more, and on permission being granted, he immediately climbed over the side and jumped on deck. Some one took a fancy to his kayak paddle,which had been broken and mended, as only an Eskimo can mend, in at least a dozen different places, and gave him an old sledge-runner for it. When the time came for the Old Pirate to leave us all of us felt badly, and when he said “Gooby,” with his peculiar accent, his eyes filled and he choked. After this he would not turn his head in our direction, and only waved his hand in answer to our good-byes. His picture, as he paddled himself with the sledge-runner, curved at both ends, to the shore, will never fade from my memory.

As the “Kite” steamed slowly down the bay the natives ran along the beach, shouting to us and waving their hands, Kulutingwah bringing up the rear with a torn American flag attached to a pole, which he waved frantically to the imminent danger of those near him. I could not help thinking, Have these poor ignorant people, who are absolutely isolated from the rest of humanity, really benefited by their intercourse with us, or have we only opened their eyes to their destitute condition? I hope the latter is not the case, for a happier, merrier set of people I have never seen; no thought beyond the present, and no care beyond that of getting enough to eat and to wear. As we steamed down the bay we turned our eyes on the red cliffs, and when they faded from view Cape Cleveland and Herbert and Northumberland Islands were the only familiar landmarks left in sight. On these we gazed with the feeling that we were looking our last upon the scene. The old Cape, especially, seemed very near and dear to me; twice it had sheltered and protected me from the fury of anArctic gale—once in the winter when Mr. Peary and the doctor had gone to rescue “Jack,” my pet Newfoundland, from its precipitous cliffs, and the second time only a few days ago, when we returned from our venturesome boat journey up Inglefield Gulf.

Our home journey was almost wholly devoid of incident. Melville Bay, smooth as glass, had lost its terrors, and we steamed through it almost without hindrance. We reached Atanekerdluk, in the Waigatt, on August 29th, and there spent a delightful and profitable day in collecting fossils among the “leaf beds” which have been made famous to geologists. The following morning we arrived at Godhavn, where once more we enjoyed the kind hospitality of Inspector and Mrs. Anderssen, and the pleasing attentions of a daughter who had only recently returned from Denmark. The same friendly reception awaited us at Godthaab, the capital of the Southern Inspectorate of Greenland, where the honors of hospitality were divided between Inspector and Mrs. Fencker and Governor and Mrs. Baumann. It was here that Nansen descended from the ice-cap after his memorable journey across the Land of Desolation and passed a long, weary winter of waiting.

SADDLE MOUNTAIN.—GODTHAAB.

The Eskimos of this region have the reputation of being the most expert kayakers in the whole of Greenland, and we were witness to some of their most remarkable feats, such as describing a complete revolution through the water, and crossing one another at right angles, one canoe shooting over the bow of the other. These performances, which are said to have been at one time common with all the west-coast Eskimos, are rapidly becoming a lost art, and it has even been doubted if they took place at all.

Sports of the Kayakers.—Overturning.

Kayaker Overturned.

Our kind friends were so pressing in their attentions that it was not without regret that we were forced to bid adieu to their hospitable homes and a last farewell to the Greenland shores. After a rather tempestuous voyage we arrived at St. John’s, Newfoundland, on September 11th, to find a scene of desolation, and wreck andruin running in the path of the recent conflagration. The fire had broken out two days after the departure of the “Kite” on her last mission of good-will, and this was the first intimation that any of us had had of the catastrophe. Shaping our course southward, we arrived, after an uneventful voyage, at our port of destination, Philadelphia, where on the 24th, amid a chorus of cheers and hurrahs, and the tooting of innumerable horns and whistles, we received the congratulations of the multitude that had assembled to await our arrival.

I returned in the best of health, much stronger than when I left sixteen months before. The journey was a thoroughly enjoyable one. There were some drawbacks, it is true, but we meet with them everywhere, and were it not for the sad loss of Mr. Verhoeff, I should not have a single regret.

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