“Has all the game felt it necessary to go south?” said the doctor, stopping at the foot of a hummock.
“I should fancy it must be so, Doctor,” answered the carpenter.
“I don’t think so,” said Johnson; “the hares, foxes, and bears are accustomed to this climate; I think this last storm must have driven them away; but they will come back with the south-winds. Ah, if you were to talk about reindeer and musk-deer, that might be different!”
“And yet at Melville Island numberless animals of this sort are found,” resumed the doctor; “it lies farther south, it is true, and during the winters he spent there Parry always had plenty of this magnificent game.”
“We have much poorer luck,” answered Bell; “if we could only get enough bear’s meat, we would do very well.”
“The difficulty is,” said the doctor, “the bears seem to me very rare and very wild; they are not civilized enough to come within gunshot.”
“Bell is talking about the flesh of the bear,” said Johnson, “but his grease is more useful than his flesh or his fur.”
“You are right, Johnson,” answered Bell; “you are always thinking of the fuel.”
“How can I help it? Even with the strictest economy, we have only enough for three weeks!”
“Yes,” resumed the doctor, “that is the real danger, for we are now only at the beginning of November, and February is the coldest month in the frigid zone; still, if we can’t get bear’s grease, there’s no lack of seal’s grease.”
“But not for a very long time, Doctor,” answered Johnson; “they will soon leave us; whether from cold or fright, soon they won’t come upon the ice any more.”
“Then,” continued the doctor, “we shall have to fall back on the bear, and I confess the bear is the most useful animal to be found in these countries, for he furnishes food, clothing, light, and fuel to men. Do you hear, Duke?” he said, patting the dog’s head, “we want some bears, my friend, bears! bears!”
Duke, who was sniffing at the ice at that time, aroused by the voices, and caresses of the doctor, started off suddenly with the speed of an arrow. He barked violently and, far off as he was, his loud barks reached the hunters’ ears.
The extreme distance to which sound is carried when the temperature is low is an astonishing fact; it is only equalled by the brilliancy of the constellations in the northern skies; the waves of light and sound are transmitted to great distances, especially in the dry cold of the nights.
The hunters, guided by his distant barking, hastened after him; they had to run a mile, and they got there all out of breath, which happens very soon in such an atmosphere. Duke stood pointing about fifty feet from an enormous mass which was rolling about on the top of a small iceberg.
“Just what we wanted!” shouted the doctor, cocking his gun.
“A fine bear!” said Bell, following the doctor’s example.
“A curious bear!” said Johnson, who intended to fire after his companions.
Duke barked furiously. Bell advanced about twenty feet, and fired; but the animal seemed untouched, for he continued rolling his head slowly.
Johnson came forward, and, after taking careful aim, he pulled the trigger.
“Good!” said the doctor; “nothing yet! Ah, this cursed refraction! We are too far off; we shall never get used to it! That bear is more than a mile away.”
“Come on!” answered Bell.
The three companions hastened toward the animal, which had not been alarmed by the firing; he seemed to be very large, but, without weighing the danger, they gave themselves up already to the joy of victory. Having got within a reasonable distance, they fired; the bear leaped into the air and fell, mortally wounded, on the level ice below.
Duke rushed towards him.
“That’s a bear,” said the doctor, “which was easily conquered.”
“Only three shots,” said Bell with some scorn, “and he’s down!”
“That’s odd,” remarked Johnson.
“Unless we got here just as he was going to die of old age,” continued the doctor, laughing.
“Well, young or old,” added Bell, “he’s a good capture.”
Talking in this way they reached the small iceberg, and, to their great surprise, they found Duke growling over the body of a white fox.
“Upon my word,” said Bell, “that’s too much!”
“Well,” said the doctor, “we’ve fired at a bear, and killed a fox!”
Johnson did not know what to say.
“Well,” said the doctor with a burst of laughter in which there was a trace of disappointment, “that refraction again! It’s always deceiving us.”
“What do you mean, Doctor?” asked the carpenter.
“Yes, my friend; it deceived us with respect to its size as well as the distance! It made us see a bear in a fox’s skin! Such a mistake is not uncommon under similar circumstances! Well, our imagination alone was wrong!”
“At any rate,” answered Johnson, “bear or fox, he’s good eating. Let’s carry him off.”
But as the boatswain was lifting him to his shoulders:—
“That’s odd,” he said.
“What is it?” asked the doctor.
“See there, Doctor, he’s got a collar around his neck.”
“A collar?” asked the doctor again, examining the fox.
In fact, a half-worn-out copper collar appeared under his white fur; the doctor thought he saw letters engraved upon it; he unfastened it from the animal’s neck, about which it seemed to have been for a long time.
“What does that mean?” asked Johnson.
“That means,” said the doctor, “that we have just killed a fox more than twelve years old—a fox who was caught by James Ross in 1848.”
“Is it possible?” said Bell.
“There’s no doubt about it. I’m sorry we killed him! While he was in winter-quarters, James Ross thought of trapping a large number of white foxes; he fastened on their necks copper collars on which was engraved the position of his ships, the Enterprise and Investigator, as well as where the supplies were left. These animals run over immense distances in search of food, and James Ross hoped that one of them might fall into the hands of one of
