146 HUNTING IN THE ARCTIC 



''Abler's" sides all night long and closed in behind us. 

 A moderate southeast wind sprang up and the glass 

 began to fall. It looked like a blow for several days. 

 We were in the ice no one could tell how far. It was 

 full time to think of getting out, for we were just a trifle 

 east of Irkaipy (Cape North), or three hundred miles 

 west of Bermg Strait, with a head wind, the time of 

 freezing for winter not many days off, and not two 

 weeks' engine fuel aboard. Our provisions and coal were 

 running low. The only preparation we could boast 

 against the dread Arctic winter was a deck-load of walrus 

 meat. An ever-present anxiety was the danger of ice 

 coming against the rudder or propeller, and many times 

 in the night the watch had to fend off threatening ice 

 cakes, which swung as they drifted past us. Had one of 

 these been set against us, or had we backed into any in 

 our maneuvering, a slight touch of their mighty force 

 would have carried away our rudder and propeller. If 

 the ice packed together so thickly that we could not 

 force it aside to get out, we were caught. Many a small 

 piece passed underneath the vessel, as she went through 

 the fields, and clanged ominously among the whirling 

 propeller blades. Any of these might break or loosen 

 the screw. Should we be frozen in the pack the north- 

 westerly drift could take us out to the unknown and 

 unreachable, with a fair chance of breaking up the ship 

 on the way. Even if we did not drift far and tried to 

 winter through, the next break-ups might not release the 

 ice so far as it had done this season. There were thus 

 several kinds of disasters which might easily happen, 

 each nearly as fatal as another. 



