The Giant of the North: Pokings Round the Pole by R. M. Ballantyne (best historical biographies TXT) 📕

Without another word Chingatok ran off in the direction pointed out, followed hotly by his friend.

Oolichuk was a large and powerful man, but, his legs were remarkably short. His pace, compared with that of Chingatok, was as that of a sparrow to an ostrich. Nevertheless he kept up, for he was agile and vigorous.

“Have you seen them—have you spoken?” asked the giant, abruptly.

“Yes, all the tribe was there.”

“No one killed?”

“No, but terribly frightened; they made me run home to fetch you.”

Chingatok increased his speed. So did Oolichuk.

While they run, let us leap a little ahead of them, reader, and see what had caused all the excitement.

The whole party had gone off that morning, with the exception of Chingatok and his mother, to spear seals in a neighbouring bay, where these animals had been discovered in great numbers. Dogs and sledges had been taken, because a successful hunt was expected, and the ice was sufficiently firm.

The bay was very large. At its distant southern extremity there rose a great promontory which jutted far out into the sea. While the men were busy there making preparations to begin the hunt, Oblooria, Chingatok’s little sister, amused herself by mounting a hummock of ice about thirty feet high.

When there, she chanced to look towards the promontory. Instantly she opened her eyes and mouth and uttered a squeal that brought her friends running to her side.

Oolichuk was the first to reach her. He had no need to ask questions. Oblooria’s gaze directed his, and there, coming round the promontory, he beheld an object which had never before filled his wondering eyes. It was, apparently, a monstrous creature with a dark body and towering wings, and a black thing in its middle, from which were vomited volumes of smoke.

“Kablunets! white men!” he yelled.

“Kablunets!—huk! huk!” echoed the whole tribe, as they scrambled up the ice-hill one after another.

And they were right. A vessel of the pale-faces had penetrated these northern solitudes, and was advancing swiftly before a light breeze under sail and steam.

Despite the preparation their minds had received, and the fact that they were out in search of these very people, this sudden appearance of them filled most of the Eskimos with alarm—some of them with absolute terror, insomuch that the term “pale-face” became most appropriate to themselves.

“What shall we do?” exclaimed Akeetolik, one of the men.

“Fly!” cried Ivitchuk, another of the men, whose natural courage was not high.

“No; let us stay and behold!” said Oolichuk, with a look of contempt at his timid comrade.

“Yes, stay and see,” said Eemerk sternly.

“But they will kill us,” faltered the young woman, whom we have already mentioned by the name of Tekkona.

“No—no one would kill you,” said Eemerk gallantly; “they would only carry you off and keep you.”

While they conversed with eager, anxious looks, the steam yacht—for such she was—advanced rapidly, threading her way among the ice-fields and floes with graceful rapidity and ease, to the unutterable amazement of the natives. Although her sails were spread to catch the light breeze, her chief motive power at the time was a screw-propeller.

“Yes, it must be alive,” said Oolichuk to Akeetolik, with a look of solemn awe. “The white men do not paddle. They could not lift paddles big enough to move such a great oomiak,” (see Note 1), “and the wind is not strong; it could not blow them so fast. See, the oomiak has a tail—and wags it!”

“Oh! do let us run away!” whispered the trembling Oblooria, as she took shelter behind Tekkona.

“No, no,” said the latter, who was brave as well as pretty, “we need not fear. Our men will take care of us.”

“I wish that Chingatok was here!” whimpered poor little Oblooria, nestling closer to Tekkona and grasping her tail, “he fears nothing and nobody.”

“Ay,” assented Tekkona with a peculiar smile, “and is brave enough to fight everything and everybody.”

“Does Oblooria think that no one can fight but the giant?” whispered Oolichuk, who stood nearest to the little maid.

He drew a knife made of bone from his boot, where it usually lay concealed, and flourished it, with a broad grin. The girl laughed, blushed slightly, and, looking down, toyed with the sleeve of Tekkona’s fur coat.

Meanwhile the yacht drew near to the floe on which our Eskimos were grouped. The ice was cracked right across, leaving a lane of open water about ten feet wide between its inner edge and the shore ice. The Eskimos stood on the land side of this crack, a hundred yards or so from it. On nearing the floe the strange vessel checked her speed.

“It moves its wings!” exclaimed Eemerk.

“And turns its side to us,” said Akeetolik.

“And wags its tail no more,” cried Oolichuk.

“Oh! do, do let us run away,” gasped Oblooria.

“No, no, we will not run,” said Tekkona.

At that moment a white cloud burst from the side of the yacht.

“Hi! hee! huk!” shouted the whole tribe in amazement.

A crash followed which not only rattled like thunder among the surrounding cliffs, but went like electric fire to the central marrow of each Eskimo. With a united yell of terror, they leaped three feet into the air—more or less—turned about, and fled. Tekkona, who was active as a young deer, herself took the lead; and Oblooria, whose limbs trembled so that she could hardly run, held on to Oolichuk, who gallantly dragged her along. The terror was increased by a prolonged screech from the steam-whistle. It was a wild scramble in sudden panic. The Eskimos reached their sledges, harnessed their teams, left their spears on the ice, cracked their whips, which caused the dogs to join in the yelling chorus, and made for the land at a furious gallop.

But their fear began to evaporate in a few minutes, and Oolichuk was the first to check his pace.

“Ho! stop,” he cried.

Eemerk looked back, saw that they were not pursued, and pulled up. The others followed suit, and soon the fugitives were seen by those on board the yacht grouped together and gazing intently at them from the top of another ice-hummock.

The effect of the cannon-shot on board the yacht itself was somewhat startling. The gun had been loaded on the other side of the promontory for the purpose of being fired if Eskimos were not visible on the coast beyond, in order to attract them from the interior, if they should chance to be there. When, however, the natives were discovered on the ice, the gun was, of course, unnecessary, and had been forgotten. It therefore burst upon the crew with a shock of surprise, and caused the Captain, who was in the cabin at the moment, to shoot up from the hatchway like a Jack-in-the-box.

“Who did that?” he demanded, looking round sternly.

The crew, who had been gazing intently at the natives, did not know.

“I really cannot tell, sir,” said the chief mate, touching his cap.

Two strapping youths—one about sixteen, the other eighteen—leaned over the side and paid no regard to the question; but it was obvious, from the heaving motion of their shoulders, that they were not so much absorbed in contemplation as they pretended to be.

“Come, Leo, Alf, you know something about this.”

The Captain was a large powerful man of about forty, with bushy iron-grey curls, a huge beard, and an aquiline nose. The two youths turned to him at once, and Leo, the eldest, said respectfully, “We did not see it done, uncle, but—but we think—”

“Well, what do you think?”

At that moment a delicate-looking, slender lad, about twelve years of age, with fair curly hair, and flashing blue eyes, stepped out from behind the funnel, which had hitherto concealed him, and said boldly, though blushingly—

“I did it, father.”

“Ha! just like you; why did you do it? eh!”

“I can hardly tell, father,” said the boy, endeavouring to choke a laugh, “but the Eskimos looked so funny, and I—I had a box of matches in my pocket, and—and—I thought a shot would make them look so very much funnier, and—and—I was right!”

“Well, Benjamin, you may go below, and remain there till further orders.”

When Captain Vane called his son “Benjamin,” he was seriously displeased. At other times he called him Benjy.

“Yes, father,” replied the boy, with a very bad grace, and down he went in a state of rebellious despair, for he was wildly anxious to witness all that went on.

His despair was abated, however, when, in the course of a few minutes, the yacht swung round so as to present her stern to the shore, and remained in that position, enabling him to observe proceedings from the cabin windows almost as well as if he had been on deck. He was not aware that his father, knowing his son’s nature, and wishing to temper discipline with mercy, had placed the vessel in that position for his special benefit!

The difficulty now was, how to attract the natives, and inspire them with confidence in the good intentions of their visitors. In any case this would have been a difficult matter, but the firing of that unlucky gun had increased the difficulty tenfold. When, however, Captain Vane saw the natives cease their mad flight, and turn to gaze at the vessel, his hopes revived, and he set about a series of ingenious efforts to attain his end.

First of all, he sent a boat in charge of his two nephews, Leonard and Alphonse Vandervell, to set up a small table on the ice, on which were temptingly arranged various presents, consisting of knives, beads, looking-glasses, and articles of clothing. Having done this, they retired, like wary anglers, to watch for a bite. But the fish would not rise, though they observed the proceedings with profound attention from the distant hummock. After waiting a couple of hours, the navigators removed the table and left an Eskimo dog in its place, with a string of blue beads tied round its neck. But this bait also failed.

“Try something emblematic, uncle,” suggested Leonard, the elder of the brothers before mentioned.

“And get Benjy to manufacture it,” said Alphonse.

As Benjy was possessed of the most fertile imagination on board, he was released from punishment and brought on deck. The result of his effort of genius was the creation of a huge white calico flag, on which were painted roughly the figure of a sailor and an Eskimo sitting on an iceberg, with a kettle of soup between them. On one side were a pair of hands clasped together; on the other a sprig of heath, the only shrub that could be seen on the shore.

“Splendid!” exclaimed Leo and Alf in the same breath, as they held the flag up to view.

“You’ll become a Royal Academician if you cultivate your talents, Benjy,” said the Captain, who was proud, as well as fond, of this his only child.

The boy said nothing, but a pleased expression and a twinkle in his eyes proved that he was susceptible to flattery, though not carried off his legs by it.

The banner with the strange device was fixed to a pole which was erected on an ice-hummock between the ship and the shore, and a bag containing presents was hung at the foot of it.

Still these Eskimo fish would not bite, though they “rose” at the flag.

Oolichuk’s curiosity had become so intense that he could not resist it. He advanced alone, very warily, and looked at it, but did not dare to touch it. Soon he was joined by Eemerk and the others. Seeing this, Captain Vane sent to meet them an interpreter whom he had procured at one of the Greenland settlements in passing. Just as this man, whose name was Anders, stepped into the boat alongside, it occurred to the Eskimos that their leader should be sent for. Oolichuk undertook to fetch him; he ran back to the sledges, harnessed a small team, and set off like the wind. Thus it came to pass that Chingatok and his mother were startled by a yell, as before mentioned.

Meanwhile Anders was put on the