Adrift on an Ice-Pan | Page 7

home and safety lost. To the northward, about a mile
distant, lay the mainland along which I had passed so merrily in the
morning,--only, it seemed, a few moments before.
By mid-day I had passed the island to which I had crossed on the ice
bridge. I could see that the bridge was gone now. If I could reach the
island I should only be marooned and destined to die of starvation. But
there was little chance of that, for I was rapidly driving into the ever
widening bay.
[Illustration: DR. GRENFELL AND JACK WITH THE JACKET
MADE FROM MOCCASINS]
It was scarcely safe to move on my small ice raft, for fear of breaking it.
Yet I saw I must have the skins of some of my dogs,--of which I had
eight on the pan,--if I was to live the night out. There was now some
three to five miles between me and the north side of the bay. There,
immense pans of Arctic ice, surging to and fro on the heavy ground
seas, were thundering into the cliffs like medieval battering-rams. It
was evident that, even if seen, I could hope for no help from that
quarter before night. No boat could live through the surf.
Unwinding the sealskin traces from my waist, round which I had
wound them to keep the dogs from eating them, I made a slip-knot,
passed it over the first dog's head, tied it round my foot close to his
neck, threw him on his back, and stabbed him in the heart. Poor beast! I
loved him like a friend,--a beautiful dog,--but we could not all hope to
live. In fact, I had no hope any of us would, at that time, but it seemed
better to die fighting.

In spite of my care the struggling dog bit me rather badly in the leg. I
suppose my numb hands prevented my holding his throat as I could
ordinarily do. Moreover, I must hold the knife in the wound to the end,
as blood on the fur would freeze solid and make the skin useless. In this
way I sacrificed two more large dogs, receiving only one more bite,
though I fully expected that the pan I was on would break up in the
struggle. The other dogs, who were licking their coats and trying to get
dry, apparently took no notice of the fate of their comrades,--but I was
very careful to prevent the dying dogs crying out, for the noise of
fighting would probably have been followed by the rest attacking the
down dog, and that was too close to me to be pleasant. A short shrift
seemed to me better than a long one, and I envied the dead dogs whose
troubles were over so quickly. Indeed, I came to balance in my mind
whether, if once I passed into the open sea, it would not be better by far
to use my faithful knife on myself than to die by inches. There seemed
no hardship in the thought. I seemed fully to sympathize with the
Japanese view of hara-kiri.
Working, however, saved me from philosophizing. By the time I had
skinned these dogs, and with my knife and some of the harness had
strung the skins together, I was ten miles on my way, and it was getting
dark.
Away to the northward I could see a single light in the little village
where I had slept the night before, where I had received the kindly
hospitality of the simple fishermen in whose comfortable homes I have
spent many a night. I could not help but think of them sitting down to
tea, with no idea that there was any one watching them, for I had told
them not to expect me back for three days.
Meanwhile I had frayed out a small piece of rope into oakum, and
mixed it with fat from the intestines of my dogs. Alas, my match-box,
which was always chained to me, had leaked, and my matches were in
pulp. Had I been able to make a light, it would have looked so
unearthly out there on the sea that I felt sure they would see me. But
that chance was now cut off. However, I kept the matches, hoping that I
might dry them if I lived through the night. While working at the dogs,

about every five minutes I would stand up and wave my hands toward
the land. I had no flag, and I could not spare my shirt, for, wet as it was,
it was better than nothing in that freezing wind, and, anyhow, it was
already nearly dark.
Unfortunately, the coves in among the cliffs are so placed that only for
a very narrow space can the people in any house