THE OSPREY. 



HUNTING THE ELEPHANT OF THE NORTH. 



JT was a dirty afternoon, vicious snow-squalls 

 chasing each other in rapid succession out 

 of the Gulf and down the Sound, giving on'y 

 occasional glimpses of the sharp ridge of Bastion 

 Point, the eastern end of Herbert Island, .'\bout 

 two miles and a half east of Cape Cleveland the 

 bluffs end against the regular convex of a 



BY ROBERT E. PE.\RY. 



Editor's Note.— The Osprey has arranged with Lieutenant Peary and his publishers, the Frederick 

 A. Stokes Company, for the publication of this^iirticle and photographs descriptive ot a walrus hunt undertaken 

 bv the writer during the e.^pedition " Northward Over the Great Ice " in 1893-4.— Photographs copyrighted, 1898, by 

 the Frederick A. btokes Co. 



up above high-water mark. A supper of veni- 

 son, hardtack, and cocoa took the edge ofif the 

 day s work, and everyone had crawled in under 

 the tarpaulins and sails thrown over the boats, 

 as falling snow aided the darkness to obliterate 

 tne desolate world. 



The next morning we were up and had eaten 

 our breakfast long before 

 the late morning light was 

 sufficient to enable us to 

 start. Everything except 

 oars, rifles, harpoons, and 

 lines was left at the camp. 

 The Eskimos were too slow 

 and cautious with the walrus 

 to suit me. and I had made 

 up my mind to handle a har- 

 poon myself, and arranged 

 my boat accordingly, with. I 

 must confess, some degree of 

 confidence, as I had already 

 tried my skill at throwing the 

 harpoon with the natives, 

 and fouiul that I had nothing 

 to be ashamed of. either as 

 rt".Z.Tr'N rrirvj^r or nrriirrir\-. 

 '• Tearing through the water." 



boulder delta, formed by 

 an ice cap torrent, which 

 for a month or two in 

 early summer roars down 

 a deep ravine with a bur- 

 den of stones and gravel. 

 Just in the angle when- 

 bluffs and delta meet there 

 are a few paces of 5an<ly 

 beach, across which a 

 boat may be drawn up un 

 til her stem is against thi 

 base of the bluff, and sin 

 is sheltered from the drift- 

 ing ice. the rabid wavt- 

 and the furious east wind- 

 by the breakwater of tlii 

 delta. Niches in the roc!. 

 offer facilities for fire-, 

 and from a perch well U]> 

 the blufTs the eye com- 

 mands the entire Sound 

 eastward till it merge- 

 into Inglefield Gulf, west 

 ward until it is lost in thi 

 expanse of Smith Sound, 

 and southward to tlu 

 shore of Herbert Island 

 With the aid of a good 

 .glass, a walrus, or an 

 "oogsook." can be picked 

 out upon the floating ice 

 anywhere within those 



limits. I had camped in this very spot in 

 September three years before, after my memo- 

 rable first encounter with the walrus, and here, 

 late at night, I now directed the course of luy 

 fleet. It was long after dark when we beached 

 the whale-boats and kayaks, and dragged them 



WALRUS HEAD. 



On the small, triangular decking at the bow 

 was coiled my long, stout walrus line, one end 

 fastened to the boat-ring, the other, with its steel- 

 edged ivory barb, attached to the harpoon shaft, 

 which lav across the gunwales against two small 

 pins. Five or six coils of the line were detached 



