It was a lovely sight, and never a rifle was lifted to shoot. Presently they disappeared, but on the mate of the _Scotia_ giving vent to a loud whistle, up came the heads again, and there they remained as long as the mate whistled, for of all wild creatures in the world that I have ever come across, the Greenland seal is the most inquisitive; and no doubt the experience of some of my old-boy readers who have been to the country is the same as my own.
Onwards, steadily onwards, all that day went our sportsmen; they did not even a.s.semble again for another meal, and at five of the clock they found themselves fully four miles from the place where the ships lay.
The field of seals which they had attacked was some ten miles square, and although they had worked their way into it for miles, nevertheless when the flags were hoisted to recall them, at two bells in the first dog-watch, the field of seals still remained about ten miles square.
This may seem strange, but is thus accounted for. Out of say twenty seals on each berg, fifteen at least would escape, and these swam away under the pack, and again took the ice on the far-off edge of the field of seals.
It being somewhat too far to drag the skins to the ship, bings had been made on the ice during the latter part of the day, so that no dead seals should be left unflensed upon the ice. When they wended their way homewards at the end of this glorious day"s shooting a broom was stuck besom-side up, on each bing, with the name of the ship on the handles.
This is done with the view of preventing other ships from appropriating the skins. This is the custom of the country--one of the unwritten laws of the sea of ice.
While the gunners and their merry men were yet a long way off from the ships, there came a hail from the crow"s-nest of the _Arrandoon_, which, by the way, McBain had hardly left all the time. Peter had brought him up coffee and food, and he had danced in the interval to keep himself warm.
"On deck there?"
"Ay, ay, sir," roared Peter, looking up.
"Is dinner all laid?"
"Ay, sir, and the cook is waiting."
"Well, on with the kilt, Peter, if you"re not afraid of getting your hocks frozen, get the bagpipes, and go and meet the hunters."
Down below dived Peter, and he was up again in what sailors call "a brace of shakes," arrayed in full Highland costume, with the bagpipes over his arm. No wonder the c.o.c.katoo cried,--
"De-ah me?" when he saw Peter, and added, "Such a to-do! such a to-do!
such a to-do!"
Now the bears had been rather numerous on the pack that day, just as the sharks were in the water. Doubtless the sharks found many a poor wounded seal to close their vengeful jaws upon, for they are either too cowardly or not swift enough to catch a healthy phoca; but the bears had behaved themselves unusually well. They had had plenty to eat, at all events, and seemed to know that the men at work on the ice were laying up a store of provisions for them that would last them all the summer, so they had made no attempt to attack them. But on their way back to the ship the doctor, who was striding on a little way in advance of the rest, startled a huge monster who was sunning himself behind a hummock.
It would be difficult to say whether the bear or the doctor was the more startled; at all events the latter fired and missed, and the former made off, running in the direction of the ships. But he hadn"t gone above half a mile when who should Bruin meet but Peter, coming swinging along with his bagpipes under his arm. Never a gun had Peter, and never a club--only the pipes. As soon as they saw each other they both stopped short.
"I do declare," Bruin seemed to say to himself, "here is a man or something all alone. But what a strange dress! I never saw anybody dressed like that before. Never mind, he looks sweet and nice; I"ll have a bit."
"I do declare," said Peter to himself, "if that isn"t a big lump of a bear coming along, and I haven"t even a stone to throw at him. Whatever shall I do at all, at all? Och! and och! this is the end of me now, at last. Sure enough it is marching to my own funeral I"ve been all the time, instead of going to meet the sportsmen. Oh! Peter, Peter! you"ll never see your old mother in this world again, nor Scotland either.
Yonder big bear is licking his chops to devour you. Yonder is the big hairy sarcophagus that"ll soon contain your mangled remains. Who would have thought that Peter of Arrandoon would have lived to play his own coronach?" [Coronach--a funeral hymn or wail for the departed.]
Hardly knowing what he did, poor Peter shouldered his pipes, and began to play a dreary, droning, yelling, squealing lament.
At the same moment Bruin commenced to perform some of the queerest antics ever a bear tried before. He stretched first one leg, then another, and he stretched his neck and described circles in the air with his nose, keeping time with the music. Then he sat up entirely on one end.
"Oh!" he seemed to say, "flesh and blood couldn"t stand that; I must, yes, I must give vent to a Ho--o--o--o--o--
"And likewise to a Hoo--oo--oo--oo--oo!!"
Reader, the voice of an asthmatical steam-engine, heard at midnight as it enters a tunnel, is a melancholy sound, so is the Welsh hooter, and the fog-horn of a Newcastle coal brig; but all combined, and sounding together, would be but a feeble imitation of the agonising notes of that great white bear as he sat on his haunches listening to Peter"s pipes.
Peter himself saw the effect his music had produced, and, like the "towsy tike" in _Tam o" Shanter_,--
"He hotched and blew wi" might and main."
And, as if Peter had been a great magician, Bruin felt impelled to try to follow the notes, though I am bound to say he did not always keep even in the key-note. Surely such a duet was never heard before in this world. There was a small open s.p.a.ce of water not far from the hummock on which the piper of the _Arrandoon_ had stationed himself; it was soon alive with the heads of hundreds of seals who had come up to listen; so, upon the whole, Peter had a most appreciative audience. But see yonder, is that a seal on the ice that is creeping closer and closer up behind the bear? Nay, for seals don"t carry rifles; and now the newcomer levels his gun just for a moment, there is a puff of blue-white smoke, the bear springs high in the air, then falls prostrate on the snow. His ululations are over for ever and ay; the piper plays a merrier air, and advances with speed to meet old Seth and the rest of the sportsmen, who, glad as they are to see him alive, greet him with uproarious cheers and laughter. Then a procession is formed, and with Peter and his pipes striding on in front, thus do the seal-stalkers return to the _Arrandoon_.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
THE COMING FROST--SILAS WARNS THE "ARRANDOON" OF DANGER--FORGING THROUGH THE ICE--BESET--A STRANGE AND ALARMING ACCIDENT.
So willingly and merrily worked all hands on the ice, that in less than three days the _Canny Scotia_ was almost a full, though by no means a b.u.mper ship, and poor Silas began to see visions of future happiness in his mind"s eye, when he should return to his native land and complete the joy of his family. Unfortunately, however, his good fortune did not last for the present. How seldom, indeed, good luck does last in this world of ours! One day, towards midnight, the sky apparently a.s.sumed a brighter blue. This seemed to concern Silas considerably. The good man was walking the deck at the time with his inseparable companion the first mate, neither of whom ever appeared now to court sleep or rest.
"Matie," said Silas, pointing skywards, "do you see any difference in the colour yonder?"
"That do I!" replied the mate.
"And hasn"t it got much colder?"
"Well, both of us have been walking," the chief officer returned, "at the rate of several knots, just to keep the dear life in us, and I never saw you, sir, with your hands so deep in your pockets before."
Down rushed the captain to consult his gla.s.s; he was speedily up again, however. "It is just as I thought," he said. "Now come up into the nest with me; there"s room for both of us. Look!" he added, as soon as they had reached their barrel of observation, "the rascals know what is coming. They are taking the water, and before ten minutes there won"t be a seal with his nose on that bit of pack. Heigho, matie! heigho!
that is just like my luck. If I"d been born a tailor, every man would have been born a Highlander, and made his own kilts. But hi! up, matie, Silas doesn"t mean to let his heart down yet for a bit. A black frost is on the wing. There is no help for that, but the _Arrandoon"s_ people don"t seem to know it. I must off over and tell them;" and even as he spoke Silas began descending the Jacob"s ladder. "Call all hands!" he cried, as he disappeared over the side; "we must work her round as long as the pieces are anything loose-like."
It was not a long journey to the big sister ship, and the st.u.r.dy legs of this ancient mariner would soon get him there. But he would not wait till alongside; he needs must hail her while still many yards from her dark and stately sides.
"What ho, there!" he bawled. "_Arrandoon_ ahoy!"
That voice of his was a wonderful one. It might have awakened the dead; it was like a ten-horse power speaking-trumpet lined with the roughest emery-paper. Seals heard it far down beneath the ice, and came to the surface to listen and to marvel. A great bear was sitting not twenty yards from Silas. He thought he should like to eat Silas, but he could not swallow that voice, so he went across the ice instead. Then the voice rolled in over the vessel"s bulwarks, startled the officer on duty, and went ringing down below through the state-rooms, causing our sleeping heroes to tumble out of their bunks with double-quick speed, even the usually late and lazy Ralph evincing more celerity than ever he had done in his life before.
They met, rubbing their eyes and looking cold and foolish, all in a knot in the saloon. Cold and foolish, and a little bit frightened as well, for the words of Silas sounded terribly like "the _Arrandoon_ on fire!"
Not a bit of it, for there came the hail again, and distinct enough this time.
"_Arrandoon_ ahoy! Is everybody dead on board?"
"What _is_ the matter?" cried McBain, as soon as he got on deck, dressed as he was in the garments of night.
"Black frost, Captain McBain," answered Silas, springing up the side, "and you"ll soon find that matter enough, or my name ain"t Grig, nor my luck like a bad wind, always veering in the wrong direction. The seals are gone, sir--every mother"s son o" them! My advice is--but, dear me, gentlemen! go below and rig out. Why, here"s four more of you! That ain"t the raiment for a black frost! You look like five candidates for a choking good influenza!" This first bit of advice being taken in good part, "Now," continued Silas, "your next best holt, Captain McBain, will be to get up steam, and get her head pointed away for the blue water, else there is no saying we may not leave our bones here."
"Ah!" exclaimed McBain, "we"ve no wish to do that. And here comes our worthy engineer. The old question, chief--How soon can you get us under way?"
"With the American hams, sir," was the quiet reply, "in about twenty minutes; with a morsel of nice blubber that I laid in especially for the purpose of emergencies, in far less time than that."
"Thanks!" said McBain, smiling; "use anything, but don"t lose time."
The ships lay far from the open sea. They had been "rove" a long way in through the pack, to get close to the seals, but, independently of that, floating streams of ice, one after another, had joined the outer edge of this immense field of bergs, placing them at a greater distance from the welcome water.
Steam was speedily roaring, and ready for its work. Then, not without considerable difficulty, the vessel was put about, and the voyage seaward was commenced. Slow and tedious this voyage was bound to be, for there was so little wind it was useless to shake the sails loose, so the duty of towing her consorts devolved upon the _Arrandoon_. Instead of remaining on his own ship, Silas Grig came on board the steamer, where his services as iceman were fully appreciated.
As yet the frost had made no appreciable difference to the solidity of the pack; a very gentle swell was moving the pieces--a swell that rolled in from seaward, causing the whole scene around to look like a tract of snow-clad land, acted on by the giant force of an earthquake. Forging ahead through such ice, even by the aid of steam, is hard, slow work; and, a.s.sisted as the _Arrandoon_ was by men walking in front of her and pushing on the bergs with long poles, hardly could she make a headway of half a mile an hour, and there were twenty good miles to traverse! It was a weary task, but the men bent their backs cheerfully to it, as British sailors ever do to a duty that has to be performed.
[Light lie the earth on the breast of the gallant Captain Brownrigg, R.N., and green be the gra.s.s on his grave. My young readers know the story; it is such stories as his they ought to read; such men as he ought to be enshrined in their memory. Betrayed by treacherous Arabs, with a mere handful of men he fought their powerful dhow and guns; and even when hope itself had fled he made no attempt to escape, but fought on and fought on, till he fell pierced with twenty wounds. He was a heroic sailor, and _he was doing his duty_!]
Even had it been possible to keep up the men"s strength, forty hours must have elapsed ere the _Arrandoon_ would be rising and falling on blue water. But many hours had not gone by ere the men got a rest they little cared for--for down went the swell, the motion among the bergs was stilled, and frost began its work of welding them together.
"Just like my luck, now, isn"t it?" said Silas, when he found the ship could not be budged another inch, and was quite surrounded by heavy ice.