The Giant of the North by Robert Michael Ballantyne (comprehension books .txt) 📖

After unrolling bundle after bundle, I came at last to the centre, and found that it contained nothing whatever but this book, wrapped up in an old cotton pocket-handkerchief. The book is _very_ old, father. See, 1611 on the first page. I did not take time to glance at more than that, but brought it straight away to you."

"Hand it over, Benjy," said the Captain eagerly. "This accounts for the mysterious `buk' that we've heard so much about."

He received the little book with a look of tender curiosity and opened it carefully, while Leo, Alf, and his son looked on over his shoulder.

"1611, sure enough," he said, "though not very legible. The characters are queer, too. Try, Alf, what you can make of it."

Alf took the book. As he did so old Makitok entered, somewhat anxious as to what they were doing with his treasure. Being quieted by the Captain with a draught of cold tea, and made to sit down, the examination of the book proceeded.

"It is much worn, and in places is almost illegible, as might be expected," said Alf. "Let me see. `Coast of Labrador, (something illegible here), 1611. This day the mutineers took possess ... (can't make out what follows), and put Captain Hudson, with his son, myself, the carpenter, and five sick men into the dinghy, casting us, (blank), with some, (blank), and one cask of water. I begin this diary to-day. It may never be seen by man, but if it does fall into the hands of any one who can read it, he will do a service to ... by conveying ... England.--John Mackintosh, _seaman_.'

"Can it be possible?" said Alf, looking up from the relic with an expression of deep solemnity, "that we have found a record of that great Arctic explorer, the unfortunate Henry Hudson?"

"It seems like it, Alf; read on," said Leo, eagerly.

We will not further trouble the reader with Alf's laboured deciphering of this curious and ancient notebook, which was not only stained and worn, but in many places rudely torn, as if its owner had seen much hard service. We will merely run over a few of the chief points which it cleared up. Unfortunately, it threw no additional light on the fate of poor Hudson. Many of the first pages of the book which no doubt treated of that, had been destroyed and the legible portion began in the middle of a record of travelling with a sledge-party of Eskimos to the north of parallel 85 degrees 20 minutes--a higher northern latitude, it will be observed, than had been reached by any subsequent explorer except Captain Vane. No mention being made of English comrades, the presumption remained that they had all been killed or had died--at all events that Mackintosh had been separated from them, and was the only survivor of the party travelling with the Eskimos.

Further on the journal, which was meagre in detail, and kept in the dry form of a log-book, spoke of having reached a far northern settlement. Reference was also made to a wife and family, leading to the conclusion that the seaman had permanently cast in his lot with the savages, and given up all hope of returning to his native land.

One sentence near the end caused a considerable sensation, and opened their eyes to a fact which they might have guessed if they had not been too much taken up with the spelling out of the faded pencilling to think of it at first.

Alf read it with difficulty. It ran thus:--

"Another boy born to-day. His name is Igluk. It is only the eldest boy of a family, in this tribe, who bears his father's surname. My eldest alone goes by the name of Mackintosh. His eldest will bear the same name, and so on. But these Eskimos make a sad mess of it. I doubt if my Scotch kinsmen would recognise us under the name of Makitok which is the nearest--"

"Makitok!" shouted Benjy, gazing open-eyed at the white-bearded wizard, who returned the gaze with some astonishment.

"Why, old boy," cried the boy, jumping up and seizing the wizard's hand, "you're a Scotsman!"

"So he is," said the Captain with a look of profound interest.

"And I say," continued Benjy, in a tone so solemn that the eyes of all the party were turned on him, "we _did_ find him _sitting on the North Pole_!"

"And what of that, you excitable goose?" said the Captain.

"Goose, father! Am I a goose for recognising the fulfilment of an ancient prophecy? Has it not been a familiar saying, ever since I was born, that when the North Pole was discovered, a Scotsman would be found sitting on the top of it?"

"Unfortunately, Ben," returned Alf with a laugh, "the same prophecy exists in other lands. Among the Germans, I believe, it is held that a Bohemian and a Jew will be found on the top of it."

"That only confirms the correctness of prophecy in general," retorted Benjy, "for this man unites all these in his own person. Does not this notebook prove him to be a Scot? Have we not just _found_ him? which proves him to be one of a `lost tribe'--in other words, a Jew; and, surely, you'll admit that, in appearance at least, he is Bohemian enough for the settlement of any disputed question. Yes, he's a Scotch Bohemian Jew, or I'm a Dutchman."

This discovery seemed almost too much for Benjy. He could not think or talk of anything else the remainder of that day.

Among other things he undertook to explain to Makitok something of his origin and antecedents.

"Ancient one," he said earnestly, through the medium of Anders, when he had led the old man aside privately, "you come of a grand nation. They are called Scots, and are said to be remarkably long-headed and wonderfully cautious. Great warriors, but greater at the arts of peace. And the fellow you call your _first father_ was a Mackintosh, (probably chief of all the Mackintoshes), who sailed nearly 270 years ago to search for this very `North Pole' that _we_ have got hold of at last. But your first father was not the leader, old boy. He was only a seaman. The leader was Henry Hudson--a man who ranks among the foremost of Arctic explorers. He won't be able to understand what that means, Anders, but no matter--translate it the best way you can. This Henry Hudson was one of the most thorough and extensive searchers of these regions that ever sailed the northern seas. He made many important discoveries, and set out on his last voyage intending to sail right over the North Pole to China, which I daresay he would have done, had not his rascally crew mutinied and cast him and his little son, with seven other men, adrift in a little boat--all of whom perished, no doubt, except your first father, Makitok, my ancient tulip!"

He wound up this summary by grasping and shaking the wizard's hand, and then flung off, to expend his feelings on other members of the community.


CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.


A RUNAWAY JOURNEY AND A TREMENDOUS EXPERIMENT.

As winter advanced, Captain Vane continued to keep up the interest of the Eskimos, and to increase their respect for the Kablunets, by gradually unfolding the various sources of power which were at his command.

He did this judiciously, just giving them a taste of the marvellous now and then to whet their appetites. He was particularly careful, however not to practise on their credulity or to pass himself off as a conjuror. He distinctly stated that all his powers were derived from God,--_their_ father and _his_,--and that he only excelled them in some matters because of having had better opportunities of acquiring knowledge.

Among other things, he effected an adaptation of his kites which produced results so surprising that we feel bound to describe them particularly.

During the winter he found, as he had expected, that the average temperature at the Pole was not nearly so cold as that experienced in lower latitudes. As far as mere feeling went, indeed, the cold seemed severe enough; nevertheless it was not sufficiently intense to freeze the great ocean, which remained an "open basin" all the year round,--a result which was doubtless owing to the upflow of the warm under-currents from the equator, referred to in a previous chapter.

This, however, did not apply to the waters lying directly around the Poloe and Flatland groups. In these archipelagos the waters being shallow, the frost was quite intense enough to cool them to the bottom. Hence the sea immediately round the islands was covered with a thick coat of solid ice, which resembled in all respects the ordinary Arctic sea-ice, being hummocky in some places, comparatively smooth in others, with a strong iceberg here and there caught and imprisoned amongst it.

As this ice surrounded all the Polar land, and stretched out to sea far beyond the reach of vision, it followed that there was little or no difference between the winter experience of our discoverers and that of all other Arctic voyagers. This realm of what we may style island-ice stretched away, all round, in the direction of the Arctic circle, getting thinner and thinner towards its outer margin, until at last it became sludgy, and, finally, melted away into the open sea. This open sea, in its turn, stretched southward, all round, to the known Arctic regions. Thus the Arctic basin was found to be a zone of open water, surrounded by ice on the south, and with a patch of ice and land in its centre.

Now, it was a strong desire on the part of Captain Vane to visit the southern edge of this central ice-patch on which he dwelt, that induced him to try the kite adaptation before referred to.

"Benjy, my boy," said he, one fine winter day, when the galaxy of stars, the full moon, and an unusually brilliant aurora, diffused a strong light over the undulations of Cup Valley, "I have a notion of taking a trip to the s'uth'ard soon."

"Which s'uth'ard d'you think of going to, father?" asked the boy.

In case any reader should hastily exclaim, "What a ridiculous question; there can be only _one_ southward!" we beg leave to point out that at the North Pole _every_ direction lies to the southward, and that, as there is necessarily no east or west at all, there is therefore no possibility of stating by compass to what part of the south one intends to go. Of course it was open to the Captain to have said he intended to descend south on one of the degrees of longitude, or between any two of them, and then, immediately on quitting the Pole the old familiar east and west would, as it were, return to him. But he found it more convenient, on the whole, having got beyond all latitude, to indicate his intended route by well-known objects of the land.

"I'm going to steer for the starboard side of Poloeland," he said, "pay a short visit to Grabantak and Amalatok in passing, and then carry on south to the open water."

"It'll be a longish trip, father."

"Not so long as you expect, my boy, for I mean to go by express."

Benjy's eyes twinkled, for