Chapter 12

Already the surface of the ice, which, with several warm days, had become more or less porous and rotten, was covered with deep slush. The western sky was now blackened by heavy wind clouds, and with scarce any warning the breeze developed into a gale. Forcing his dogs forward at their best pace, while he ran by the side of the komatik, he soon put another mile behind him. Before him the shore loomed up, and did not seem far away. But every minute counted. It was evident the ice could not stand the strain of the wind much longer.

Presently one of Grenfell's feet went through where slush covered an opening crack. He shouted at the dogs, but, buffeted by wind and floundering through slush, they could travel no faster though they made every effort to do so, for they, no less perhaps than their master, realized the danger that threatened them.

Then, suddenly, the ice went asunder, not in large pans as it would have done earlier in the winter when it was stout and hard, but in a mass of small pieces, with only now and again a small pan.

Grenfell and the dogs found themselves floundering in a sea of slush ice that would not bear their weight. The faithful dogs had done their best, but their best had not been good enough. With super-human effort Grenfell managed to cut their traces and set them free from the komatik, which was pulling them down. Even now, with his own life in the gravest peril, he thought of them.

When the dogs were freed, Grenfell succeeded in clambering upon a small ice pan that was scarce large enough to bear his weight, and for the moment was safe. But the poor dogs, much more frightened than their master, and looking to him for protection, climbed upon the pan with him, and with this added weight it sank from under him.

Swimming in the ice-clogged water must have been well nigh impossible. The shock of the ice-cold water itself, even had there been no ice, was enough to paralyze a man. But Grenfell, accustomed to cold, and with nerves of iron as a result of keeping his body always in the pink of physical condition, succeeded finally in reaching a pan that would support both himself and the dogs. The animals followed him and took refuge at his feet.

Standing upon the pan, with the dogs huddled about him, he scanned the naked shores, but no man or sign of human life was to be seen. How long his own pan would hold together was a question, for the broken ice, grinding against it, would steadily eat it away.

There was a steady drift of the ice toward the open sea. The wind was bitterly cold. There was nothing to eat for himself and nothing to feed the dogs, for the loaded komatik had long since disappeared beneath the surface of the sea.

Exposed to the frigid wind, wet to the skin, and with no other protection than the clothes upon his back, it seemed inevitable that the cold would presently benumb him and that he would perish from it even though his pan withstood the wearing effects of the water. The pan was too small to admit of sufficient exercise to keep up the circulation of blood, and though he slapped his arms around his shoulders and stamped his feet, a deadening numbness was crawling over him as the sun began to sink in the west and cold increased.

Though, in the end he might drown, Grenfell determined to live as long as he could. Perhaps this was a test of courage that God had given him! It is a man's duty, whatever befalls him, to fight for life to the last ditch, and live as long as he can. Most men, placed as Grenfell was placed, would have sunk down in despair, and said: "It's all over! I've done the best I could!" And there they would have waited for death to find them. When a man is driven to the wall, as Grenfell was, it is easier to die than live. When God brings a man face to face with death, He robs death of all its terrors, and when that time comes it is no harder for a man who has lived right with God to die than it is for him to lie down at night and sleep. But Grenfell was never a quitter. He was going to fight it out now with the elements as best he could with what he had at hand.

These northern dogs, when driven to desperation by hunger, will turn upon their best friend and master, and here was another danger. If he and the dogs survived the night and another day, what would the dogs do? Then it would be, as Grenfell knew full well, his life or theirs.

The dogs wore good warm coats of fur, and if he had a coat made of dog skins it would keep him warm enough to protect his life, at least, from the cold. Now the animals were docile enough. Clustered about his feet, they were looking up into his face expectantly and confidently. He loved them as a good man always loves the beasts that serve him. They had hauled him over many a weary mile of snow and ice, and had been his companions and shared with him the hardships of many a winter's storm.

But it was his life or theirs. If he were to survive the night, some of the dogs must be sacrificed. In all probability he and they would be drowned anyway before another night fell upon the world.

There was no time to be lost in vain regrets and indecision. Grenfell drew his sheath knife, and as hard as we know it was for him, slaughtered three of the animals. This done, he removed their pelts, and wrapping the skins about him, huddled down among the living dogs for a night of long, tedious hours of waiting and uncertainty, until another day should break.

That must have been a period of terrible suffering for Grenfell, but he had a stout heart and he survived it. He has said that the dog skins saved his life, and without them he certainly would have perished.

The ice pan still held together, and with a new day came fresh hope of the possibility of rescue. The coast was still well in sight, and there was a chance that a change of wind might drive the pan toward it on an incoming tide. At this season, too, the men of the coast were out scanning the sea for "signs" of seals, and some of them might see him.

This thought suggested that if he could erect a signal on a pole, it would attract attention more readily. He had no pole, and he thought at first no means of raising the signal, which was, indeed, necessary, for at that distance from shore only a moving signal would be likely to attract the attention of even the keenly observant fishermen.

Then his eyes fell upon the carcasses of the three dogs with their stiff legs sticking up. He drew his sheath knife and went at them immediately. In a little while he had severed the legs from the bodies and stripped the flesh from the bones. Now with pieces of dog harness he lashed the legs together, and presently had a serviceable pole, but one which must have been far from straight.

Elated with the result of his experiment, he hastily stripped the shirt from his back, fastened it to one end of his staff, and raising it over his head began moving it back and forth.

It was an ingenious idea to make a flagstaff from the bones of dogs' legs. Hardly one man in a thousand would have thought of it. It was an exemplification of Grenfell's resourcefulness, and in the end it saved his life.

As he had hoped, men were out upon the rocky bluffs scanning the sea for seals. The keen eyes of one of them discovered, far away, something dark and unusual. The men of this land never take anything for granted. It is a part of the training of the woodsman and seaman to identify any unusual movement or object, or to trace any unusual sound, before he is satisfied to let it pass unheeded. Centering his attention upon the distant object the man distinguished a movement back and forth. Nothing but a man could make such a movement he knew, and he also knew that any man out there was in grave danger. He called some other fishermen, manned a boat and Dr. Grenfell and his surviving dogs were rescued.

XXI

WRECKED AND ADRIFT

It happened that it was necessary for Dr. Grenfell to go to New York one spring three or four years ago. Men interested in raising funds to support the Labrador and Newfoundland hospitals were to hold a meeting, and it was essential that he attend the meeting and tell them of the work on the coast, and what he needed to carry it on.

This meeting was to have been held in May, and to reach New York in season to attend it Dr. Grenfell decided to leave St. Anthony Hospital, where he then was, toward the end of April, for in any case traveling would be slow.

It was his plan to travel northward, by dog team, to the Straits of Belle Isle, thence westward along the shores, and finally southward, down the western coast of Newfoundland, to Port Aux Basque, from which point a steamer would carry him over to North Sydney, in Nova Scotia. There he could get a train and direct railway connections to New York. There is an excellent, and ordinarily, at this season, an expeditious route for dog travel down the western coast of Newfoundland, and Grenfell anticipated no difficulties.

Just as he was ready to start a blizzard set in with a northeast gale, and smash! went the ice. This put an end to dog travel. There was but one alternative, and that was by boat. Traveling along the coast in a small boat is pretty exciting and sometimes perilous when you have to navigate the boat through narrow lanes of water, with land ice on one side and the big Arctic ice pack on the other, and a shift of wind is likely to send the pack driving in upon you before you can get out of the way. And if the ice pack catches you, that's the end of it, for your boat will be ground up like a grain of wheat between mill stones, and there you are, stranded upon the ice, and as like as not cut off from land, too.

But there was no other way to get to that meeting in New York, and Grenfell was determined to get there. And so, when the blizzard had passed he got out a small motor boat, and made ready for the journey. If he could reach a point several days' journey by boat to the southward, he could leave the boat and travel one hundred miles on foot overland to the railroad.

This hike of one hundred miles, with provisions and equipment on his back, was a tremendous journey in itself. It would not be on a beaten road, but through an unpopulated wilderness still lying deep under winter snows. To Grenfell, however, it would be but an incident in his active life. He was accustomed to following a dog team, and that hardens a man for nearly any physical effort. It requires that a man keep at a trot the livelong day, and it demands a good heart and good lungs and staying powers and plenty of grit, and Grenfell was well equipped with all of these.

The menacing Arctic ice pack lay a mile or so seaward when Grenfell and one companion turned their backs on St. Anthony, and the motor boat chugged southward, out of the harbor and along the coast. For a time all went well, and then an easterly wind sprang up and there followed a touch-and-go game between Dr. Grenfell and the ice.

In an attempt to dodge the ice the boat struck upon rocks. This caused some damage to her bottom, but not sufficient to incapacitate her, as it was found the hole could be plugged. The weather turned bitterly cold, and the circulating pipes of the motor froze and burst. This was a more serious accident, but it was temporarily repaired while Grenfell bivouaced ashore, sleeping at night under the stars with a bed of juniper boughs for a mattress and an open fire to keep him warm.

Ice now blocked the way to the southward, though open leads of water to the northward offered opportunity to retreat, and, with the motor boat in a crippled condition, it was decided to return to St. Anthony and make an attempt, with fresh equipment, to try a route through the Straits of Belle Isle.

They were still some miles from St. Anthony when they found it necessary to abandon the motor boat in one of the small harbor settlements. Leaving it in charge of the people, Grenfell borrowed a small rowboat. Rowing the small boat through open lanes and hauling it over obstructing ice pans they made slow progress and the month of May was nearing its close when one day the pack suddenly drove in upon them.

They were fairly caught. Ice surrounded them on every side. The boat was in imminent danger of being crushed before they realized their danger. Grenfell and his companion sprang from the boat to a pan, and seizing the prow of the boat hauled upon it with the energy of desperation. They succeeded in raising the prow upon the ice, but they were too late. The edge of the ice was high and the pans were moving rapidly, and to their chagrin they heard a smashing and splintering of wood, and the next instant were aware that the stern of the boat had been completely bitten off and that they were adrift on an ice pan, cut off from the land by open water.

An inspection of the boat proved that it was wrecked beyond repair. All of the after part had been cut off and ground to pulp between the ice pans. In the distance, to the westward, rose the coast, a grim outline of rocky bluffs. Between them and the shore the sea was dotted with pans and pieces of ice, separated by canals of black water. The men looked at each other in consternation as they realized that they had no means of reaching land and safety, and that a few hours might find them far out on the Atlantic.

In the hope of attracting attention, Dr. Grenfell and William Taylor, his companion, fired their guns at regular intervals. Expectantly they waited, but there was no answering signal from shore and no sign of life anywhere within their vision.

For a long while they waited and watched and signalled. With a turn in the tide it became evident, finally, that the pan on which they were marooned was drifting slowly seaward. If this continued they would soon be out of sight of land, and then all hope of rescue would vanish.

"I'll tell you what I'll do, now," suggested Taylor. "I'll copy toward shore. I'll try to get close enough for some one to see me."

To "copy" is to jump from one pan or piece of ice to another. The gaps of water separating them are sometimes wide, and a man must be a good jumper who lands. Some of the pieces of ice are quite too small to bear a man's weight, and he must leap instantly to the next or he will sink with the ice. It is perilous work at best, and much too dangerous for any one to attempt without much practice and experience.

They had a boat hook with them, and taking it to assist in the long leaps, Taylor started shore-ward. Dr. Grenfell watched him anxiously as he sprang from pan to pan making a zigzag course toward shore, now and again taking hair-raising risks, sometimes resting for a moment on a substantial pan while he looked ahead to select his route, then running, and using the boat hook as a vaulting pole, spanning a wide chasm. Then, suddenly, Dr. Grenfell saw him totter, throw up his hands and disappear beneath the surface of the water. In a hazardous leap he had missed his footing, or a small cake of ice had turned under his weight.

XXII

SAVING A LIFE

It was a terrible moment for Grenfell when he saw his friend disappear beneath the icy waves. Would the cold so paralyze him as to render him helpless? Would he be caught under an ice pan? A hundred such thoughts flashed through Grenfell's mind as he stood, impotent to help because of the distance between them. Then to his great joy he saw Taylor rise to the surface and scramble out upon a pan in safety.

The ice was too far separated now for Taylor either to advance or retreat, and the pan upon which he had taken refuge began a rapid drift seaward. He had made a valiant effort, but the attempt had failed.

Grenfell resumed firing his gun, still hoping that some one might hear it and come to their rescue. Time passed and Taylor drifted abreast of Grenfell and finally drifted past him. Then, in the far distance, Grenfell glimpsed the flash of an oar. The flash was repeated with rhythmic regularity. The outlines of a boat came into view. The men shouted the good news to each other. Help was coming!

The signals had been heard, and in due time, and with much thankfulness, Dr. Grenfell and William Taylor were safely in the boat and on their way to St. Anthony.

Not long after his return to St. Anthony, the ice drifted eastward and an open strip of sea appeared leading northward toward the Straits of Belle Isle. The ice was now a full mile off shore, it was the beginning of June, and Dr. Grenfell, expecting that at this late season the Straits would be open for navigation, had the _Strathcona_ made ready for sea at once, and with high hopes, stowed the anchor and steamed northward. It was his plan to have the vessel carry him westward through the Straits and land him at some port on the west coast of Newfoundland where he could take passage on the regular mail boat, which he had been advised had begun its summer service. Thence he could continue his trip to New York, where the important meeting had been adjourned several times in expectation of his coming.

But again he was doomed to disappointment. The Straits were found to be packed from shore to shore with heavy floe ice and clogged with icebergs. Before the _Strathcona_ could make her escape she was surrounded by ice and frozen tight and fast into the floe.

Grenfell was determined to reach New York and attend that meeting. It was supremely important that he do so. Now there was but one way to reach the mail boat, and that was to walk. The distance to the nearest port of call was ninety miles.

Making up a pack of food, cooking utensils, bedding and a suit of clothes that would permit him to present a civilized and respectable appearance when he reached New York, he made ready for the long overland journey. Shouldering his big pack, he bade goodbye to Mrs. Grenfell, who was with him on the _Strathcona_, and to the crew, and set out over the ice pack to the land.

Three days later Dr. Grenfell reached the harbor where he was to board the mail boat upon her arrival. He was wearied and stiff in his joints after the hard overland hike with a heavy pack on his back, and looking forward to rest and a good meal, he went directly to the home of a mission clergyman living in the little village.

His welcome was hearty, as a welcome always is on this coast. The clergyman showered him with kindnesses. A pot of steaming tea and an appetizing meal was on the table in a jiffy. It was luxury after the long days on the trail and Grenfell sat down with anticipation of keen enjoyment.

At the moment that Grenfell seated himself the door opened unceremoniously, and an excited fisherman burst into the room with the exclamation:

"For God's sake, some one come! Come and save my brother's life! He's bleeding to death!"

Dr. Grenfell learned in a few hurried inquiries that the man's brother had accidentally shot his leg nearly off an hour before and was already in a comatose condition from loss of blood. The family lived five miles distant, and the only way to reach the cabin where the wounded man lay was on foot.

Grenfell forgot all about the steaming tea, the good meal and rest. A moment's delay might cost the man his life. Grenfell ran. Over that five miles of broken country he ran as he had never run before, with the half-frenzied fisherman leading the way.

The wounded man was a young fellow of twenty. Dr. Grenfell knew him well. He was a hero of the world war. He had volunteered when a mere boy, served bravely through four years of the terrible conflict and though he had taken part in many of the great battles he had lived to return to his home and his fishing.

"I never knew a better cure for stiffness than a splendid chance for serving," said Grenfell in referring to that run from the missionary's home to the fisherman's cottage. All his stiff joints and weary muscles were forgotten as he ran.

When Dr. Grenfell entered the room where the man lay, he found the young fisherman soaked with blood and sea water, lying stretched upon a hard table. The remnant of his shattered leg rested upon a feather pillow and was strung up to the ceiling in an effort to stop the flow of blood. He was moaning, but was practically unconscious, and barely alive.

The room was crowded to suffocation with weeping relatives and sympathetic neighbors. Dr. Grenfell cleared it at once. The place was small and the light poor and a difficult place in which to treat so critical a case or to operate successfully. He had no surgical instruments or medicines, and even for him, accustomed as he was to work under handicaps and difficulties, a serious problem confronted him.

The man was so far gone that an operation seemed hopeless, but nevertheless it was worth trying. Grenfell sent messengers far and near for reserve supplies that he had left at various points to be drawn upon in cases of emergency, and in a little while had at his command some opiates, a small amount of ether, some silk for ligatures, some crude substitutes for instruments, and the supply of communal wine from the missionary's little church, five miles away.

While these things had been gathered in, the flow of blood had been abated by the use of a tourniquet. There was scarcely enough ether to be of use, but with the assistance of two men Dr. Grenfell applied it and operated.

One of the assistants fainted, but the other stuck faithfully to his post, and with a cool head and steady hand did Dr. Grenfell's bidding. The operation was performed successfully, and the young soldier's life was saved through Dr. Grenfell's skillful treatment. Today this fisherman has but one leg, but he is well and happy and a useful man in the world.

Fate takes a hand in our lives sometimes, and plays strange pranks with us. In New York a group of gentlemen were impatiently awaiting the arrival of Dr. Grenfell, while he, in an isolated cottage on the rugged coast of Northern Newfoundland was saving a fisherman's life, and in the importance and joy of this service had perhaps for the time quite forgotten the gentlemen and the meeting and even New York.

Perhaps Providence had a hand in it all. If the water lanes had not closed, and the motor boat had not been damaged, and Dr. Grenfell and William Taylor had not been sent adrift on the ice, and no obstacles had stood in the way of Dr. Grenfell's journey to New York, and the _Strathcona_ had not been frozen into the ice pack, in all probability this brave young soldier and fisherman would have died. There is no doubt that _he_ believes God set the stage to send Dr. Grenfell on that ninety-mile hike.

XXIII

REINDEER AND OTHER THINGS

Hunting in a northern wilderness is never to be depended upon. Sometimes game is plentiful, and sometimes it is scarcely to be had at all. This is the case both with fur bearing animals and food game. So it is in Labrador. When I have been in that country I have depended upon my gun to get my living, just as the Indians do. One year I all but starved to death, because caribou and other game was scarce. Other years I have lived in plenty, with a caribou to shoot whenever I needed meat.

In Labrador the Eskimos and liveyeres rely upon the seals to supply them with the greater part of their dog feed, supplemented by fish, cod heads and nearly any offal. The Eskimos eat seal meat, too, with a fine relish, both cooked and raw, and when the seals are not too old their meat, properly cooked, is very good eating indeed for anybody.

The Indians rely on the caribou, or wild reindeer, to furnish their chief food supply, and to a large extent the caribou is also the chief meat animal of the liveyeres.