526 



SAMOYEDE DOGS HARNESSED TO ANTARCTIC SLEDGE. 

 THE NEAR MIDDLE DOG IS MRS. RINGER'S OUSSA. 



CHAPTER LX. 

 ARCTIC AND OTHER DRAUGHT DOGS. 



" Unmeet we should do 



As the doings of wolves are, 

 Raising wrongs 'gainst each other 

 As the dogs of the Norns, 

 The greedy ones nourished 

 In waste steads of the earth." 



LAY OF HAMDIR. 



THE uncivilised Polar tribes, both those 

 who inhabited the Siberian tundras, 

 and the Eskimos of America and 

 Greenland, had discovered long before Arctic 

 expeditions had begun, , a safe and easy 

 means of traversing the barren, trackless 

 regions of the frozen North : namely the 

 sledge drawn by dogs They were a semi- 

 nomadic people, moving their habitations 

 at certain seasons of the year in accordance 

 with the varying facilities for procuring 

 food, and the need for a convenient method 

 of locomotion by land and the absence of 

 any other animal fitted for the work of 

 hauling heavy burdens very naturally 

 caused them to enlist the services of the dog. 

 Nor could a more adaptable animal have 

 been chosen for travelling over frozen ground 

 and icebound seas, had these inhabitants of 

 the frigid zone been at liberty to select from 

 the fauna of the whole earth. Had the 

 horse been possible, or the reindeer easily 

 available, the necessity of adding fodder to 

 the loaded sleds was an insuperable diffi- 



culty ; but the dog was carnivorous, and 

 could feed on blubber, walrus skin, fish, 

 bear, or musk ox, obtained in the course of 

 the journey, or even on the carcases of his 

 own kind ; and his tractable character, the 

 combined strength of an obedient pack, and 

 the perfect fitness of the animal for the 

 work required, rendered the choice so 

 obvious that there can hardly have been a 

 time when the Arctic peoples were ignorant 

 of the dog's value. 



The Eskimos are not an artistic race ; 

 but the few ancient records rudely inscribed 

 on rock or bone give proof that in the very 

 earliest times their sledges were drawn by 

 dogs. In the sixteenth century Martin 

 Frobisher, who voyaged to Greenland in 

 search of gold, and the early navigators who 

 penetrated far into the Arctic seas to seek 

 a north-west passage, observed with interest 

 the practical uses to which the wolf-like dog 

 of the north was put. In later times the 

 European explorers recognised the advantage 

 of imitating the Eskimo method of locomo- 



