The Walrus Hunters: A Romance of the Realms of Ice

“They say he did not love war,” remarked Bartong.

“No; he hated it: but he was brave, and a good fighter—the best in the tribe. None of the young men dared to touch him.”

“Was the young brave Alizay afraid to touch him?” asked the guide, with a sly glance at the younger woman.

At this Idazoo flushed and looked up angrily.

“No,” she said sharply; “Alizay fears nothing.”

Bartong took no notice of the remark, but continued gravely to question the other.

“Was Nazinred very fond of his daughter?” he asked.

“Yes, very.”

“And was the girl fond of him and of you?”

“Yes,” replied the poor woman, beginning to weep gently.

“And she seems to have been very fond of this Eskimo, who, they tell me, saved your life once.”

“She was, but I did not think she would go away with him. It was not like her—she was always so good and biddable, and told me everything.”

“Why did your husband go off alone?”

“I cannot tell. I suppose he knew that none of the young men would go with him, or feared they might lose heart and turn back. No doubt he thought it best to go by himself, for he was very brave; nothing would turn him back!”

A fresh though silent dropping of tears occurred here, and a severe pang of remorse shot through the heart of Idazoo as she thought of her unkind report of what had taken place beside the dead tree under the cliff.

“Don’t cry, Isquay; Nazinred will come back, you may be sure of that,” said the guide, in a confident tone, “and he will bring your little girl along with him, for when a man is good and brave he never fails!”

The brevity of summer near the shores of the Arctic Sea rendered it advisable that no time should be wasted in looking about too particularly for a site for the new trading-post; and as MacSweenie was well pleased with Mozwa’s selection he at once adopted it and set to work.

Deeming it important to open the campaign by putting a good taste in the mouths of his friends the Indians, he began by distributing a few gratuities to them—some coloured beads to the women, and a few lines, fish-hooks, and tobacco to the men. Then he marked out a site for the future dwelling-house and store, got out the tools and set to work to fell, saw, and shape suitable timber for the buildings. He constituted Magadar chief hunter to the establishment, supplied him with a new gun, powder and ball, and sent him off to the woods as proud as, and doubtless much happier than, a king. Mozwa he kept by him, as a counsellor to whom he could appeal in all matters regarding the region and the people, as well as an overseer of those among his countrymen who were hired to render assistance. Alizay was sent off in a canoe—much to the satisfaction of Mowat—for that forgotten keg of screw-nails which had lain so heavy on his mind, and the old chief was supplied with unlimited tobacco, and allowed to wander about at will, under the agreeable impression that he was superintendent-general of the works. Isquay, Idazoo, and some of the other women were furnished with moose-deer skins and needles, and employed to make moccasins for the men, as well as to do all the needful repairs to garments.

Thus the plateau on the banks of the Ukon River presented, during the weeks that followed, a scene of lively bustle and unfamiliar noise to the furred and feathered inhabitants of those vast solitudes, and formed to the Red men a new and memorable era in their monotonous existence.

At last there came a day when the roof of the principal dwelling was completely covered, the doors were fixed up, and the glazed windows fitted in.

“Now, Tonal’,” remarked MacSweenie, on the morning of that auspicious day, “it iss a house-warming that I will be giving to-night, for the Indians will be expectin’ something o’ the sort, so you will be telling the cook to make the biggest lump o’ plum-duff he ever putt his hands to; an’ tell him not to spare the plums. It iss not every day we will be givin’ thiss goot people a blow-out, an’ it iss a matter of great importance, to my thinking, that first impressions should be good ones. It iss the duty of a new broom to sweep clean. If it continues, goot and well, but if it does not begin that way it iss not likely to come to it, whatever. There iss far more than people think in sentiment. If you fail to rouse a sentiment of goot-will, or confidence, or whatever it may be, at a first start-off it iss not easy to rouse it afterwards. Hev ye not noticed that, Tonal’?”

“I can’t say that I have,” answered the interpreter, with a matter-of-fact frown at the ground, “but I have noticed that the pit-saw they was usin’ yesterday has been allowed to saw into the holdin’-irons and damaged half o’—”

“Hoots, man! never mind the pit-saw!” exclaimed MacSweenie, with a touch of asperity. “All the planks we want are sawn, an’ if they were not, surely we could mend—tut, man, I wonder ye can play the fuddle. It always seemed to me that a goot fuddler must be a man of sentiment, but ye are the exception, Tonal’, that proves the rule. Away wi’ you an’ gie my orders to the cook, an’ see that you have the fuddle in goot tune, for we will want it to-night. An’ let him hev plenty of tea, for if we gain the women we’re sure o’ the men.”

Mowat retired with a smile on his broad benignant face. He understood his leader, and was not offended by his plain speaking. Besides, it was not easy to make the interpreter take offence. His spirit was of that happy nature which hopeth all things and believeth all things. It flowed calm and deep like an untroubled river. Nothing short of a knock-down blow would have induced Donald Mowat to take offence, but that would certainly have stirred him, and as he possessed vast physical strength, and was something awful to behold when roused, and his comrades were aware of these facts, the serenity of his life was not often or deeply ruffled.

The cook, who was an enthusiast in his art, did his best, and was eminently successful. His plum-duff dumpling was bigger than any gun—at least of ancient type—could have swallowed, and the plums, as Mowat afterwards said, did not need to seek for each other. He made enough of delightfully greasy cakes to feed an army, and, according to his own statement, infused “lashin’s o’ tea.”

Before the hour for the feast arrived that night, Mowat got out his violin and went into one of the rooms of the new house to put it in order. The window of the room looked towards the back of the house, where the forest was seen just beyond the plateau.

Drawing a bench to the window, he sat down and opened the case. Of course he found the first string broken, but that did not break his heart, for he had a good supply of spare strings, and if these should fail—well, there were plenty of deer-sinews in the land. It was soon put to rights, and, leaning his back against the wall, he began to tickle the strings gently. Whatever he was at other times, there is no doubt that the interpreter was full of genuine sentiment the moment he got the violin under his chin.

Now at that moment three young Dogrib braves chanced to be passing under the window, which was about seven feet from the ground. Though equally young, and no doubt equally brave, as well as equally Dogribbed, those three youths were not equally matched, for one was tall and thin, another was short and thick, while the third was middle-sized and fat. They had been hunting—successfully—for the thick man carried a small deer on his lusty shoulders.

On hearing the first notes of the instrument the three youths started into three different attitudes as if of petrified surprise, and remained so, waiting for more.

They had not to wait long, for, after tickling the fiddle once or twice to get it in perfect tune, Mowat raised his eyes to the pine-plank ceiling and glided softly into one of those exquisite Scottish airs by means of which a first-rate performer on the violin can almost draw the soul out of a man’s body. We think it was “The Flowers of the Forest.”

Whatever it was the three Dogribs were ravished. They turned their heads slowly, as if afraid to break the spell, and looked at each other, showing the whites of their great eyes increasingly, while each raised a hand with spread fingers as if to keep the others from speaking. They had never heard anything approaching to it before. They had never even imagined anything like it. It was an utterly new sensation. What could it be? They had heard of something strange in the musical way from Nazinred and Mozwa, but with the carelessness of youth they had scarce listened to the comments of these men. Now it burst upon their awakened sense like sounds from some other planet. Their mouths opened slowly as well as their eyes, and there was an expression of awe in their faces which betokened a touch of superstitious fear.

Suddenly Mowat drew his bow across all the strings with a skirl that might have shamed the bagpipes, and burst into the Reel o’ Tullochgorum.

The effect was electrical. The thick man dropped the deer; the thin man sloped forward; the fat man sprang into the air, and all three made for the woods as if all the spirits of evil were after them in full cry.

We need hardly say, after this, that those Dogrib Indians spent an excited and agreeable evening with the fur-traders. They appreciated the dancing, undoubtedly, though very few of them would condescend to join. They appreciated the plum-duff and the greasy cakes highly, and they more than appreciated the tea—especially the women—which MacSweenie took care to provide hot, strong, and sweet. But there is no doubt that the lion of the evening was—the “fuddle.”

Chapter Twenty Six.

A Mysterious Journey and a Great Discovery

Putting on the wings of imagination, good reader, let us once more fly over the snow-fields of the lone Nor’-west and return to the regions of thick-ribbed ice. We have to apologise humbly for asking you also to fly back a little in time, and plunge once more into the dreary winter, from which, no doubt, you thought you had fairly escaped.

One morning toward the beginning of spring, referred to in last chapter, while yet the northern seas were covered with their solid garment, Cheenbuk announced to all whom it might concern that he intended to go off on a long journey to the eastward—he called it the place where the Great Light rises—for purposes which he did not see fit publicly to reveal.

At that time the Great Light to which he referred had begun to show symptoms of intention to return to the dark regions which it had forsaken for several months. The glimmer on the eastern sky had been increasing perceptibly each day, and at last had reached the point of producing a somewhat rosy twilight for two or three hours before and after noon. King Frost, however, still reigned supreme, and the dog-sledge as yet was the only mode of travelling among the islands or on the sea.

“Why go you towards the rising sun?” asked Nazinred when Cheenbuk invited him to be one of the party.

“Because it is from my countrymen who dwell there that we get the hard stuff that is so good for our spear-heads, and lances, and arrows. We know not where they find the stuff, and they won’t tell. I shall go and find out for myself, and take back plenty of it to our people.”

The “hard stuff” referred to was hoop-iron, which, as well as nails and a few hatchets, the Eskimos of the eastern parts of the Arctic shores obtained from whale-ships and passed on to their friends in the more remote regions of the farther north.

“I can tell you how they get it,” said the Indian. “White traders to whom our people go with their furs have spoken of such things, and my ears have been open. They say that there are white men who come over the great salt lake from far-off lands in big big canoes. They come to catch the great whales, and it is from them that the hard stuff comes.”

For some minutes the Eskimo was silent. A new idea had entered his head and he was turning it over.

“Have you ever seen these white men or their big canoes?” asked Cheenbuk with great interest.

“Never. The salt lake where they kill the whale is too far from my people’s hunting-grounds. But the white traders I have visited have seen them. Some traders have come from the same far-off lands in big canoes of the same sort.”

“Is it very far from here to the seas to which these whale-killers come?”

“Very far from the hunting-grounds of the Dogribs, but it may not be far from here.”

“I will go and see,” said Cheenbuk, with much decision, and he went off forthwith to make preparations. The expedition consisted of one large sledge with a team of twelve dogs. Being resolved not to risk failure by taking too many companions, the Eskimo limited the number to seven, besides himself—namely, Nazinred, with his fire-spouter; Oolalik, whom he deemed the strongest and bravest among the young men; Anteek, the most plucky of the big boys; Aglootook, the medicine-man, whom he took “for luck;” and Nootka, as being the most vigorous and hardworking among the women. She could repair the boots, etcetera, and do what little cooking might be required. Cowlik the easy-going was also taken to keep Nootka company.

It was high noon when the party set out on their mysterious journey, and a brighter glow than usual was suffusing the eastern sky, while a gleam of direct sunshine, the first seen that spring, was tipping the peaks of the higher bergs as if with burnished gold.