its surface. Perceiving a little boat floating on the loch not far from the spot where we had observed this phenomenon, we pulled towards it, and ascertained that the Lapp officer in charge was actually intent on stalking the peripatetic school–to use a technical expression–whose evolutions had so much astonished us. The great object of the sportsman is to judge by their last appearance what part of the water the fish are likely to select for the scene of their next promenade. Directly he has determined this in his own mind, he rows noiselessly to the spot, and, as soon as they show themselves, hooks them with a landing-net into his boat.
By this time it had become a doubtful point whether it would not be as little trouble to row on to Alten as to return to the schooner, so we determined to go on. Unfortunately we turned down a wrong fiord, and after a long pull, about two o’clock in the morning had the satisfaction of finding ourselves in a cul-de-sac. To add to our discomfort, clouds of mosquitoes with the bodies of behemoths and the stings of dragons, had collected from all quarters of the heavens to make a prey of us. In vain we struggled–strove to knock them down with the oars,–plunged our heads under the water,–smacked our faces with frantic violence; on they came in myriads, until I thought our bleaching bones would alone remain to indicate our fate. At last Sigurdr espied a log but on the shore, where we might at least find some one to put us into the right road again; but on looking in at the open door, we only saw a Lapland gentleman fast asleep. Awaking at our approach he started to his feet, and though nothing could be more gracefully conciliatory than the bow with which I opened the conversation, I regret to say that after staring wildly round for a few minutes, the aboriginal bolted straight away in the most unpolite manner and left us to our fate. There was nothing for it but patiently to turn back, and try some other opening. This time we were more successful, and about three o’clock A.M. had the satisfaction of landing at one of the wharves attached to the copper mines of Kaafiord. We came upon a lovely scene. It was as light and warm as a summer’s noon in England; upon a broad plateau, carved by nature out of the side of the grey limestone, stood a bright shining house in the middle of a plot of rich English-looking garden. On one side lay the narrow fiord, on every other rose an amphitheatre of fir-clad mountains. The door of the house was open, so were many of the windows–even those on the ground-floor, and from the road where we stood we could see the books on the library shelves. A swing and some gymnastic appliances on the lawn told us that there were children. Altogether, I thought I had never seen such a charming picture of silent comfort and security. Perhaps the barren prospects we had been accustomed to made the little oasis before us look more cheerful than we might otherwise have thought it.
The question now arose, what was to be done? My principal reason for coming to Alten was to buy some salt provisions and Lapland dresses; but dolls and junk were scarcely a sufficient pretext for knocking up a quiet family at three o’clock in the morning. It is true, I happened to have a letter for Mr. T–, written by a mutual friend, who had expressly told me that–arrive when I might at Alten,–the more unceremoniously I walked in and took possession of the first unoccupied bed I stumbled on, the better Mr. T– would be pleased; but British punctilio would not allow me to act on the recommendation, though we were sorely tried. In the meantime the mosquitoes had become more intolerable than ever. At last, half mad with irritation, I set off straight up the side of the nearest mountain, in hopes of attaining a zone too high for them to inhabit; and, poising myself upon its topmost pinnacle, I drew my handkerchief over my head–I was already without coat and waistcoat–and remained the rest of the morning “mopping and mowing” at the world beneath my feet.
About six o’clock, like a phantom in a dream, the little schooner came stealing round the misty headland, and anchored at the foot of the rocks below. Returning immediately on board, we bathed, dressed, and found repose from all our troubles. Not long after, a message from Mr. T–, in answer to a card I had sent up to the house as soon as the household gave signs of being astir–invited us to breakfast; and about half-past nine we presented ourselves at his hospitable door. The reception I met with was exactly what the gentlemen who had given me the letter of introduction had led me to expect; and so eager did Mr. T– seem to make us comfortable, that I did not dare to tell him how we had been prowling about his house the greater part of the previous night, lest he should knock me down on the spot for not having knocked him up. The appearance of the inside of the house quite corresponded with what we had anticipated from the soigne air of everything about its exterior. Books, maps, pictures, a number of astronomical instruments, geological specimens, and a magnificent assortment of fishing-rods, betrayed the habits of the practical, well-educated, business-loving English gentlemen who inhabited it; and as he showed me the various articles of interest in his study, most heartily did I congratulate myself on the lucky chance which had brought me into contact with so desirable an acquaintance.
All this time we had seen nothing of the lady of the house; and I was just beginning to speculate as to whether that crowning ornament could be wanting to this pleasant home, when the door at the further end of the room suddenly opened, and there glided out into the sunshine–“The White Lady of Avenel.” A fairer apparition I have seldom seen,–stately, pale, and fragile as a lily–blond hair, that rippled round a forehead of ivory–a cheek of waxen purity on which the fitful colour went and came–not with the flush of southern blood, or flower-bloom of English beauty,–but rather with a cool radiance, as of “northern streamers” on the snows of her native hills,– eyes of a dusky blue, and lips of that rare tint which lines the conch-shell. Such was the Chatelaine of Kaafiord,–as perfect a type of Norse beauty as ever my Saga lore had conjured up! Frithiof’s Ingeborg herself seemed to stand before me. A few minutes afterwards, two little fair-haired maidens, like twin snowdrops, stole into the room; and the sweet home picture was complete.
The rest of the day has been a continued fete. In vain after having transacted my business, I pleaded the turning of the tide, and our anxiety to get away to sea; nothing would serve our kind entertainer but that we should stay to dinner; and his was one of those strong energetic wills it is difficult to resist.
In the afternoon, the Hammerfest steamer called in from the southward, and by her came two fair sisters of our hostess from their father’s home in one of the Loffodens which overlook the famous Maelstrom. The stories about the violence of the whirlpool Mr. T– assures me are ridiculously exaggerated. On ordinary occasions the site of the supposed vortex is perfectly unruffled, and it is only when a strong weather tide is running that any unusual movements in the water can be observed; even then the disturbance does not amount to much more than a rather troublesome race. “Often and often, when she was a girl, had his wife and her sisters sailed over its fabulous crater in an open boat.” But in this wild romantic country, with its sparse population, rugged mountains, and gloomy fiords, very ordinary matters become invested with a character of awe and mystery quite foreign to the atmosphere of our own matter-of-fact world; and many of the Norwegians are as prone to superstition as the poor little Lapp pagans who dwell among them.
No later than a few years ago, in the very fiord we had passed on our way to Alten, when an unfortunate boat got cast away during the night on some rocks at a little distance from the shore, the inhabitants, startled by the cries of distress which reached them in the morning twilight, hurried down in a body to the sea-side,–not to afford assistance,–but to open a volley of musketry on the drowning mariners; being fully persuaded that the stranded boat, with its torn sails, was no other than the Kracken or Great Sea-Serpent flapping its dusky wings: and when, at last, one of the crew succeeded in swimming ashore in spite of waves and bullets,–the whole society turned and fled!
And now, again good-bye. We are just going up to dine with Mr. T–; and after dinner, or at least as soon as the tide turns, we get under way–Northward Ho! (as Mr. Kingsley would say) in right good earnest this time!
LETTER XI.
WE SAIL FOR BEAR ISLAND, AND SPITZBERGEN–CHERIE ISLAND– BARENTZ-SIR HUGH WILLOUGHBY–PARRY’S ATTEMPT TO REACH THE NORTH POLE–AGAIN AMONGST THE ICE–ICEBLINK–FIRST SIGHT OF SPITZBERGEN–WILSON–DECAY OF OUR HOPES–CONSTANT STRUGGLE WITH THE ICE–WE REACH THE 80 DEGREES N. LAT.–A FREER SEA–WE LAND IN SPITZBERGEN–ENGLISH BAY–LADY EDITH’S GLACIER–A MIDNIGHT PHOTOGRAPH–NO REINDEER TO BE SEEN–ET EGO IN ARCTIS–WINTER IN SPITZBERGEN– PTARMIGAN–THE BEAR-SAGA–THE “FOAM” MONUMENT– SOUTHWARDS–SIGHT THE GREENLAND ICE–A GALE–WILSON ON THE MAELSTROM–BREAKERS AHEAD–ROOST–TAKING A SIGHT– THRONDHJEM.
Throndhjem, Aug. 22nd, 1856.
We have won our laurels, after all! We have landed in Spitzbergen–almost at its most northern extremity; and the little “Foam” has sailed to within 630 miles of the Pole; that is to say, within 100 miles as far north as any ship has ever succeeded in getting.
I think my last letter left us enjoying the pleasant hospitalities of Kaafiord.
The genial quiet of that last evening in Norway was certainly a strange preface to the scenes we have since witnessed. So warm was it, that when dinner was over, we all went out into the garden, and had tea in the open air; the ladies without either bonnets or shawls, merely plucking a little branch of willow to brush away the mosquitoes; and so the evening wore away in alternate intervals of chat and song. At midnight, seawards again began to swirl the tide, and we rose to go,–not without having first paid a visit to the room where the little daughters of the house lay folded in sleep. Then descending to the beach, laden with flowers and kind wishes waved to us by white handkerchiefs held in still whiter hands, we rowed on board; up went the napping sails, and dipping her ensign in token of adieu–the schooner glided swiftly on between the walls of rock, until an intervening crag shut out from our sight the friendly group that had come forth to bid us “Good speed.” In another twenty-four hours we had threaded our way back through the intricate fiords; and leaving Hammerfest three or four miles on the starboard hand, on the evening of the 28th of July, we passed out between the islands of Soroe and Bolsvoe into the open sea.
My intention was to go first to Bear Island, and ascertain for myself in what direction the ice was lying to the southward of Spitzbergen.
Bear–or Cherie Island, is a diamond-shaped island, about ten miles long, composed of secondary rocks–principally sandstone and limestone-lying about 280 miles due north of the North Cape. It was originally discovered by Barentz, the 9th of June, 1596, on the occasion of his last and fatal voyage. Already had he commanded two expeditions sent forth by the United Provinces to discover a north-east passage to that dream-land–Cathay; and each time, after penetrating to the eastward of Nova Zembla, he had been foiled by the impenetrable line of ice. On this occasion he adopted the bolder and more northerly courses which brought him to Bear Island. Thence, plunging into the mists of the frozen sea, he ultimately sighted the western mountains of Spitzbergen. Unable to proceed further in that direction, Barentz retraced his steps, and again passing in sight of Bear Island, proceeded in a south-east direction to Nova Zembla, where his ships got entangled in the ice, and he subsequently perished.
Towards the close of the sixteenth century, in spite of repeated failures, one endeavour after another was made to penetrate to India across these fatal waters.
The first English vessel that sailed on the disastrous quest was the “Bona Esperanza.” in the last year of King Edward VI. Her commander was Sir Hugh Willoughby, and we have still extant a copy of the instructions drawn up by Sebastian Cabot–the Grand Pilot of England, for his guidance. Nothing can be more pious than the spirit in which this ancient document is conceived; expressly enjoining that morning and evening prayers should be offered on board every ship attached to the expedition, and that neither dicing, carding, tabling, nor other devilish devices–were to be permitted. Here and there were clauses of a more questionable morality,–recommending that natives of strange lands be “enticed on board, and made drunk with your beer and wine; for then you shall know the secrets of their hearts.” The whole concluding with an exhortation to all on board to take especial heed to the devices of “certain creatures, with men’s heads, and the tails of fishes, who swim with bows and arrows about the fiords and bays, and live on human flesh.”
On the 11th of May the ill-starred expedition got under way from Deptford, and saluting the king, who was then lying sick at Greenwich, put to sea. By the 30th of July the little fleet–three vessels in all–had come up abreast of the Loffoden islands, but a gale coming on, the “Esperanza” was separated from the consorts. Ward-huus–a little harbour to the east of the North Cape-had been appointed as the place of rendezvous in case of such an event, but unfortunately, Sir Hugh overshot the mark, and wasted all the precious autumn time in blundering amid the ice to the eastward. At last, winter set in, and they were obliged to run for a port in Lapland. Here, removed from all human aid, they were frozen to death. A year afterwards, the ill-fated ships were discovered by some Russian sailors, and an unfinished journal proved that Sir Hugh and many of his companions were still alive in January, 1554.
The next voyage of discovery in a north-east direction was sent out by Sir Francis Cherie, alderman of London, in 1603. After proceeding as far east as Ward-huus and Kela, the “Godspeed” pushed north into the ocean, and on the 16th of August fell in with Bear Island. Unaware of its previous discovery by Barentz, Stephen Bennet–who commanded the expedition–christened the island Cherie Island, in honour of his patron, and to this day the two names are used almost indiscriminately.
In 1607, Henry Hudson was despatched by the Muscovy Company, with orders to sail, if possible, right across the pole. Although perpetually baffled by the ice, Hudson at last succeeded in reaching the north-west extremity of Spitzbergen, but finding his further progress arrested by an impenetrable barrier of fixed ice, he was forced to return. A few years later, Jonas Poole–having been sent in the same direction, instead of prosecuting any discoveries, wisely set himself to killing the sea-horses that frequent the Arctic ice-fields, and in lieu of tidings of new lands–brought back a valuable cargo of walrus tusks. In 1615, Fotherby started with the intention of renewing the attempt to sail across the north pole, but after encountering many dangers he also was forced to return. It was during the course of his homeward voyage that he fell in with the island of Jan Mayen. Soon afterwards, the discovery by Hudson and Davis, of the seas and straits to which they have given their names, diverted the attention of the public from all thoughts of a north-east passage, and the Spitzbergen waters were only frequented by ships engaged in the fisheries. The gradual disappearance of the whale, and the discovery of more profitable fishing stations on the west coast of Greenland, subsequently abolished the sole attraction for human being which this inhospitable region ever possessed, and of late years, I understand, the Spitzbergen seas have remained as lonely and unvisited as they were before the first adventurer invaded their solitude.
Twice only, since the time of Fotherby, has any attempt been made to reach the pole on a north-east course. In 1773, Captain Phipps, afterwards Lord Mulgrave, sailed in the “Carcass” towards Spitzbergen, but he never reached a higher latitude than 81 degrees. It was in this expedition that Nelson made his first voyage, and had that famous encounter with the bear. The next and last endeavour was undertaken by Parry, in 1827. Unable to get his ship even as far north as Phipps had gone, he determined to leave her in a harbour in Spitzbergen, and push across the sea in boats and sledges. The uneven nature of the surface over which they had to travel, caused their progress northward to be very slow, and very laborious. The ice too, beneath their feet, was not itself immovable, and at last they perceived they were making the kind of progress a criminal makes upon the treadmill,–the floes over which they were journeying drifting to the southward faster than they walked north; so that at the end of a long day’s march of ten miles, they found themselves four miles further from their destination than at its commencement. Disgusted with so Irish a manoeuvre, Parry determined to return, though not until he had almost reached the 83rd parallel, a higher latitude than any to which man is known to have penetrated. Arctic authorities are still of opinion, that Parry’s plan for reaching the pole might prove successful, if the expedition were to set out earlier in the season, ere the intervening field of ice is cast adrift by the approach of summer.
Our own run to Bear Island was very rapid. On getting outside the islands, a fair fresh wind sprung up, and we went spinning along for two nights and two days as merrily as possible, under a double-reefed mainsail and staysail, on a due north course. On the third day we began to see some land birds, and a few hours afterwards, the loom of the island itself; but it had already begun to get fearfully cold, and our thermometer, which I consulted every two hours, plainly indicated that we were approaching ice. My only hope was that, at all events, the southern extremity of the island might be disengaged; for I was very anxious to land, in order to examine some coal-beds which are said to exist in the upper strata of the sandstone formation. This expectation was doomed to complete disappointment. Before we had got within six miles of the shore, it became evident that the report of the Hammerfest Sea-horseman was too true.
Between us and the land there extended an impenetrable barrier of packed ice, running due east and west, as far as the eye could reach.
[Figure: fig-p162.gif]
What was now to be done? If a continuous field of ice lay 150 miles off the southern coast of Spitzbergen, what would be the chance of getting to the land by going further north? Now that we had received ocular proof of the veracity of the Hammerfest skipper in this first particular, was it likely that we should have the luck to find the remainder of his story untrue? According to the track he had jotted down for me on the chart, the ice in front stretched right away west in an unbroken line, to the wall of ice which we had seen running to the north, from the upper end of Jan Mayen. Only a week had elapsed since he had actually ascertained the impracticability of reaching a higher latitude,–what likelihood could there be of a channel having been opened up to the northward during so short an interval? Such was the series of insoluble problems by which I posed myself, as we stood vainly smacking our lips at the island, which lay so tantalizingly beyond our reach.
Still, unpromising as the aspect of things might appear, it would not do to throw a chance away; so I determined to put the schooner round on the other tack, and run westwards along the edge of the ice, until we found ourselves again in the Greenland sea. Bidding, therefore, a last adieu to Mount Misery, as its first discoverers very appropriately christened one of the higher hills in Bear Island, we suffered it to melt back into a fog,–out of which, indeed, no part of the land had ever more than partially emerged,–and with no very sanguine expectations as to the result, sailed west away towards Greenland. During the next four-and-twenty hours we ran along the edge of the ice, in nearly a due westerly direction, without observing the slightest indication of anything approaching to an opening towards the North. It was weary work, scanning that seemingly interminable barrier, and listening to the melancholy roar of waters on its icy shore.
At last, after having come about 140 miles since leaving Bear Island,–the long, white, wave-lashed line suddenly ran down into a low point, and then trended back with a decided inclination to the North. Here, at all events, was an improvement; instead of our continuing to steer W. by S., or at most W. by N., the schooner would often lay as high up as N.W., and even N.W. by N. Evidently the action of the Gulf Stream was beginning to tell, and our spirits rose in proportion. In a few more hours, however, this cheering prospect was interrupted by a fresh line of ice being reported, not only ahead, but as far as the eye could reach on the port bow; so again the schooner’s head was put to the westward, and the old story recommenced. And now the flank of the second barrier was turned, and we were able to edge up a few hours to the northward; but only to be again confronted by another line, more interminable, apparently, than the last. But why should I weary you with the detail of our various manoeuvres during the ensuing days? They were too tedious and disheartening at the time, for me to look back upon them with any pleasure. Suffice it to say, that by dint of sailing north whenever the ice would permit us, and sailing west when we could not sail north, we found ourselves on the 2nd of August, in the latitude of the southern extremity of Spitzbergen, though divided from the land by about fifty miles of ice. All this while the weather had been pretty good, foggy and cold enough, but with a fine stiff breeze that rattled us along at a good rate whenever we did get a chance of making any Northing. But lately it had come on to blow very hard, the cold became quite piercing, and what was worse–in every direction round the whole circuit of the horizon, except along its southern segment,–a blaze of iceblink illuminated the sky. A more discouraging spectacle could not have met our eyes. The iceblink is a luminous appearance, reflected on the heavens from the fields of ice that still lie sunk beneath the horizon; it was, therefore on this occasion an unmistakable indication of the encumbered state of the sea in front of us.
I had turned in for a few hours of rest, and release from the monotonous sense of disappointment, and was already lost in a dream of deep bewildering bays of ice, and gulfs whose shifting shores offered to the eye every possible combination of uncomfortable scenery, without possible issue,–when “a voice in my dreaming ear” shouted “LAND!” and I awoke to its reality. I need not tell you in what double quick time I tumbled up the companion, or with what greediness I feasted my eyes on that longed-for view,–the only sight–as I then thought–we were ever destined to enjoy of the mountains of Spitzbergen!
The whole heaven was overcast with a dark mantle of tempestuous clouds, that stretched down in umbrella-like points towards the horizon, leaving a clear space between their edge and the sea, illuminated by the sinister brilliancy of the iceblink. In an easterly direction, this belt of unclouded atmosphere was etherealized to an indescribable transparency, and up into it there gradually grew–above the dingy line of starboard ice–a forest of thin lilac peaks, so faint, so pale, that had it not been for the gem-like distinctness of their outline, one could have deemed them as unsubstantial as the spires of fairy-land. The beautiful vision proved only too transient; in one short half hour mist and cloud had blotted it all out, while a fresh barrier of ice compelled us to turn our backs on the very land we were striving to reach.
Although we were certainly upwards of sixty miles distant from the land when the Spitzbergen hills were first observed, the intervening space seemed infinitely less; but in these high latitudes the eye is constantly liable to be deceived in the estimate it forms of distances. Often, from some change suddenly taking place in the state of the atmosphere, the land you approach will appear even to RECEDE; and on one occasion, an honest skipper–one of the most valiant and enterprising mariners of his day–actually turned back, because, after sailing for several hours with a fair wind towards the land, and finding himself no nearer to it than at first, he concluded that some loadstone rock beneath the sea must have attracted the keel of his ship, and kept her stationary.
The next five days were spent in a continual struggle with the ice. On referring to our log, I see nothing but a repetition of the same monotonous observations.
“July 31st.–Wind W. by S.–Courses sundry to clear ice.”
“Ice very thick.”
“These twenty-four hours picking our way through ice.”
“August 1st.–Wind W.–courses variable–foggy–continually among ice these twenty-four hours.”
And in Fitz’s diary, the discouraging state of the weather is still more pithily expressed:–
“August 2nd.–Head wind–sailing westward–large hummocks of ice ahead, and on port bow, i.e. to the westward–hope we may be able to push through. In evening, ice gets thicker; we still hold on–fog comes on–ice getting thicker–wind freshens–we can get no farther–ice impass- able, no room to tack–struck the ice several times– obliged to sail S. and W.–things look very shady.”
Sometimes we were on the point of despairing altogether, then a plausible opening would show itself as if leading towards the land, and we would be tempted to run down it until we found the field become so closely packed, that it was with great difficulty we could get the vessel round,–and only then at the expense of collisions, which made the little craft shiver from stem to stern. Then a fog would come on–so thick, you could almost cut it like a cheese, and thus render the sailing among the loose ice very critical indeed then it would fall dead calm, and leave us, hours together, muffled in mist, with no other employment than chess or hopscotch. It was during one of those intervals of quiet that I executed the annexed work of art, which is intended to represent Sigurdr, in the act of meditating a complicated gambit for the Doctor’s benefit.
About this period Wilson culminated. Ever since leaving Bear Island he had been keeping a carnival of grief in the pantry, until the cook became almost half-witted by reason of his Jeremiads. Yet I must not give you the impression that the poor fellow was the least wanting in PLUCK–far from it. Surely it requires the highest order of courage to anticipate every species of disaster every moment of the day, and yet to meet the impending fate like a man–as he did. Was it his fault that fate was not equally ready to meet him? HIS share of the business was always done: he was ever prepared for the worst; but the most critical circumstances never disturbed the gravity of his carriage, and the fact of our being destined to go to the bottom before tea-time would not have caused him to lay out the dinner-table a whit less symmetrically. Still, I own, the style of his service was slightly depressing. He laid out my clean shirt of a morning as if it had been a shroud; and cleaned my boots as though for a man ON HIS LAST LEGS. The fact is, he was imaginative and atrabilious,–contemplating life through a medium of the colour of his own complexion.
This was the cheerful kind of report he used invariably to bring me of a morning. Coming to the side of my cot with the air of a man announcing the stroke of doomsday, he used to say, or rather, TOLL–
“Seven o’clock, my Lord!”
“Very well; how’s the wind?”
“Dead ahead, my Lord–DEAD!”
“How many points is she off her course?”
“Four points, my Lord–full four points!” (Four points being as much as she could be.)
“Is it pretty clear? eh! Wilson?”
“–Can’t see your hand, my Lord!–can’t see your hand!”
“Much ice in sight?”
“–Ice all round, my Lord–ice a-all ro-ound!”–and so exit, sighing deeply over my trousers.
Yet it was immediately after one of these unpromising announcements, that for the first time matters began to look a little brighter. The preceding four-and-twenty hours we had remained enveloped in a cold and dismal fog. But on coming on deck, I found the sky had already begun to clear; and although there was ice as far as the eye could see on either side of us, in front a narrow passage showed itself across a patch of loose ice into what seemed a freer sea beyond. The only consideration was–whether we could be certain of finding our way out again, should it turn out that the open water we saw was only a basin without any exit in any other direction. The chance was too tempting to throw away; so the little schooner gallantly pushed her way through the intervening neck of ice where the floes seemed to be least huddled up together, and in half an hour afterwards found herself running up along the edge of the starboard ice, almost in a due northerly direction. And here I must take occasion to say that, during the whole of this rather anxious time, my master–Mr. Wyse–conducted himself in a most admirable manner. Vigilant, cool, and attentive, he handled the vessel most skilfully, and never seemed to lose his presence of mind in any emergency. It is true the silk tartan still coruscated on Sabbaths, but its brilliant hues were quite a relief to the colourless scenes which surrounded us, and the dangling chain now only served to remind me of what firm dependence I could place upon its wearer.
Soon after, the sun came out, the mist entirely disappeared, and again on the starboard hand shone a vision of the land; this time not in the sharp peaks and spires we had first seen, but in a chain of pale blue egg-shaped islands, floating in the air a long way above the horizon. This peculiar appearance was the result of extreme refraction, for, later in the day, we had an opportunity of watching the oval cloud-like forms gradually harden into the same pink tapering spikes which originally caused the island to be called Spitzbergen: nay, so clear did it become, that even the shadows on the hills became quite distinct, and we could easily trace the outlines of the enormous glaciers–sometimes ten or fifteen miles broad–that fill up every valley along the shore. Towards evening the line of coast again vanished into the distance, and our rising hopes received an almost intolerable disappointment by the appearance of a long line of ice right ahead, running to the westward, apparently, as far as the eye could reach. To add to our disgust, the wind flew right round into the North, and increasing to a gale, brought down upon us–not one of the usual thick arctic mists to which we were accustomed, but a dark, yellowish brown fog, that rolled along the surface of the water in twisted columns, and irregular masses of vapour, as dense as coal smoke. We had now almost reached the eightieth parallel of north latitude, and still an impenetrable sheet of ice, extending fifty or sixty miles westward from the shore, rendered all hopes of reaching the land out of the question. Our expectation of finding the north-west extremity of the island disengaged from ice by the action of the currents was–at all events for this season–evidently doomed to disappointment. We were already almost in the latitude of Amsterdam Island–which is actually its north-west point–and the coast seemed more encumbered than ever. No whaler had ever succeeded in getting more than about 120 miles further north than we ourselves had already come; and to entangle ourselves any further in the ice–unless it were with the certainty of reaching land–would be sheer folly. The only thing to be done was to turn back. Accordingly, to this course I determined at last to resign myself, if, after standing on for twelve hours longer, nothing should turn up to improve the present aspect of affairs. It was now eleven o’clock; P. M. Fitz and Sigurdr went to bed, while I remained on deck to see what the night might bring forth. It blew great guns, and the cold was perfectly intolerable; billow upon billow of black fog came sweeping down between the sea and sky, as if it were going to swallow up the whole universe; while the midnight sun–now completely blotted out–now faintly struggling through the ragged breaches of the mist–threw down from time to time an unearthly red-brown glare on the waste of roaring waters.
For the whole of that night did we continue beating up along the edge of the ice, in the teeth of a whole gale of wind; at last, about nine o’clock in the morning,–but two short hours before the moment at which it had been agreed we should bear up, and abandon the attempt,–we came up with a long low point of ice, that had stretched further to the Westward than any we had yet doubled; and there, beyond, lay an open sea!–open not only to the Northward and Westward, but also to the Eastward! You can imagine my excitement.” Turn the hands up, Mr. Wyse!” “‘Bout ship!” “Down with the helm!” “Helm a-lee!” Up comes the schooner’s head to the wind, the sails flapping with the noise of thunder–blocks rattling against the deck, as if they wanted to knock their brains out–ropes dancing about in galvanised coils, like mad serpents–and everything to an inexperienced eye in inextricable confusion; till gradually she pays off on the other tack–the sails stiffen into deal-boards–the staysail sheet is let go–and heeling over on the opposite side. Again she darts forward over the sea like an arrow from the bow. “Stand by to make sail!” “Out all reefs!” I could have carried sail to sink a man-of-war!–and away the little ship went, playing leapfrog over the heavy seas, and staggering under her canvas, as if giddy with the same joyful excitement which made my own heart thump so loudly.
In another hour the sun came out, the fog cleared away, and about noon–up again, above the horizon, grow the pale lilac peaks, warming into a rosier tint as we approach. Ice still stretches toward the land on the starboard side; but we don’t care for it now–the schooner’s head is pointing E. and by S. At one o’clock we sight Amsterdam Island, about thirty miles on the port bow; then came the “seven ice-hills”–as seven enormous glaciers are called–that roll into the sea between lofty ridges of gneiss and mica slate, a little to the northward of Prince Charles’s Foreland. Clearer and more defined grows the outline of the mountains, some coming forward while others recede; their rosy tints appear less even, fading here and there into pale yellows and greys; veins of shadow score the steep sides of the hills; the articulations of the rocks become visible; and now, at last, we glide under the limestone peaks of Mitre Cape, past the marble arches of King’s Bay on the one side, and the pinnacle of the Vogel Hook on the other, into the quiet channel that separates the Foreland from the main.
[Figure: fig-p170.gif]
It was at one o’clock in the morning of the 6th of August, 1856, that after having been eleven days at sea, we came to an anchor in the silent haven of English Bay, Spitzbergen.
And now, how shall I give you an idea of the wonderful panorama in the midst of which we found ourselves? I think, perhaps, its most striking feature was the stillness, and deadness, and impassibility of this new world: ice, and rock, and water surrounded us; not a sound of any kind interrupted the silence; the sea did not break upon the shore; no bird or any living thing was visible; the midnight sun, by this time muffled in a transparent mist, shed an awful, mysterious lustre on glacier and mountain; no atom of vegetation gave token of the earth’s vitality: an universal numbness and dumbness seemed to pervade the solitude. I suppose in scarcely any other part of the world is this appearance of deadness so strikingly exhibited. On the stillest summer day in England, there is always perceptible an under-tone of life thrilling through the atmosphere; and though no breeze should stir a single leaf, yet–in default of motion–there is always a sense of growth; but here not so much as a blade of grass was to be seen on the sides of the bald excoriated hills. Primeval rocks and eternal ice constitute the landscape.
The anchorage where we had brought up is the best to be found, with the exception perhaps of Magdalena Bay, along the whole west coast of Spitzbergen; indeed it is almost the only one where you are not liable to have the ice set in upon you at a moment’s notice. Ice Sound, Bell Sound, Horn Sound–the other harbours along the west coast–are all liable to be beset by drift-ice during the course of a single night, even though no vestige of it may have been in sight four-and-twenty hours before; and many a good ship has been inextricably imprisoned in the very harbour to which she had fled for refuge. This bay is completely landlocked, being protected on its open side by Prince Charles’s Foreland, a long island lying parallel with the mainland. Down towards either horn run two ranges of schistose rocks, about 1,500 feet high, their sides almost precipitous, and the topmost ridge as sharp as a knife, and jagged as a saw; the intervening space is entirely filled up by an enormous glacier, which,–descending with one continuous incline from the head of a valley on the right, and sweeping like a torrent round the roots of an isolated clump of hills in the centre–rolls at last into the sea. The length of the glacial river from the spot where it apparently first originated, could not have been less than thirty, or thirty-five miles, or its greatest breadth less than nine or ten; but so completely did it fill up the higher end of the valley, that it was as much as you could do to distinguish the further mountains peeping up above its surface. The height of the precipice where it fell into the sea, I should judge to have been about 120 feet.
On the left a still more extraordinary sight presented itself. A kind of baby glacier actually hung suspended half way on the hill side, like a tear in the act of rolling down the furrowed cheek of the mountain.
I have tried to convey to you a notion of the falling impetus impressed on the surface of the Jan Mayen ice rivers; but in this case so unaccountable did it seem that the over-hanging mass of ice should not continue to thunder down upon its course, that one’s natural impulse was to shrink from crossing the path along which a breath–a sound–might precipitate the suspended avalanche into the valley. Though, perhaps, pretty exact in outline and general effect, the sketch I have made of this wonderful scene, will never convey to you a correct notion of the enormous scale of the distances, and size of its various features. These glaciers are the principal characteristic of the scenery in Spitzbergen; the bottom of every valley in every part of the island, is occupied and generally completely filled by them, enabling one in some measure to realize the look of England during her glacial period, when Snowdon was still being slowly lifted towards the clouds, and every valley in Wales was brimful of ice. But the glaciers in English Bay are by no means the largest in the island. We ourselves got a view–though a very distant one–of ice rivers which must have been more extensive; and Dr. Scoresby mentions several which actually measured forty or fifty miles in length, and nine or ten in breadth; while the precipice formed by their fall into the sea, was sometimes upwards of 400 or 500 feet high. Nothing is more dangerous than to approach these cliffs of ice. Every now and then huge masses detach themselves from the face of the crystal steep, and topple over into the water; and woe be to the unfortunate ship which might happen to be passing below. Scoresby himself actually witnessed a mass of ice, the size of a cathedral, thunder down into the sea from a height of 400 feet; frequently during our stay at Spitzbergen we ourselves observed specimens of these ice avalanches; and scarcely an hour passed without the solemn silence of the bay being disturbed by the thunderous boom resulting from similar catastrophes occurring in adjacent valleys.
As soon as we had thoroughly taken in the strange features of the scene around us, we all turned in for a night’s rest. I was dog tired, as much with anxiety as want of sleep; for in continuing to push on to the northward in spite of the ice, I naturally could not help feeling that if any accident occurred, the responsibility would rest with me; and although I do not believe that we were at any time in any real danger, yet from our inexperience in the peculiarities of arctic navigation, I think the coolest judgment would have been liable to occasional misgivings as to what might arise from possible contingencies. Now, however, all was right; the result had justified our anticipations; we had reached the so longed-for goal; and as I stowed myself snugly away in the hollow of my cot, I could not help heartily congratulating myself that–for that night at all events– there was no danger of the ship knocking a hole in her bottom against some hummock which the lookout had been too sleepy to observe; and that Wilson could not come in the next morning and announce “ice all round, a-all ro-ound!” In a quarter of an hour afterwards, all was still on board the “Foam;” and the lonely little ship lay floating on the glassy bosom of the sea, apparently as inanimate as the landscape.
My feelings on awakening next morning were very pleasant; something like what one used to feel the first morning after one’s return from school, on seeing pink curtains glistening round one’s head, instead of the dirty-white boards of a turned-up bedstead. When Wilson came in with my hot water, I could not help triumphantly remarking to him,–“Well, Wilson, you see we’ve got to Spitzbergen, after all!” But Wilson was not a man to be driven from his convictions by facts; he only smiled grimly, with a look which meant–“Would we were safe back again!” Poor Wilson! he would have gone only half way with Bacon in his famous Apothegm; he would willingly “commit the Beginnings of all actions to Argus with his hundred eyes, and the Ends”–to Centipede, with his hundred legs. “First to watch, and then to speed”–away! would have been his pithy emendation.
Immediately after breakfast we pulled to the shore, carrying in the gig with us the photographic apparatus, tents, guns, ammunition, and the goat. Poor old thing! she had suffered dreadfully from sea-sickness, and I thought a run ashore might do her good. On the left-hand side of the bay, between the foot of the mountain and the sea, there ran a low flat belt of black moss, about half a mile broad; and as this appeared the only point in the neighbourhood likely to offer any attraction to reindeer, it was on this side that I determined to land. My chief reason for having run into English Bay rather than Magdalena Bay was because we had been told at Hammerfest that it was the more likely place of the two for deer; and as we were sadly in want of fresh meat this advantage quite decided us in our choice. As soon, therefore, as we had superintended the erection of the tent, and set Wilson hard at work cleaning the glasses for the photographs, we slung our rifles on our backs, and set off in search of deer. But in vain did I peer through my telescope across the dingy flat in front; not a vestige of a horn was to be seen, although in several places we came upon impressions of their track. At last our confidence in the reports of their great plenty became considerably diminished. Still the walk was very refreshing after our confinement on board; and although the thermometer was below freezing, the cold only made the exercise more pleasant. A little to the northward I observed, lying on the sea-shore, innumerable logs of driftwood. This wood is floated all the way from America by the Gulf Stream, and as I walked from one huge bole to another, I could not help wondering in what primeval forest each had grown, what chance had originally cast them on the waters, and piloted them to this desert shore. Mingled with this fringe of unhewn timber that lined the beach lay waifs and strays of a more sinister kind; pieces of broken spars, an oar, a boat’s flagstaff, and a few shattered fragments of some long-lost vessel’s planking. Here and there, too, we would come upon skulls of walrus, ribs and shoulder-blades of bears, brought possibly by the ice in winter. Turning again from the sea, we resumed our search for deer; but two or three hours’ more very stiff walking produced no better luck. Suddenly a cry from Fitz, who had wandered a little to the right, brought us helter-skelter to the spot where was standing. But it was not a stag he had called us to come and look upon. Half imbedded in the black moss at his feet, there lay a grey deal coffin falling almost to pieces with age; the lid was gone–blown off probably by the wind–and within were stretched the bleaching bones of a human skeleton. A rude cross at the head of the grave still stood partially upright, and a half obliterated Dutch inscription preserved a record of the dead man’s name and age.
…..VANDER SCHELLING….
COMMAN….JACOB MOOR….
OB 2 JUNE 1758 AET 44.
[Figure: fig-p174.gif]
It was evidently some poor whaler of the last century to whom his companions had given the only burial possible in this frost-hardened earth, which even the summer sun has no force to penetrate beyond a couple of inches, and which will not afford to man the shallowest grave. A bleak resting-place for that hundred years’ slumber, I thought, as I gazed on the dead mariner’s remains!–
“I was snowed over with snow,
And beaten with rains,
And drenched with the dews;
Dead have I long been,”–
–murmured the Vala to Odin in Nifelheim,–and whispers of a similar import seemed to rise up from the lidless coffin before us. It was no brother mortal that lay at our feet, softly folded in the embraces of “Mother Earth,” but a poor scarecrow, gibbeted for ages on this bare rock, like a dead Prometheus; the vulture, frost, gnawing for ever on his bleaching relics, and yet eternally preserving them!
On another part of the coast we found two other corpses yet more scantily sepulchred, without so much as a cross to mark their resting-place. Even in the palmy days of the whale-fisheries, it was the practice of the Dutch and English sailors to leave the wooden coffins in which they had placed their comrades’ remains, exposed upon the shore; and I have been told by an eye-witness, that in Magdalena Bay there are to be seen, even to this day, the bodies of men who died upwards of 250 years ago, in such complete preservation that, when you pour hot water on the icy coating which encases them, you can actually see the unchanged features of the dead, through the transparent incrustation.
As soon as Fitz had gathered a few of the little flowering mosses that grew inside the coffin, we proceeded on our way, leaving poor Jacob Moor–like his great namesake–alone in his glory.
Turning to the right, we scrambled up the spur of one of the mountains on the eastern side of the plain, and thence dived down among the lateral valleys that run up between them. Although by this means we opened up quite a new system of hills, and basins, and gullies, the general scenery did not change its characteristics. All vegetation–if the black moss deserves such a name–ceases when you ascend twenty feet above the level of the sea, and the sides of the mountains become nothing but steep slopes of schist, split and crumbled into an even surface by the frost. Every step we took unfolded a fresh succession of these jagged spikes and break-neck acclivities, in an unending variety of quaint configuration. Mountain climbing has never been a hobby of mine, so I was not tempted to play the part of Excelsior on any of these hill sides; but for those who love such exercise a fairer or a more dangerous opportunity of distinguishing themselves could not be imagined. The supercargo or owner of the very first Dutch ship that ever came to Spitzbergen, broke his neck in attempting to climb a hill in Prince Charles’s Foreland. Barentz very nearly lost several of his men under similar circumstances; and when Scoresby succeeded in making the ascent of another hill near Horn Sound, it was owing to his having taken the precaution of marking each upward step in chalk, that he was ever able to get down again. The prospect from the summit, the approach to which was by a ridge so narrow that he sat astride upon its edge, seems amply to have repaid the exertion; and I do not think I can give you a better idea of the general effect of Spitzbergen scenery, than by quoting his striking description of the panorama he beheld:–
“The prospect was most extensive and grand. A fine sheltered bay was seen to the east of us, an arm of the same on the north-east, and the sea, whose glassy surface was unruffled by a breeze, formed an immense expanse on the west; the icebergs rearing their proud crests almost to the tops of mountains between which they were lodged, and defying the power of the solar beams, were scattered in various directions about the sea-coast and in the adjoining bays. Beds of snow and ice filling extensive hollows, and giving an enamelled coat to adjoining valleys, one of which commencing at the foot of the mountain where we stood extended in a continued line towards the north, as far as the eye could reach–mountain rising above mountain, until by distance they dwindled into insignificancy–the whole contrasted by a cloudless canopy of deepest azure, and enlightened by the rays of a blazing sun, and the effect aided by a feeling of danger, seated as we were on the pinnacle of a rock almost surrounded by tremendous precipices,–all united to constitute a picture singularly sublime.
“Our descent we found really a very hazardous, and in some instances a painful undertaking. Every movement was a work of deliberation. Having by much care, and with some anxiety, made good our descent to the top of the secondary hills, we took our way down one of the steepest banks, and slid forward with great facility in a sitting posture. Towards the foot of the hill, an expanse of snow stretched across the line of descent. This being loose and soft, we entered upon it without fear; but on reaching the middle of it, we came to a surface of solid ice, perhaps a hundred yards across, over which we launched with astonishing velocity, but happily escaped without injury. The men whom we left below, viewed this latter movement with astonishment and fear.”
So universally does this strange land bristle with peaks and needles of stone, that the views we ourselves obtained –though perhaps from a lower elevation, and certainly without the risk–scarcely yielded either in extent or picturesque grandeur to the scene described by Dr. Scoresby.
Having pretty well overrun the country to the northward, without coming on any more satisfactory signs of deer than their hoof-prints in the moss, we returned on board. The next day–but I need not weary you with a journal of our daily proceedings, for, however interesting each moment of our stay in Spitzbergen was to ourselves–as much perhaps from a vague expectation of what we might see, as from anything we actually did see–a minute account of every walk we took, and every bone we picked up, or every human skeleton we came upon, would probably only make you wonder why on earth we should have wished to come so far to see so little. Suffice it to say that we explored the neighbourhood in the three directions left open to us by the mountains, that we climbed the two most accessible of the adjacent hills, wandered along the margin of the glaciers, rowed across to the opposite side of the bay, descended a certain distance along the sea-coast, and in fact exhausted all the lions of the vicinity.
During the whole period of our stay in Spitzbergen, we had enjoyed unclouded sunshine. The nights were even brighter than the days, and afforded Fitz an opportunity of taking some photographic views by the light of a MIDNIGHT sun. The cold was never very intense, though the thermometer remained below freezing, but about four o’clock every evening, the salt-water bay in which the schooner lay was veneered over with a pellicle of ice one-eighth of an inch in thickness, and so elastic, that even when the sea beneath was considerably agitated, its surface remained unbroken, the smooth, round waves taking the appearance of billows of oil. If such is the effect produced by the slightest modification of the sun’s power, in the month of August,–you can imagine what must be the result of his total disappearance beneath the horizon. The winter is, in fact, unendurable. Even in the height of summer, the moisture inherent in the atmosphere is often frozen into innumerable particles, so minute as to assume the appearance of an impalpable mist. Occasionally persons have wintered on the island, but unless the greatest precautions have been taken for their preservation, the consequences have been almost invariably fatal. About the same period as when the party of Dutch sailors were left at Jan Mayen, a similar experiment was tried in Spitzbergen. At the former place it was scurvy, rather than cold, which destroyed the poor wretches left there to fight it out with winter; at Spitzbergen, as well as could be gathered from their journal, it appeared that they had perished from the intolerable severity of the climate,–and the contorted attitudes in which their bodies were found lying, too plainly indicated the amount of agony they had suffered. No description can give an adequate idea of the intense rigour of the six months’ winter in this part of the world. Stones crack with the noise of thunder; in a crowded hut the breath of its occupants will fall in flakes of snow; wine and spirits turn to ice; the snow burns like caustic; if iron touches the flesh, it brings the skin away with it; the soles of your stockings may be burnt off your feet, before you feel the slightest warmth from the fire; linen taken out of boiling water, instantly stiffens to the consistency of a wooden board; and heated stones will not prevent the sheets of the bed from freezing. If these are the effects of the climate within an air-tight, fire-warmed, crowded hut–what must they be among the dark, storm-lashed mountain-peaks outside?
It was now time to think of going south again; we had spent many more days on the voyage to Spitzbergen than I had expected, and I was continually haunted by the dread of your becoming anxious at not hearing from us. It was a great disappointment to be obliged to return without having got any deer; but your peace of mind was of more consequence to me than a ship-load of horns, and accordingly we decided on not remaining more than another day in our present berth leaving it still an open question whether we should not run up to Magdalena Bay, if the weather proved very inviting, the last thing before quitting for ever the Spitzbergen shores.
We had killed nothing as yet, except a few eider ducks, and one or two ice-birds–the most graceful winged creatures I have ever seen, with immensely long pinions, and plumage of spotless white. Although enormous seals from time to time used to lift their wise, grave faces above the water, with the dignity of sea-gods, none of us had any very great inclination to slay such rational human-looking creatures, and–with the exception of these and a white fish, a species of whale–no other living thing had been visible. On the very morning, however, of the day settled for our departure, Fitz came down from a solitary expedition up a hill with the news of his having seen some ptarmigan. Having taken a rifle with him instead of a gun, he had not been able to shoot more than one, which he had brought back in triumph as proof of the authenticity of his report, but the extreme juvenility of his victim hardly permitted us to identify the species; the hole made by the bullet being about the same size as the bird. Nevertheless, the slightest prospect of obtaining a supply of fresh meat was enough to reconcile us to any amount of exertion; therefore, on the strength of the pinch of feathers which Fitz kept gravely assuring us was the game he had bagged, we seized our guns–I took a rifle in case of a possible bear–and set our faces toward the hill. After a good hour’s pull we reached the shoulder which Fitz had indicated as the scene of his exploit, but a patch of snow was the only thing visible. Suddenly I saw Sigurdr, who was remarkably sharp-sighted, run rapidly in the direction of the snow, and bringing his gun up to his shoulder, point it–as well as I could distinguish–at his own toes. When the smoke of the shot had cleared away, I fully expected to see the Icelander prostrate; but he was already reloading with the greatest expedition. Determined to prevent the repetition of so dreadful an attempt at self-destruction, I rushed to the spot. Guess then my relief when the bloody body of a ptarmigan–driven by so point blank a discharge a couple of feet into the snow–was triumphantly dragged forth by instalments from the sepulchre which it had received contemporaneously with its death wound, and thus happily accounted for Sigurdr’s extraordinary proceeding. At the same moment I perceived two or three dozen other birds, brothers and sisters of the defunct, calmly strutting about under our very noses. By this time Sigurdr had reloaded, Fitz had also come up, and a regular massacre began. Retiring to a distance–for it was the case of Mahomet and the mountain reversed–the two sportsmen opened fire upon the innocent community, and in a few seconds sixteen corpses strewed the ground.
Scarcely had they finished off the last survivor of this Niobean family, when we were startled by the distant report of a volley of musketry, fired in the direction of the schooner. I could not conceive what had happened. Had a mutiny taken place? Was Mr. Wyse re-enacting, with a less docile ship’s company, the pistol scene on board the Glasgow steamer? Again resounded the rattle of the firing. At all events, there was no time to be lost in getting back, so, tying up the birds in three bundles, we flung ourselves down into the gully by which we had ascended, and leaping on from stone to stone, to the infinite danger of our limbs and necks, rolled rather than ran down the hill. On rounding the lower wall of the curve which hitherto had hid what was passing from our eyes, the first I observed was Wilson breasting up the hill, evidently in a state of the greatest agitation. As soon as he thought himself within earshot, he stopped dead short, and, making a speaking-trumpet with his hands, shrieked, rather than shouted, “If you please, my Lord!”–(as I have already said, Wilson never forgot les convenances)–“If you please, my Lord, there’s a b-e-a-a-a-a-r!” prolonging the last word into a polysyllable of fearful import. Concluding by the enthusiasm he was exhibiting, that the animal in question was at his heels,–hidden from us probably by the inequality of the ground,–I cocked my rifle, and prepared to roll him over the moment he should appear in sight. But what was my disappointment, when, on looking towards the schooner, my eye caught sight of our three boats fastened in a row, and towing behind them a white floating object, which my glass only too surely resolved the next minute into the dead bear!
On descending to the shore, I learned the whole story. As Mr. Wyse was pacing the deck, his attention was suddenly attracted by a white speck in the water, swimming across from Prince Charles’s Foreland,–the long island which lies over against English Bay. When first observed, the creature, whatever it might be, was about a mile and a half off,–the width of the channel between the island and the main being about five miles. Some said it was a bird, others a whale, and the cook suggested a mermaid. When the fact was ascertained that it was a BONA FIDE bear, a gun was fired as a signal for us to return; but it was evident that unless at once intercepted, Bruin would get ashore. Mr. Wyse, therefore, very properly determined to make sure of him. This was a matter of no difficulty: the poor beast showed very little fight. His first impulse was to swim away from the boat; and even after he had been wounded, he only turned round once or twice upon his pursuers. The honour of having given him his death wound rests between the steward and Mr. Wyse; both contend for it. The evidence is conflicting, as at least half-a-dozen mortal wounds were found in the animal’s body; each maybe considered to have had a share in his death. Mr. Grant rests his claim principally upon the fact of his having put two bullets in my new rifle– which must have greatly improved the bore of that instrument. On the strength of this precaution, he now wears as an ornament about his person one of the bullets extracted from the gizzard of our prize.
All this time, Wilson was at the tent, busily occupied in taking photographs. As soon as the bear was observed, a signal was made to him from the ship, to warn him of the visitor he might shortly expect on shore. Naturally concluding that the bear would in all probability make for the tent as soon as he reached land, it became a subject of consideration with him what course he should pursue. Weapons he had none, unless the chemicals he was using might be so regarded. Should he try the influence of chloroform on his enemy; or launch the whole photographic apparatus at his grisly head, and take to his heels? Thought is rapid, but the bear’s progress seemed equally expeditious; it was necessary to arrive at some speedy conclusion. To fly–was to desert his post and leave the camp in possession of the spoiler; life and honour were equally dear to him. Suddenly a bright idea struck him.
At the time the goat had been disembarked to take her pleasure on TERRA FIRMA, our crow’s-nest barrel had been landed with her. At this moment it was standing unoccupied by the side of the tent. By creeping into it, and turning its mouth downward on the ground, Wilson perceived that he should convert it into a tower of strength for himself against the enemy, while its legitimate occupant, becoming at once a victim to the bear’s voracity, would probably prevent the monster from investigating too curiously its contents. It was quite a pity that the interposition of the boats prevented his putting this ingenious plan into execution. He had been regularly done out of a situation, in which the most poignant agony of mind and dreary anticipations would have been absolutely required of him. He pictured the scene to himself; he lying fermenting in the barrel, like a curious vintage; the bear sniffing querulously round it, perhaps cracking it like a cocoa-nut, or extracting him like a periwinkle! Of these chances he had been deprived by the interference of the crew. Friends are often injudiciously meddling.
Although I felt a little vexation that one of us should not have had the honour of slaying the bear in single combat, which would certainly have been for the benefit of his skin, the unexpected luck of having got one at all, made us quite forget our personal disappointment. As for my people, they were beside themselves with delight. To have killed a polar bear was a great thing, but to eat him would be a greater. If artistically dealt with, his carcase would probably cut up into a supply of fresh meat for many days. One of the hands appened to be a butcher. Whenever I wanted anything a little out of the way to be done on board, I was sure to find that it happened to be the specialite of some one of the ship’s company. In the course of a few hours, the late bear was converted into a row of the most tempting morsels of beef, hung about the rigging. Instead of in flags, the ship was dressed in joints. In the meantime it so happened that the fox, having stolen a piece of offal, was in a few minutes afterwards seized with convulsions. I had already given orders that the bear’s liver should be thrown overboard, as being, if not poisonous, at all events very unwholesome. The seizure of the fox, coupled with this injunction, brought about a complete revolution in the men’s minds, with regard to the delicacies they had been so daintily preparing for themselves. Silently, one by one, the pieces were untied and thrown into the sea: I do not think a mouthful of bear was eaten on board the “Foam.” I never heard whether it was in consequence of any prognostics of Wilson’s that this act of self-denial was put into practice. I observed, however, that for some days after the slaughter and dismemberment of the bear, my ship’s company presented an unaccountably sleek appearance. As for the steward, his head and whiskers seemed carved out of black marble: a varnished boot would not have looked half so bright: I could have seen to shave myself in his black hair. I conclude, therefore, that the ingenious cook must, at all events, have succeeded in manufacturing a supply of genuine bear’s grease, of which they had largely availed themselves.
The bagging of the bear had so gloriously crowned our visit to Spitzbergen, that our disappointment about the deer was no longer thought of; it was therefore with light hearts, and most complete satisfaction, that we prepared for departure.
Maid Marian had already carved on a flat stone an inscription, in Roman letters, recording the visit of the “Foam” to English Bay, and a cairn having been erected to receive it, the tablet was solemnly lifted to its resting-place. Underneath I placed a tin box, containing a memorandum similar to that left at Jan Mayen, as well as a printed dinner invitation from Lady –, which I happened to have on board. Having planted a boat’s flag beside the rude monument, and brought on board with us a load of driftwood, to serve hereafter as Christmas yule-logs, we bade an eternal adieu to the silent hills around us; and weighing anchor, stood out to sea. For some hours a lack of wind still left us hanging about the shore, in the midst of a grave society of seals; but soon after, a gentle breeze sprang up in the south, and about three o’clock on Friday, the 11th of August, we again found ourselves spanking along before a six-knot breeze, over the pale green sea.
In considering the course on which I should take the vessel home, it appeared to me that in all probability we should have been much less pestered by the ice on our way to Spitzbergen, if, instead of hugging the easterly ice, we had kept more away to the westward; I determined therefore–as soon as we got clear of the land–to stand right over to the Greenland shore, on a due west course, and not to attempt to make any southing, until we should have struck the Greenland ice. The length of our tether in that direction being ascertained, we could then judge of the width of the channel down which we were to beat, for it was still blowing pretty fresh from the southward.
Up to the evening of the day on which we quitted English Bay, the weather had been most beautiful; calm, sunshiny, dry, and pleasant. Within a few hours of our getting under weigh, a great change had taken place, and by midnight it had become as foggy and disagreeable as ever. The sea was pretty clear. During the few days we had been on shore, the northerly current had brushed away the great angular field of ice which had lain off the shore, in a northwest direction; so that instead of being obliged to run up very nearly to the 80th parallel, in order to round it, we were enabled to sail to the westward at once. During the course of the night, we came upon one or two wandering patches of drift ice, but so loosely packed that we had no difficulty in pushing through them. About four o’clock in the morning, a long line of close ice was reported right a-head, stretching south as far as the eye could reach. We had come about eighty miles since leaving Spitzbergen. The usual boundary of the Greenland ice in summer runs, according to Scoresby, along the second parallel of west longitude. This we had already crossed, so that it was to be presumed the barricade we saw before us was a frontier of the fixed ice. In accordance, therefore, with my predetermined plan, we now began working to the southward, and the result fully justified my expectations.
The sea became comparatively clear, as far as could be seen from the deck of the vessel, although small vagrant patches of ice that we came up with occasionally–as well as the temperature of the air and the sea–continued to indicate the proximity of larger bodies on either side of us.
It was a curious sensation with which we had gradually learnt to contemplate this inseparable companion: it had become a part of our daily existence, an element, a thing without which the general aspect of the universe would be irregular and incomplete. It was the first thing we thought of in the morning, the last thing we spoke of at night. It glittered and grinned maliciously at us in the sunshine; it winked mysteriously through the stifling fog; it stretched itself like a prostrate giant, with huge, portentous shoulders and shadowy limbs, right across our course; or danced gleefully in broken groups in the little schooner’s wake. There was no getting rid of it, or forgetting it, and if at night we sometimes returned in dreams to the green summer world–to the fervent harvest fields of England, and heard “the murmurs of innumerous bees,” or the song of larks on thymy uplands–thump! bump! splash! gra-a-ate!–came the sudden reminder of our friend on the starboard bow; and then sometimes a scurry on deck, and a general “scrimmage” of the whole society, in endeavours to prevent more serious collisions. Moreover, I could not say, with your old French friend, that “Familiar’ty breeds despise.” The more we saw of it, the less we liked it; its cold presence sent a chilly sense of discouragement to the heart, and I had daily to struggle with an ardent desire to throw a boot at Wilson’s head, every time his sepulchral voice announced the “Ice ALL ROUND!”
It was not until the 14th of August, five days after quitting Spitzbergen, that we lost sight of it altogether. From that moment the temperature of the sea steadily rose, and we felt that we were sailing back again into the pleasant summer.
A sad event which occurred soon after, in some measure marred our enjoyment of the change. Ever since she had left Hammerfest, it had become too evident that a sea-going life did not agree with the goat. Even the run on shore at Spitzbergen had not sufficed to repair her shattered constitution, and the bad weather we had had ever since completed its ruin. It was certain that the butcher was the only doctor who could now cure her. In spite, therefore, of the distress it occasioned Maid Marian, I was compelled to issue orders for her execution. Sigurdr was the only person who regarded the TRAGICAL event with indifference, nay, almost with delight. Ever since we had commenced sailing in a southerly direction, we had been obliged to beat, but during the last four-and-twenty hours the wind kept dodging us every time we tacked, as a nervous pedestrian sets to you sometimes on a narrow trottoir. This spell of ill-luck the Icelander heathenishly thought would only be removed by a sacrifice to Rhin, the goddess of the sea, in which light he trusted she would look upon the goat’s body when it came to be thrown overboard.
Whether the change which followed upon the consignment of her remains to the deep really resulted from such an influence, I am not prepared to say. The weather immediately thereafter certainly DID change. First the wind dropped altogether, but though the calm lasted several hours, the sea strangely enough appeared to become all the rougher, tossing and tumbling restlessly UP AND DOWN–(not over and over as in a gale)–like a sick man on a fever bed; the impulse to the waves seeming to proceed from all four quarters of the world at once. Then, like jurymen with a verdict of death upon their lips, the heavy, ominous clouds slowly passed into the north-west.
A dead stillness followed–a breathless pause–until, at some mysterious signal, the solemn voice of the storm hurtled over the deep. Luckily we were quite ready for it; the gale came from the right quarter, and the fiercer it blew the better. For the next three days and three nights it was a scurry over the sea such as I never had before; nine or ten knots an hour was the very least we ever went, and 240 miles was the average distance we made every four-and-twenty hours.
Anything grander and more exciting than the sight of the sea under these circumstances you cannot imagine. The vessel herself remains very steady; when you are below you scarcely know you are not in port. But on raising your head above the companion the first sight which meets your eye is an upright wall of black water, towering, you hardly know how many feet, into the air over the stern. Like a lion walking on its hind legs, it comes straight at you, roaring and shaking its white mane with fury-it overtakes the vessel–the upright shiny face curves inwards–the white mane seems to hang above your very head; but ere it topples over, the nimble little ship has already slipped from underneath. You hear the disappointed jaws of the sea-monster snap angrily together,–the schooner disdainfully kicks up her heel–and raging and bubbling up on either side the quarter, the unpausing wave sweeps on, and you see its round back far ahead, gradually swelling upwards, as it gathers strength and volume for a new effort.
We had now got considerably to the southward of North Cape. We had already seen several ships, and you would hardly imagine with what childish delight my people hailed these symptoms of having again reached more “Christian latitudes,” as they called them.
I had always intended, ever since my conversation with Mr. T. about the Malstrom, to have called in at Loffoden Islands on our way south, and ascertain for myself the real truth about this famous vortex. To have blotted such a bugbear out of the map of Europe, if its existence really was a myth, would at all events have rendered our cruise not altogether fruitless. But, since leaving Spitzbergen, we had never once seen the sun, and to attempt to make so dangerous a coast in a gale of wind and a thick mist, with no more certain knowledge of the ship’s position than our dead reckoning afforded, was out of the question, so about one o’clock in the morning, the weather giving no signs of improvement, the course I had shaped in the direction of the island was altered, and we stood away again to the southward. This manoeuvre was not unobserved by Wilson, but he mistook its meaning. Having, I suppose, overheard us talking at dinner about the Malstrom, he now concluded the supreme hour had arrived. He did not exactly comprehend the terms we used, but had gathered that the spot was one fraught with danger. Concluding from the change made in the vessel’s course that we were proceeding towards the dreadful locality, he gave himself up to despair, and lay tossing in his hammock in sleepless anxiety. At last the load of his forebodings was greater than he could bear, he gets up, steals into the Doctor’s cabin, wakes him up, and standing over him–as the messenger of ill tidings once stood over Priam–whispers, “SIR!” “What is it?” says Fitz, thinking, perhaps, some one was ill. “Do you know where we are going?” “Why, to Throndhjem,” answered Fitz. “We were going to Throndhjem,” rejoins Wilson, “but we ain’t now–the vessel’s course was altered two hours ago. Oh, Sir! we are going to Whirlpool-to WHIRL-RL-POOO-L! Sir!” in a quaver of consternation,–and so glides back to bed like a phantom, leaving the Doctor utterly unable to divine the occasion of his visit.
The whole of the next day the gale continued. We had now sailed back into night; it became therefore a question how far it would be advisable to carry on during the ensuing hours of darkness, considering how uncertain we were as to our real position. As I think I have already described to you, the west coast of Norway is very dangerous; a continuous sheet of sunken rocks lies out along its entire edge for eight or ten miles to sea. There are no lighthouses to warn the mariner off; and if we were wrong in our reckoning, as we might very well be, it was possible we might stumble on the land sooner than we expected. I knew the proper course would be to lie to quietly until we could take an observation; but time was so valuable, and I was so fearful you would be getting anxious. The night was pretty clear. High mountains, such as we were expecting to make, would be seen, even at night, several miles off. According to our log we were still 150 miles off the land, and, however inaccurate our calculation might be, the error could not be of such magnitude as that amounted to. To throw away so fair a wind seemed such a pity, especially as it might be days before the sun appeared; we had already been at sea about a fortnight without a sight of him, and his appearance at all during the summer is not an act DE RIGUEUR in this part of the world; we might spend yet another fortnight in lying to, and then after all have to poke our way blindfold to the coast; at all events it would be soon enough to lie to the next night. Such were the considerations, which–after an anxious consultation with Mr. Wyse in the cabin, and much fingering of the charts,–determined me to carry on during the night.
Nevertheless, I confess I was very uneasy, Though I went to bed and fell asleep–for at sea nothing prevents that process–my slumbers were constantly agitated by the most vivid dreams that I ever remember to have had. Dreams of an arrival in England, and your coming down to meet us, and all the pleasure I had in recounting our adventures to you; then suddenly your face seemed to fade away beneath a veil of angry grey surge that broke over low, sharp-pointed rocks; and the next moment there resounded over the ship that cry which has been the preface to so many a disaster–the ring of which, none who have ever heard it are likely to forget–“Breakers ahead!”
In a moment I was on deck, dressed–for it is always best to dress,–and there, sure enough, right ahead, about a mile and a half off, through the mist, which had come on very thick, I could distinguish the upward shooting fluff of seas shattering against rocks. No land was to be seen, but the line of breakers every instant became more evident; at the pace we were going, in seven or eight minutes we should be upon them. Now, thought I to myself, we shall see whether a stout heart beats beneath the silk tartan! The result covered that brilliant garment with glory and salt water. To tack was impossible, we could only wear,–and to wear in such a sea was no very pleasant operation. But the little ship seemed to know what she was about, as well as any of us: up went the helm, round came the schooner into the trough of the sea,–high over her quarter toppled an enormous sea, built up of I know not how many tons of water, and hung over the deck,–by some unaccountable wriggle, an instant ere it thundered down she had twisted her stern on one side, and the waves passed underneath. In another minute her head was to the sea, the mainsail was eased over, and all danger was past.
What was now to be done? That the land we had seen was the coast of Norway I could not believe. Wrong as our dead reckoning evidently was, it could not be so wrong as that. Yet only one other supposition was possible, viz., that we had not come so far south as we imagined, and that we had stumbled upon Roost–a little rocky island that lies about twenty miles to the southward of the Loffoden Islands. Whether this conjecture was correct or not, did not much matter; to go straight away to sea, and lie to until we could get an observation, was the only thing to be done. Away then we went, struggling against a tremendous sea for a good nine hours, until we judged ourselves to be seventy or eighty miles from where we had sighted the breakers,–when we lay to, not in the best of tempers. The next morning, not only was it blowing as hard as ever, but all chance of getting a sight that day seemed also out of the question. I could have eaten my head with impatience. However, as it is best never to throw a chance away, about half-past eleven o’clock, though the sky resembled an even sheet of lead, I got my sextant ready, and told Mr. Wyse to do the same.
Now, out of tenderness for your feminine ignorance I must state, that in order to take an observation, it is necessary to get a sight of the sun at a particular moment of the day: this moment is noon. When, therefore, twelve o’clock came, and one could not so much as guess in what quarter of the heavens he might be lying perdu, you may suppose I almost despaired. Ten minutes passed. It was evident we were doomed to remain, kicking our heels for another four-and-twenty hours where we were. No!–yes!–no! By Phoebus! there he is! A faint spongy spot of brightness gleamed through the grey roof overhead. The indistinct outline grew a little clearer; one-half of him, though still behind a cloud, hardened into a sharp edge. Up went the sextant. “52.43!” (or whatever it was) I shouted to Mr. Wyse. “52.41, my Lord!” cried he, in return; there was only the discrepancy of a mile between us. We had got the altitude; the sun might go to bed for good and all now, we did not care,–we knew our position to an inch. There had been an error of something like forty miles in our dead reckoning, in consequence–as I afterwards found–of a current that sets to the northward, along the west coast of Norway, with a velocity varying from one to three miles an hour. The island upon which we had so nearly run WAS Roost. We were still nearly 200 miles from our port. “Turn the hands up! Make sail!” and away we went again in the same course as before, at the rate of ten knots an hour.
“The girls at home have got hold of the tow-rope, I think, my Lord,” said Mr. Wyse, as we bounded along over the thundering seas.
[Figure: fig-p192.gif]
By three o’clock next day we were up with Vigten, and now a very nasty piece of navigation began. In order to make the northern entrance of the Throndhjem Fiord, you have first to find your way into what is called the Froh Havet,–a kind of oblong basin about sixteen miles long, formed by a ledge of low rocks running parallel with the mainland, at a distance of ten miles to seaward. Though the space between this outer boundary and the coast is so wide, in consequence of the network of sunken rocks which stuffs it up, the passage by which a vessel can enter is very narrow, and the only landmark to enable you to find the channel is the head one of the string of outer islets. As this rock is about the size of a dining-table, perfectly flat, and rising only a few feet above the level of the sea, to attempt to make it is like looking for a needle in a bottle of hay. It was already beginning to grow very late and dark by the time we had come up with the spot where it ought to have been, but not a vestige of such a thing had turned up. Should we not sight it in a quarter of an hour, we must go to sea again, and lie to for the night,–a very unpleasant alternative for any one so impatient as I was to reach a port. Just as I was going to give the order, Fitz–who was certainly the Lynceus of the ship’s company–espied its black back just peeping up above the tumbling water on our starboard bow. We had hit it off to a yard!
In another half-hour we were stealing down in quiet water towards the entrance of the fiord. All this time not a rag of a pilot had appeared, and it was without any such functionary that the schooner swept up next morning between the wooded, grain-laden slopes of the beautiful loch, to Throndhjem–the capital of the ancient sea-kings of Norway.
LETTER XII.
THRONDHJEM–HARALD HAARFAGER–KING HACON’S LAST BATTLE– OLAF TRYGGVESSON–THE “LONG SERPENT”–ST. OLAVE–THORMOD THE SCALD–THE JARL OF LADE–THE CATHEDRAL–HARALD HARDRADA–THE BATTLE OF STANFORD BRIDGE–A NORSE BALI –ODIN–AND HIS PALADINS.
Off Munkholm, Aug. 27, 1856.
Throndhjem (pronounced Tronyem) looked very pretty and picturesque, with its red-roofed wooden houses sparkling in the sunshine, its many windows filled with flowers, its bright fiord covered with vessels gaily dressed in flags, in honour of the Crown Prince’s first visit to the ancient capital of the Norwegian realm. Tall, pretentious warehouses crowded down to the water’s edge, like bullies at a public show elbowing to the foremost rank, orderly streets stretched in quiet rows at right angles with each other, and pretty villas with green cinctures sloped away towards the hills. In the midst rose the king’s palace, the largest wooden edifice in Europe, while the old grey cathedral–stately and grand, in spite of the slow destruction of the elements, the mutilations of man’s hands, or his yet more degrading rough-cast and stucco reparations–still towered above the perishable wooden buildings at his feet, with the solemn pride which befits the shrine of a royal saint.
I cannot tell you with what eagerness I drank in all the features of this lovely scene; at least, such features as Time can hardly alter–the glancing river, from whence the city’s ancient name of Nidaros, or “mouth of the Nid,” is derived,–the rocky island of Munkholm, the bluff of Lade,–the land-locked fiord and its pleasant hills, beyond whose grey stony ridges I knew must lie the fatal battle-field of Sticklestad. Every spot to me was full of interest,–but an interest noways connected with the neat green villas, the rectangular streets, and the obtrusive warehouses. These signs of a modern humdrum prosperity seemed to melt away before my eyes as I gazed from the schooner’s deck, and the accessories of an elder time came to furnish the landscape,–the clumsy merchantmen lazily swaying with the tide, darkened into armed galleys with their rows of glittering shields,–the snug, bourgeois-looking town shrank into the quaint proportions of the huddled ancient Nidaros,–and the old marauding days, with their shadowy line of grand old pirate kings, rose up with welcome vividness before my mind.
What picture shall I try to conjure from the past, to live in your fancy, as it does in mine?
Let the setting be these very hills,–flooded by this same cold, steely sunshine. In the midst stands a stalwart form, in quaint but regal attire. Hot blood deepens the colour of his sun-bronzed cheek; an iron purpose gleams in his earnest eyes, like the flash of a drawn sword; a circlet of gold binds the massive brow, and from beneath it stream to below his waist thick masses of hair, of that dusky red which glows like the heart of a furnace in the sunlight, but deepens earth-brown in the shadow. By his side stands a fair woman; her demure and heavy-lidded eyes are seldom lifted from the earth, which yet they seem to scorn, but the king’s eyes rest on her, and many looks are turned towards him. A multitude is present, moved by one great event, swayed by a thousand passions,–some with garrulous throats full of base adulation and an unworthy joy,–some pale, self-scorning, with averted looks, and hands that twitch instinctively at their idle daggers, then drop hopeless, harmless at their sides.
The king is Harald Haarfager, “of the fair hair,” the woman is proud and beautiful Gyda, whose former scorn for him, in the days when he was nothing but the petty chief of a few barren mountains, provoked that strange wild vow of his, “That he would never clip or comb his locks till he could woo her as sole king of Norway.”
Among the crowd are those who have bartered, for ease, and wealth, and empty titles born of the king’s breath–their ancient Udal rights, their Bonder privileges; others have sunk their proud hearts to bear the yoke of the stronger hand, yet gaze with yearning looks on the misty horizon that opens between the hills. A dark speck mars that shadowy line. Thought follows across the space. It is a ship. Its sides are long, and black, and low; but high in front rises the prow, fashioned into the semblance of a gigantic golden dragon, against whose gleaming breast the divided waters angrily flash and gurgle. Along the top sides of the deck are hung a row of shining shields, in alternate breadths of red and white, like the variegated scales of a sea-monster, whilst its gilded tail curls aft over the head of the steersman. From either flank projects a bank of some thirty oars, that look, as they smite the ocean with even beat, like the legs on which the reptile crawls over its surface. One stately mast of pine serves to carry a square sail made of cloth, brilliant with stripes of red, white, and blue.
And who are they who navigate this strange, barbaric vessel?–why leave they the sheltering fiords of their beloved Norway? They are the noblest hearts of that noble land–freemen, who value freedom,–who have abandoned all rather than call Harald master, and now seek a new home even among the desolate crags of Iceland, rather than submit to the tyranny of a usurper.
“Rorb–ober Gud! wenn nur bie Geelen gluben!”
Another picture, and a sadder story; but the scene is now a wide dun moor, on the slope of a seaward hill; the autumn evening is closing in, but a shadow darker than that of evening broods over the desolate plain,–the shadow of DEATH. Groups of armed men, with stern sorrow in their looks, are standing round a rude couch, hastily formed of fir branches. An old man lies there–dying. His ear is dulled even to the shout of victory; the mists of an endless night are gathering in his eyes; but there is passion yet in the quivering lip, and triumph on the high-resolved brow; and the gesture of his hand has kingly power still. Let me tell his saga, like the bards of that old time.
HACON’S LAST BATTLE.
I.
All was over: day was ending
As the foeman turned and fled.
Gloomy red
Glowed the angry sun descending;
While round Hacon’s dying bed,
Tears and songs of triumph blending, Told how fast the conqueror bled
II.
“Raise me,” said the King. We raised him– Not to ease his desperate pain;
That were vain!
“Strong our foe was–but we faced him Show me that red field again.”
Then, with reverent hands, we placed him High above the bloody plain.
III.
Silent gazed he; mute we waited,
Kneeling round-a faithful few,
Staunch and true,–
Whilst above, with thunder freighted, Wild the boisterous north wind blew,
And the carrion-bird, unsated,
On slant wing around us flew.
IV.
Sudden, on our startled hearing,
Came the low-breathed, stern command– “Lo! ye stand?
Linger not, the night is nearing; Bear me downwards to the strand,
Where my ships are idly steering
Off and on, in sight of land.”
V.
Every whispered word obeying,
Swift we bore him down the steep, O’er the deep,
Up the tall ship’s side, low swaying To the storm-wind’s powerful sweep,
And–his dead companions laying
Round him,–we had time to weep.
VI.
But the King said–“Peace! bring hither Spoil and weapons–battle-strown,
Make no moan;
Leave me and my dead together,
Light my torch, and then–begone.” But we murmured, each to other,
“Can we leave him thus alone?”
VII.
Angrily the King replieth;
Flash the awful eyes again,
With disdain–
“Call him not alone who lieth
Low amidst such noble slain;
Call him not alone who dieth
Side by side with gallant men.”
VIII.
Slowly, sadly, we departed:
Reached again that desolate shore, Nevermore
Trod by him, the brave true-hearted– Dying in that dark ship’s core!
Sadder keel from land ne’er parted, Nobler freight none ever bore!
IX.
There we lingered, seaward gazing,
Watching o’er that living tomb,
Through the gloom–
Gloom! which awful light is chasing– Blood-red flames the surge illume!
Lo! King Hacon’s ship is blazing; ‘Tis the hero’s self-sought doom.
X.
Right before the wild wind driving, Madly plunging–stung by fire–
No help nigh her–
Lo! the ship has ceased her striving! Mount the red flames higher–higher!
Till–on ocean’s verge arriving,
Sudden sinks the Viking’s pyre–
Hacon’s gone!
Let me call one more heroic phantom from Norway’s romantic past.
A kingly presence, stately and tall; his shield held high above his head–a broken sword in his right hand. Olaf Tryggvesson! Founder of Nidaros;–that cold Northern Sea has rolled for many centuries above your noble head, and yet not chilled the battle heat upon your brow, nor staunched the blood that trickles down your iron glove, from hidden, untold wounds, which the tender hand of Thyri shall never heal!
To such ardent souls it is indeed given “to live for ever” (the for ever of this world); for is it not “Life” to keep a hold on OUR affections, when their own passions are at rest,–to influence our actions (however indirectly)–when action is at an end for them? Who shall say how much of modern heroism may owe its laurels to that first throb of fiery sympathy which young hearts feel at the relation of deeds such as Olaf Tryggvesson’s?
The forms of those old Greeks and Romans whom we are taught to reverence, may project taller shadows on the world’s stage; but though the scene be narrow here, and light be wanting, the interest is not less intense, nor are the passions less awful that inspired these ruder dramas.
There is an individuality in the Icelandic historian’s description of King Olaf that wins one’s interest–at first as in an acquaintance–and rivets it at last as in a personal friend. The old Chronicle lingers with such loving minuteness over his attaching qualities, his social, generous nature, his gaiety and “frolicsomeness;” even his finical taste in dress, and his evident proneness to fall too hastily in love, have a value in the portrait, as contrasting with the gloomy colours in which the story sinks at last. The warm, impulsive spirit speaks in every action of his life, from the hour when–a young child, in exile–he strikes his axe into the skull of his foster-father’s murderer, to the last grand scene near Svalderoe. You trace it in his absorbing grief for the death of Geyra, the wife of his youth; the saga says, “he had no pleasure in Vinland after it,” and then naively observes, “he therefore provided himself with war-ships, and went a-plundering,” one of his first achievements being to go and pull down London Bridge. This peculiar kind of “distraction” (as the French call it) seems to have had the desired effect, as is evident in the romantic incident of his second marriage, when the Irish Princess Gyda chooses him–apparently an obscure stranger–to be her husband, out of a hundred wealthy and well-born aspirants to her hand. But neither Gyda’s love, nor the rude splendours of her father’s court, can make Olaf forgetful of his claims upon the throne of Norway–the inheritance of his father; and when that object of his just ambition is attained, and he is proclaimed King by general election of the Bonders, as his ancestor Harald Haarfager had been, his character deepens in earnestness as the sphere of his duties is enlarged. All the energies of his ardent nature are put forth in the endeavour to convert his subjects to the true Faith. As he himself expresses it, “he would bring it to this,–that all Norway should be Christian or die!” In the same spirit he meets his heretic and rebellious subjects at the Thing of Lade, and boldly replies, when they require him to sacrifice to the false gods, “If I turn with you to offer sacrifice, then shall it be the greatest sacrifice that can be made; I will not offer slaves, nor malefactors to your gods,–I will sacrifice men;–and they shall be the noblest men among you!” It was soon after this that he despatched the exemplary Thangbrand to Iceland.
With a front not less determined does he face his country’s foes. The king of Sweden, and Svend “of the forked beard,” king of Denmark, have combined against him. With them is joined the Norse jarl, Eric, the son of Hacon. Olaf Tryggvesson is sailing homewards with a fleet of seventy ships,–himself commanding the famous “Long Serpent,” the largest ship built in Norway. His enemies are lying in wait for him behind the islands.
Nothing can be more dramatic than the description of the sailing of this gallant fleet–(piloted by the treacherous Earl Sigwald)–within sight of the ambushed Danes and Swedes, who watch from their hiding-place the beautiful procession of hostile vessels, mistaking each in turn for the “Long Serpent,” and as often undeceived by a new and yet more stately apparition. She appears at length, her dragon prow glittering in the sunshine, all canvas spread, her