The doctor, after reflecting a moment, ascribed this uneasiness to the presence of Simpson’s corpse, which his companions had not yet had time to bury. Hence he resolved to proceed to this sad ceremony on that very day; the next morning they were to start. Bell and the doctor, picks in hand, went to the bottom of the ravine; the elevation which Duke had noticed offered a suitable place for the grave, which would have to be dug deep to escape the bears.
The doctor and Bell began by removing the soft snow, then they attacked the solid ice; at the third blow of his pick the doctor struck against some hard body; he picked up the pieces and found them the fragments of a glass bottle. Bell brought to light a stiffened bag, in which were a few crumbs of fresh biscuit.
“What’s this?” said the doctor.
“What can it be?” asked Bell, stopping his work.
The doctor called to Hatteras, who came at once.
Duke barked violently, and with his paws tried to tear up the ice.
“Have we by any possibility come across a supply of provisions?” said the doctor.
“It looks like it,” answered Bell.
“Go on!” said Hatteras.
A few bits of food were found and a box quarter full of pemmican.
“If we have,” said Hatteras, “the bears have visited it before we did. See, these provisions have been touched already.”
“It is to be feared,” answered the doctor, “for—”
He did not finish his sentence; a cry from Bell interrupted him; he had turned over a tolerably large piece of ice and showed a stiff, frozen human leg in the ice.
“A corpse!” cried the doctor.
“It’s a grave,” said Hatteras.
It was the body of a sailor about thirty years old, in a perfect state of preservation; he wore the usual dress of Arctic sailors; the doctor could not say how long he had been dead.
After this, Bell found another corpse, that of a man of fifty, exhibiting traces of the sufferings that had killed him.
“They were never buried,” cried the doctor; “these poor men were surprised by death as we find them.”
“You are right, Doctor,” said Bell.
“Go on, go on!” said Hatteras.
Bell hardly dared. Who could say how many corpses lay hidden here?
“They were the victims of just such an accident as we nearly perished by,” said the doctor; “their snow-house fell in. Let us see if one may not be breathing yet!”
The place was rapidly cleared away, and Bell brought up a third body, that of a man of forty; he looked less like a corpse than the others; the doctor bent over him and thought he saw some signs of life.
“He’s alive!” he shouted.
Bell and he carried this body into the snow-house, while Hatteras stood in silence, gazing at the sunken dwelling.
The doctor stripped the body; it bore no signs of injury; with Bell’s aid he rubbed it vigorously with tow dipped in alcohol, and he saw life gradually reviving within it; but the man was in a state of complete prostration, and unable to speak; his tongue clove to his palate as if it were frozen.
The doctor examined his patient’s pockets; they were empty. No paper. He let Bell continue rubbing, and went out to Hatteras.
He found him in the ruined snow-house, clearing away the floor; soon he came out, bearing a half-burned piece of an envelope. A few words could be deciphered:—
… tamont
. … orpoise
… w York.
“Altamont!” shouted the doctor, “of the Porpoise! of New York!”
“An American!” said Hatteras.
“I shall save him,” said the doctor; “I’ll answer for it, and we shall find out the explanation of this puzzle.”
He returned to Altamont, while Hatteras remained pensive. The doctor succeeded in recalling the unfortunate man to life, but not to consciousness; he neither saw, heard, nor spoke, but at any rate he was alive!
The next morning Hatteras said to the doctor—
“We must start.”
“All right, Hatteras! The sledge is not loaded; we shall carry this poor fellow back to the ship with us.
“Very well,” said Hatteras. “But first let us bury these corpses.”
The two unknown sailors were placed beneath the ruins of the snow-house; Simpson’s body took the place of Altamont’s.
The three travellers uttered a short prayer over their companion, and at seven o’clock in the morning they set off again for the ship.
Two of the dogs were dead. Duke volunteered to drag the sledge, and he worked as resolutely as a Greenland dog.
For twenty days, from January 31st to February 19th, the return was very much like the first part of the journey. Save that it was in the month of February, the coldest of the whole year, and the ice was harder; the travellers suffered terribly from the cold, but not from the wind or snowstorm.
The sun reappeared for the first time January 31st; every day it rose higher above the horizon. Bell and the doctor were at the end of their strength, almost blind and quite lame; the carpenter could not walk without crutches. Altamont was alive, but continued insensible; sometimes his life was despaired of, but unremitting care kept him alive! And yet the doctor needed to take the greatest care of himself, for his health was beginning to suffer.
Hatteras thought of the Forward! In what condition was he going to find it? What had happened on board? Had Johnson been able to withstand Shandon and his allies? The cold had been terrible! Had they burned the ship? Had they spared her masts and keel?
While thinking of this, Hatteras walked on as if he had wished to get an early view of the Forward.
February 24th, in the morning, he stopped suddenly. Three hundred paces before him appeared a reddish glow, above
