The Adventures of Captain Hatteras

which are delicious eating, noisy flocks of kittiwakes, and great white-bellied loons represented the winged tribe. The doctor was lucky enough to kill some gray hares, which had not yet put on their white winter coat of fur, and a blue fox, which Duke skilfully caught. A few bears, evidently accustomed to fear men, could not be approached, and the seals were very timid, probably for the same reason. The harbor was full of a very good tasting shellfish. The genus Articulata, order Diptera, family Culicides, division Nemocera, was represented by a simple mosquito, a single one, which the doctor, though much bitten, had the pleasure of catching. As a conchologist, he was less fortunate, and he was obliged to content himself with a sort of mussel and some bivalves.

XXI

The Death of Bellot

The temperature remained at 57° during July 3rd and 4th; this was the highest temperature observed. But on Thursday, the 5th, the wind shifted to the southeast, with violent snow-squalls. The thermometer fell twenty-three degrees in the preceding night. Hatteras, indifferent to the hostility of the crew, gave the order to set sail. For thirteen days, ever since passing Cape Dundas, the Forward had not gone a single degree farther north; hence the party represented by Clifton was dissatisfied; their wishes, it is true, coincided with those of the captain, namely, that they should make their way through Wellington Channel, and they were all glad to be off once more.

It was with difficulty that sail was set; but having in the course of the night run up the mainsail and topsails, Hatteras plunged boldly into the ice, which the current was driving towards the south. The crew became very tired of this tortuous navigation, which kept them very busy with the sails.

Wellington Channel is not very broad; it lies between North Devon on the east and Cornwallis Island on the west; for a long time this island was considered a peninsula. It was Sir John Franklin who circumnavigated it, in 1846, from the western side, going about its northern coast.

The exploration of Wellington Channel was made in 1851, by Captain Penny, in the whale-ships Lady Franklin and Sophia; one of his lieutenants, Stewart, who reached Cape Beechey, latitude 76° 20′, discovered the open sea. The open sea! It was for that Hatteras longed.

“What Stewart found, I shall find,” he said to the doctor; “and I shall be able to get to the Pole under sail.”

“But,” answered the doctor, “don’t you fear lest the crew⁠—”

“The crew!” said Hatteras, coldly.

Then in a lower tone he murmured⁠—

“Poor men!” much to the doctor’s surprise.

It was the first sentiment of this sort which he had ever noticed in the captain.

“No,” he went on warmly, “they must follow me, and they shall.”

Still, if the Forward need not fear collision with the ice-streams, she made but little way northward, being much delayed by contrary winds. With some difficulty they got by Capes Spencer and Innis, and Tuesday, the 10th, latitude 75° was at last reached, much to Clifton’s joy.

The Forward was now at the very spot where the American ships, the Rescue and the Advance, commanded by Captain Haven, ran such terrible dangers. Dr. Kane accompanied this expedition; towards the end of September, 1850, these ships were caught in the ice, and carried with irresistible force into Lancaster Sound.

Shandon told James Wall about it in the presence of some of the men.

“The Advance and the Rescue,” he said, “were so tossed about by ice, that they could keep no fires on board; and yet the thermometer stood at 18° below zero. During the whole winter the crews were kept imprisoned, ready to abandon their ships, and for three weeks they did not take off their clothes! It was a terrible situation; after drifting a thousand miles, they were driven to the middle of Baffin’s Bay!”

One may easily judge of the effect of such a narration on a crew already discontented.

While this conversation was going on, Johnson was talking with the doctor about an event which had taken place here; the doctor, at his request, told him the exact moment when the brig reached latitude 75° 30′.

“There it is! there it is!” said Johnson, “there is that unlucky land!”

And so speaking, tears came into the boatswain’s eyes.

“You mean Lieutenant Bellot’s death,” said the doctor.

“Yes, sir, of that brave, good man!”

“And it was here, you say, that it took place?”

“Just here, on this part of the coast of North Devon. It was very great ill-luck, and this would not have happened if Captain Pullen had come on board sooner.”

“What do you mean, Johnson?”

“Listen, Doctor, and you will see by how slight a thread life is held. You know that Lieutenant Bellot had already made an expedition in search of Franklin, in 1850?”

“Yes; in the Prince Albert.”

“Well, in 1853, having returned to France, he got permission to sail in the Phoenix, in which I was a sailor, under Captain Inglefield. We came with the Breadalbane to carry supplies to Beechey Island.”

“Those which we did not find!”

“Exactly, Doctor. We arrived at Beechey Island at the beginning of August; the 10th of that month, Captain Inglefield left the Phoenix to rejoin Captain Pullen, who had been away for a month from his ship, the North Star. He intended on his return to send the Admiralty despatches to Sir Edward Belcher, who was wintering in Wellington Channel. Now, shortly after our captain’s departure, Captain Pullen reached his ship. If he had only come back before Captain Inglefield had left! Lieutenant Bellot, fearing that our captain’s absence might be a long one, and knowing that the Admiralty despatches were important, offered to carry them himself. He left the two ships under Captain Pullen’s charge, and left August 12, with a sledge and an india-rubber canoe. He took with him Harvey, quartermaster of the North Star, and three sailors, Madden, David Hook, and