THE FORTUNES OF THE WHALEBOAT PARTY. 833 



tion a serious one, and the villagers put the strangers 

 upon an allowance. Moreover, the diet to which they 

 were forced, and the lack of any anti-scorbutic, might 

 lead to an outbreak of scurvy, as the party was in a 

 most crippled condition. " At this time," says Mr. 

 Melville, k - an exile had been put to live with us, mak- 

 ing twelve men in our hut. We had had no bread for 

 about forty days ; we had no anti-scorbutics of any 

 kind, no salt to use with our food, and the geese which 

 we were supplied with were in a very bad state of de- 

 cay, so much so that when we would hang them up 

 their intestines would drop out. I told the men that 

 they must be as cheerful as they could ; make a point 

 of burning plenty of wood ; keep themselves as warm 

 as they could ; any way get plenty of wood so as to ex- 

 ercise all hands. I was very anxious at this time, owing 

 to our short supply of provisions, and the kind we were 

 living on, fearing that the decayed geese would cause 

 typhoid fever, from the fact that we had no anti-scor- 

 bntics ; in case we stayed there, I felt there was great 

 probability of the whole party dying of scurvy." 



They had amongst them prepared documents for 

 transmission to the nearest authority. Mr. Melville 

 prepared a telegram to the Secretary of the Navy and 

 to the American Minister at St. Petersburg ; letters 

 were also written in English, French, German, and 

 Swedish ; pictures of the ship in the ice, and of the 

 American flag, and some postage stamps were added, 

 and all the papers sewed in an oilskin bag and com- 

 mitted to the Starosti of the village, who undertook to 

 send them forward. 



One by one the men began to improve in their con- 

 dition, and Mr. Melville was exceedingly anxious to get 

 the party moved to Bulun, and about the 10th of Oc- 

 53 



