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The following day, April 12th, while Sharkey and Koojesse were engaged in the locality of my third encampment hunting young seal, I started, accompanied by my attendant, Henry Smith, to explore another bay which appeared to run up some distance beyond Peter Force Sound. I expected to be able to go and return in one day, and therefore made no preparations beyond taking half a pound of pemmican and a quarter of a pound of Borden's meat-biscuit, intended for our lunch. As I wished to keep a careful account of the distance traveled, I took the line used by me when on the Greenland coast, near Holsteinborg, in drawing out of the great deep many a cod and halibut, and measured off with tape-line seventy-five feet; my log then consisted of a cold chisel used by me in cutting out my rock pemmican.

It should be said, however, that previous to this time, and on all subsequent occasions when my whole company were with me, and all our provision was to be carried, no one could ride on the sledge, the dogs having difficulty even in dragging their necessary load. Consequently, at such times, all my measurements between my astronomically-determined points had to be made by pacing— a tolerably accurate, but, withal, a very tiresome method of working.

I found many apparent heads to the bay during my passage up, and at each turn it seemed as if we had reached the termination; but, on making the several points of land, others were found beyond.

After some hours of travel the dogs became very tired, the snow allowing them to sink to their bodies at every step. It was growing late; a snow-storm was coming on; to return was impossible; we therefore set about making ourselves as comfortable as circumstances would allow. We had no snow-knife, but an impromptu igloo was planned which we built of the sledge and snow, getting out the blocks of the latter in the best way possible, that is to say, with a broken sledge-beam.

When the igloo was finished, and before the door was sealed up, we took in the dogs, and were soon really comfortable. The storm came down fearfully, but we were well protected; the beating snow sought an entrance, but could find none. Fortunately, we had saved a piece of the pemmican from our lunch, and this served to give us just a mouthful for supper; some fragments of the meat-biscuit also remained; and after this frugal repast and some pipes of tobacco, we retired to our snow bed. I had one

WHITE MAN'S IGLOO.-THE STORM.

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dog for my feet-warmer, another for my pillow, while a third was arched at my back. Henry was also comfortably provided for. My diary for that day, written in the igloo of a white man's invention, concludes as follows:

"Now within a few minutes of midnight. Hark! a singular noise strikes the ear. Perhaps it is a polar bear! We listen. Again the same alarming noise. Another sound, and we determine its source. It is the snoring of one of the dogs! So goodnight to all the sleeping world. Heaven bless all those who need it; none needs it more than myself."

The next morning, April 13th, I arose from my snowy couch at five o'clock, knocked my head against the snow door, made my way over its ruins on all-fours, then stood erect and looked around. The heavens seemed to indicate the dawn of a beautiful day. I called up Henry, and soon the dogs were harnessed, when we proceeded toward the head of this narrow bay—Newton's Fiord,* as I named it—which we reached at 7 A.M. The termination I found to consist of a broken narrow plain, walled by a line of mountains on either side.

Before we reached this spot the snow commenced falling, though the fall was accompanied by no wind, and the weather was very thick. Soon after seven we started on our return journey to our encampment, and at nine o'clock we were abreast of the place where we had passed the previous night. At that time the wind was freshening, and it was snowing hard. Our passage thence to the place of our encampment was very difficult. Not only had we to encounter a severe northwest gale, charged with cold at 32° below the freezing-point, accompanied by drift-snow filling the air so thickly that often no objects at three fathoms' distance could be seen, but the dogs became perfectly exhausted from being overworked, and from going long without food. On making inquiries of Henry Smith, I learned that Sharkey and Koojesse had been feeding their own dogs and neglecting my "Greenlanders," which were now just on the point of giving out. Two of them were so knocked up before reaching home that they could not pull a pound; one was so fatigued that he repeatedly fell down. I was obliged to lead the way for several miles by the compass, it being impossible to see the land, though the fiord was only from half a mile to two miles wide.

Named after O. E. Newton, M.D., of Cincinnati, Ohio. The termination of Newton's Fiord is in lat. 63° 22' N., long. 66° 05′ W.

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During the afternoon the sun shone down through the storm that seemed only hugging the earth. For the last nine miles which I made along by the west side of the fiord and Peter Force Sound, the mountains would every few moments show a shaded contour—a ghost-like faintness—by which I was enabled to make my course without the compass. When within two miles of the igloos I came upon our sledge-tracks of the day before, and these I followed carefully while they were visible; but, with all my care, the track was soon lost; and as the land was again closed from view, we should have been in grievous difficulty had not the compass guided me. The risk was indeed great; for in such a storm we might easily have gone out to sea, or the ice of the bay on which we were traveling might have broken up and carried us away.

Providentially, we reached the encampment-my fifth, as I called it, which was the same as the third—at 5 10 P.M., finding Sharkey on the look-out, anxiously awaiting us, while Koojesse was out in search of me. The Innuits, all through the previous night, had kept my lantern suspended to a pole by the igloo as a beacon light. Hot suppers were quickly prepared for us by the women, and we soon retired to rest.

FIGHTING THE HUNGRY DOGS.

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CHAPTER XXXIII.

Continue the Journey up Frobisher Bay.—Arrive at Beauty Bay.—The Sledge attacked by hungry Dogs.—Meeting with Friends.—Bereavement of old Allokee and his Wife.—Death of Tweroong.—Heart-rending Particulars. —A Seal-feast. —A sudden Excitement.—Strange Visit of an Angeko.—Parting with Allokee. —Visit to the Grinnell Glacier.—Ascent by Polar Bear Tracks.—A Sea of Ice.— An exciting Journey back.

During the day, April 14th, 1862, I remained quiet in the igloo, engaged in writing and working up observations. On the 15th I made a trip up the east arm of Peter Force Sound; and on the 16th we left the fifth (same as third) encampment, and proceeded on up Frobisher Bay. We made but slow progress on account of sealing, there being a necessity for obtaining all the food that could be found. Six of us, besides the dogs, required a large quantity. After journeying seven miles, we made our next encampment on the ice a few paces from a point of land forming the west cape of a pretty little bay, which, on the boat-voyage in the previous fall, I had called Beauty Bay. That night we had a different kind of dwelling from the one ordinarily occupied by us. The weather was now occasionally warm enough to admit of half igloo and half tupic, which was made by omitting the dome, and placing tent-poles, covered with canvas, on the snow walls.

An exciting scene occurred while the igloo wall was being erected. Koojesse and Sharkey were at work on the building, while Henry and I removed every thing from the sledge. We being at some little distance, the dogs suddenly sprung in a pack upon the sledge, and each snatched a piece of the meat and blubber still remaining upon it. With a club in my hand and a sealspear in Henry's, we belabored them lustily, but they were so hungry that it really seemed as if they cared nothing for blows. As a piece of meat was rescued from the jaws of one, another, and perhaps two others, as quickly had it. Blow followed blow; dogs flew this way and that, all acting like devils, determined to conquer or die in their devouring work. It was quite five minutes before the battle was through, and not then till Koojesse

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leaped the walls of the igloo and came to our assistance. During this melee, Henry unfortunately broke the wood portion of Koojesse's oo-nar (seal-spear), and this enraged the Innuit to a degree not easily to be described, for no instrument is constructed by the natives with more care than this.

The following day, April 17th, I made an exploring trip up Beauty Bay, and on my return found that our igloo had fallen in. The sun was now becoming so powerful that the upper tier of the snow wall melted, and brought down the top and poles upon the two women who were within, and were consequently overwhelmed in the ruins.

Next morning, April 18th, at 9 A.M., we again started, taking a course direct for Gabriel's Island of Frobisher, in the main bay, called by the Innuits Ki-ki-tuk-ju-a. Our progress was slow, owing to the heavy load and the poor condition of the dogs; and at noon, symptoms of a gale coming on, it was deemed advisable to make for shelter. Before we could obtain it, the gale had burst upon us, filling the air with the "white dust" of the country. Presently we saw an Innuit in the distance approaching, and, aft

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