The Land of Desolation: Being a Personal Narrative of Observation and Adventure in Greenland

At length there came the cry of “Bears! bears!” which had been so long eagerly desired. With the first alarm the people swarmed up from below, and the deck was alive in an insta...

When we came to cross the Arctic Circle, instead of having the midnight sun, we had no sun at all; for one of those villainous fogs, so prevalent during the summer in the Arctic...

We returned to Godhavn on the 10th of September, and for a week thereafter travelled about the Island of Disco as we found opportunity and inclination. To the geologist, as prev...

We named our new harbor “Panther Bay,” and, while resting there until another day comes to invite us to new work and new adventures, let us, more critically than we have had opp...

The morning came fresh and sparkling as the eyes of our fair oarswomen, who, singing to the music of their splashing oars, came stealing over the still waters, bearing the good...

This “Land of Desolation,” to which we had come, is the Greenland of history and of the present time. All the southern part of it, as far up as the sixty-first degree of latitud...

The condition of the Esquimaux has not only improved spiritually since they arrived in Greenland, but they have improved in their temporal affairs as well. Formerly they led a p...

The night did not prove promising for the safety of the _Panther_. At intervals alarming sounds proceeded from the glacier, and now and then a quick sharp crack, followed by a h...

“A rocky islet in the sea, A lonely harbor on its lee, The roaring surf around! Chill are the winds and cold the sky, Dead in the dells the flowers lie, The snow is on the ground!

The final destruction of the Northmen in Greenland is a matter of melancholy interest. Exactly when it came about we can not know. We have seen that the bishop’s see was abandon...

Monday was occupied by our party in a very agreeable and profitable manner—by the photographers especially, who, early in the day, took possession of one of the governor’s rooms...

While the chain is clicking in the hawse-hole, let us take a quiet view of the situation. There is no need, however, to describe with much minuteness the “Melville Bay pack” whi...

I had set my heart upon making a thorough survey of the fiord of Aukpadlartok. As recorded in a previous chapter, I had previously been there and penetrated to within five miles...

When the revellers from the Julianashaab ball appeared after breakfast we were well away at sea. Most of them had either forgotten or had never been aware of the intention of th...

Upernavik District extends from about latitude 70° to latitude 74°, and enjoys the pre-eminent distinction of being the most northern spot of all the earth where civilized indus...

The view of the southern shore of Disco Island as we crossed the bay was truly magnificent. The gnarled shore, full of clefts and caverns, was white with the foam of the sea; th...

As this was to be our last tie-up in Melville Bay, and as every body was well satisfied that Melville Bay had been thoroughly “done,” there was now some impatience to hear the o...

We have seen that the great sea of ice which covers Greenland, and makes it the Land of Desolation that it is, is formed from snow-flakes. That formation takes place only in cer...

During the absence of the captain and myself from the vessel the artists had not been idle. They had landed near the glacier, and with brush and camera had begun their work. The...

On our way to Upernavik we wheeled into the fiord of Aukpadlartok, to which I have hitherto made allusion, and I verily believe there never was such another wilderness of desola...

Under ordinary circumstances, there can be no more comfortable situation on board a ship than that of passenger. You are not expected to know any thing, and, if wise, you will n...

I was much disappointed that we could not prolong our stay in the vicinity of the Devil’s Thumb. But our situation there was indeed a hazardous one. The ice was crowding about u...

The fiord on the border of which stands the colony of Julianashaab is now known as the fiord of Igalliko, meaning, “the fiord of the deserted homes:” the deserted homes being th...

These Northmen were certainly a very wonderful people, and they did very wonderful things; but of all their enterprises the most singular would seem to be their coming to Greenl...

Lief, the son of Eric, was a man of restless disposition. Not content with Greenland, he had visited Europe, and had there studied in the very practical school which the Northme...

We were not long now in reaching our destination, which was the foot of the extensive green slope on the north side of the fiord. Above this slope, and from a quarter to half a...

Our lunch was spread under the ample shelter of a tent, which screened us from the rays of the sun, and formed a no bad substitute for the protecting trees under which our picni...

Eric named his first settlement Brattahlid. The next he called Gardar; another, the Norse name of which has been lost, now bears the Esquimaux name of Krakortok, which means, “t...

Having our pilot, Peter Motzfeldt, on board, we were obliged to put into Kraksimeut. After passing a few hours there, we made a direct course for the open sea. Motzfeldt, in the...

Two oomiaks loaded with women, and half a dozen men in kayaks, had followed us up from Kraksimeut; and they pitched their camp upon the shore as near our vessel as they could. A...

Imagine it! The fiord is two miles wide; the valley beyond is of corresponding width, and the glacier fills it perfectly. How thick it is, of course, can not be told, but hundre...

In the previous chapters we have traced the history of the Norman-Greenlanders from their first appearance to their decay. We have witnessed their early struggles, have observed...

I can imagine no more grand and imposing spectacle than the birth of an iceberg; and we have now, I think, gone far enough in the examination of glaciers and their movements to...

I trust that I have made plain, even to the least scientific of my readers, the nature of the glacier which we are visiting, as well as the general principles of glacier formati...

On the morning after we had anchored in Panther Bay I went ashore to stake off a base-line, preliminary to a survey of the glacier and surrounding region, in which operation I w...

Julianashaab is not at any time a particularly lively place, but there is sufficient activity during six days of the week to make the silence of the seventh very marked. Solemnl...

As we have seen, the glacier does not accommodate itself to the bed in which it rests very readily. The substance, though possessing a sort of ductility, is not sufficiently pla...

On a gloomy night in the month of July, 1585, the ship _Sunshine_, of fifty tons, “fitted out,” as the old chronicles inform us, “by divers opulent merchants of London, for the...

PAGE The “Panther” among the Icebergs _Frontispiece_. View of Julianashaab 27 The Oomiak and Crew 46 View of the Old Norse Ruins 63 Ground-plan of Ruins 67 Concordia at the Picn...