WALRUS-SHOOTING IN WHALE SOUND 



and after finishing the wounded walrus with a volley of shots, 

 we laboriously towed both carcases to the nearest ice-floe. 

 Leaving one of the Eskimos as a marker for the Diana, we 

 rowed over the now thoroughly agitated waters of Whale 

 Sound to finish the harpooned walrus, but discovered the car- 

 cas of another, which had evidently been killed in the first 

 onslaught, floating in some slush-ice, and were obliged to tow 

 it to the nearest floe. 



By this time the sky was covered with black clouds, the 

 wind was whistling a gale, and the cakes of ice were rolling 

 over and over, continually breaking up in the grasp of the 

 agitated waters; but we drove the boat through the flying 

 spray to the crippled walrus, shot it, and towed it to the nearest 

 pan, where we were joined shortly by one of the other boats. 

 The sea was now a wild sight, and the pan on which we had 

 taken shelter was rocking and pitching, and continually break- 

 ing off in small floes around the edges. It was accordingly 

 with a feeling of relief that w^e saw the Diana slowly picking 

 her course through the floes in our direction, and three-quarters 

 of an hour later she slowed up within two hundred yards. A 

 slit was cut in the three-quarter-inch thick neck skin of each 

 walrus; it was towed to the side of the vessel; a large hook 

 was inserted in the slit ; the dummy engine on deck commenced 

 to rattle and creak; and slowly but surely each dripping body 

 was hoisted to the proper height, swung over, and carefully 

 lowered among the dead walruses now covering the decks. The 

 Diana then steamed among the tossing floes until the third 

 whaleboat was picked up, and the last of the fifteen walruses 

 secured in the day's hunt was lowered to a resting-place among 

 its fellows. Then the vessel headed for the quieter waters in 

 the shelter of Northumberland Island. 



An open barrel of hardtack had been placed back of the 

 cook's galley for the benefit of the Eskimos, and, bloody but 

 happy, these simple people indulged in a continual feast as 



43 



