CHAPTER III.
THE COLONY OF PRÖVEN.—THE KAYAK OF THE GREENLANDER.—SCARCITY OF DOGS.—LIBERALITY OF THE CHIEF TRADER.—ARCTIC FLORA.
THE COLONY OF PRÖVEN.—THE KAYAK OF THE GREENLANDER.—SCARCITY OF DOGS.—LIBERALITY OF THE CHIEF TRADER.—ARCTIC FLORA.
We were escorted into the harbor of Pröven by the strangest fleet of boats and the strangest-looking boatmen that ever convoyed a ship. They were the far-famed kayakers of Greenland, and they deserve a passing notice.
THE KAYAK OF THE GREENLANDER.
Thekayakof the Greenlander is the frailest specimen of marine architecture that ever carried human freight. It is eighteen feet long and as many inches wide at its middle, and tapers, with an upward curving line, to a point at either end. The skeleton of the boat is made of light wood; the covering is of tanned seal-skin, sewed together by the native women with sinew thread, and with a strength and dexterity quite astonishing. Not a drop of water finds its way through their seams, and the skin itself is perfectly water-proof. The boat is about nine inches deep, and the top is covered like the bottom. There is no opening into it except a round hole in the centre, which admits the hunter as far as his hips. This hole is surrounded with a wooden rim, over which the kayaker laces the lower edge of his water-tight jacket, and thus fastens himself in and keeps the water out. He propels himself with a single oar about six feet long, which terminates in a blade or paddle at either end. This instrument of locomotion is grasped in thecentre, and is dipped in the water alternately to right and left. The boat is graceful as a duck and light as a feather. It has no ballast and no keel, and it rides almost on the surface of the water. It is therefore necessarily top-heavy. Long practice is required to manage it, and no tight-rope dancer ever needed more steady nerve and skill of balance than this same savage kayaker. Yet, in this frail craft, he does not hesitate to ride seas which would swamp an ordinary boat, or to break through surf which may sweep completely over him. But he is used to hard battles, and, in spite of every fortune, he keeps himself upright.
I watched their movements with much interest as they collected about the schooner. Among the benefits which they had derived from civilization was an appreciation of the value of rum, coffee, and tobacco; and they were not overly modest in their demands for these articles. Most of them had, however, something to trade, and went home with their reward. One old fellow who had managed to pick up a few words of English, without being particularly clear as to their meaning, was loud in his demands for a "pound rum, bottle sugar," offering in exchange a fine salmon.
SCARCITY OF DOGS.
I had intended to remain at Pröven only a single day, and then to hasten on with all possible speed; but our stay was prolonged by circumstances to which I was forced to submit with as good a grace as possible. It was idle for me to leave without a supply of dogs, for my plans and preparations were entirely based upon them; and the prospect of accomplishing my design in this respect appeared, from the first, very feeble. In order to save time, Sonntag had gone to the villagewhen we lay becalmed off Svarte Huk, and he returned on board with the most discouraging accounts of the poverty of the settlements in that which was such an essential addition to our equipment. A disease which had prevailed among the teams, during the past year, had diminished the stock to less than half of what was required for the prosperity of the people; and all our offers to purchase, either with money or provisions, were at first flatly refused, and were in the end only partially successful.
Mr. Sonntag had called upon the Assistant Trader immediately after his arrival, and was at once informed by that official of the unfortunate state of affairs. He would, however, personally interest himself in the matter, and advised that we should await the arrival of the Chief Trader, Mr. Hansen, who resided at Upernavik, which is forty miles to the north, and would be in Pröven in a day or so. It was evident that nothing could be done without the aid of this all-powerful public functionary, for whose arrival we had no alternative but to wait. If we went on to Upernavik we ran the hazard of missing him; and, by not seeing him until his return to that settlement from his southern tour, of losing the advantage of his prompt coöperation.
Mr. Hansen arrived the following day, and assured me that he would do what was in his power; but he feared that he should have little success. As an earnest of his good-will, he informed me, with a delicate courtesy which made me for the moment wonder if a lordly son of Castile had not wandered to this land of ice, and disguised himself in a seal-skin coat, that his own teams were at my disposal. Beyond this, however, he could neither advise nor command. Therewas no public stock from which to supply my wants; and so great and universal had been the ravages of disease among the animals, that many hunters were wholly destitute, and none were in possession of their usual number. He however at once dispatched a courier to Upernavik, and others to various small settlements, and thus heralded the news that any hunter who had an extra dog would find a market for it by bringing it forthwith to Pröven or Upernavik.
LIBERALITY OF THE CHIEF TRADER.
This action of the Chief Trader was the more appreciated that it was disinterested, and was uncalled for either by any official demands which were laid upon him, or by any special show of dignity or importance with which the insignificant schooner lying in the harbor could back up my claims. The State Department at Washington had, at my solicitation, requested from the Danish Government such recognition for me as had been hitherto accorded to the American and English naval expeditions; but the courteous response which came in the form of a command to the Greenland officials to furnish me with every thing in their power did not reach the settlements until the following year. The commands of his Majesty the King could not, however, have stood me in better stead than the gentlemanly instincts of Mr. Hansen.
There is little in the history of Pröven, either past or present, that will interest the readers of this narrative. What there is of it stands on the southern slope of a gneissoid spur which forms the terminus of one of the numerous islands of the vast archipelago lying between the peninsula of Svarte Huk and Melville Bay. A government-house, one story high and plastered over with pitch and tar, is the most conspicuousbuilding in the place. A shop and a lodging-house for a few Danish employees stands next in importance. Two or three less imposing structures of the pitch and tar description, inhabited by Danes who have married native women; a few huts of stone and turf, roofed with boards and overgrown with grass; about an equal number of like description, but without the board roof, and a dozen seal-skin tents, all pitched about promiscuously among the rocks, make up the town. There is a blubber-house down by the beach, and a stunted flag-staff on the hill, from which the Danish Flag gracefully waving in the wind, gave the place a show of dignity. The dignity of civilization was further preserved by an old cannon which lay on the grass under the flag, and whose rusty throat made the welkin ring as our anchor touched the Greenland rocks.
THE SETTLEMENT.
The settlement, orColonien, as the Danes distinguish it, dates back almost to the days of good old Hans Egede, and its name, as nearly as can be interpreted, signifies "Experiment;" and, after the Greenland fashion, a successful experiment it has been. Its people live, chiefly, by hunting the seal; and, of all the northern colonies, few have been as prosperous. The collections of oil and skins during some years are sufficient to freight a brig of three hundred tons.
The place bears ample evidence of the nature of its business. Carcasses of seals and seal's offal lay strewn along the beach, and over the rocks, and among the huts, in every stage of decomposition; and this, added to every other conceivable accumulation that could exhibit a barbarous contempt for the human nose, made the first few hours of our stay there any thing but comfortable.
ARCTIC FLORA.
A better prospect, however, greeted us behind the town. A beautiful valley lay there, nestling between the cliffs, and rich in Arctic vegetation. It was covered with a thick turf of moss and grasses, among which thePoa Arctica,Glyceria Arctica, andAlopecurus Alpinuswere most abundant. In places it was, indeed, a perfect marsh. Little streams of melted snow meandered through it, gurgling among the stones, or dashing wildly over the rocks. Myriads of little golden petaled poppies (Papaver nudicaule) fluttered over the green. The dandelion (Leontodon palustre), close kindred of the wild flower so well known at home, kept it company; the buttercup (Ranunculus nivalis), with its smiling, well-remembered face, was sometimes seen; and the less familiarPotentillaand the purplePediculariswere dotted about here and there. The saxifrages, purple, white, and yellow, were also very numerous. I captured not less than seven varieties. The birch and crowberry, and the beautifulAndromeda, the heather of Greenland, grew matted together in a sheltered nook among the rocks; and, in strange mimicry of Southern richness, the willows feebly struggled for existence on the spongy turf. With my cap I covered a whole forest of them.
VALUE OF DOGS
I had been in Pröven in 1853, and the place had not changed in the interval. The old ex-trader Christiansen was there, a little older, but not less frugal than before. He complained bitterly of Dr. Kane not having kept his promises to him, and I endeavored to mollify his wrath by assuring him that Dr. Kane had lost his vessel and could not return; but his life had been made unhappy during seven long years by visions of a barrel of American flour, and he would not be comforted. He was scarcely able tocrawl about; but, when I sent ashore to him the coveted treasure, he found strength to break the head out of the cask, to feast his eyes on the long-expected gratuity. His sons, each with a brood of Esquimaux visaged, though flaxen-haired children, crowded around the present. My diary records that they were the best hunters in the settlement, and that they had the best teams of dogs; and it also mentions, with a little chagrin, that they would not sell one of them. I attributed this obstinacy, at the time, to their cross old paternal relative; but there were better reasons than this. They knew by bitter experience the risks of going into the long winter without an ample supply of dogs to carry them over the ice upon the seal hunt, and to part with their animals was to risk starvation. I offered to give them pork and beef and canned meats, and flour and beans; but they preferred the seal and the excitement of the hunt, and refused to trade.
At last the couriers had all come in, bringing unwelcome news. A half-dozen old dogs and a less number of good ones were all that I had to console myself for the delay; but the Chief Trader had returned to Upernavik, from which place I had received more encouraging accounts than from the lower stations.
Greenlander in his Kayak