464 



THE POLAR WORLD. 



OVER THE ICE. 



as a hunter, or native shrewdness, is looked up to with respect, and his opinions 

 are regarded with deference ; but he has no sort of authority except that which 

 each person voluntarily concedes to him. 



We left Mr. Hall near the close of January, 1861, when he was just return- 

 ing to the ship after his first overland expedition. We do not propose to fol- 

 low him through the course of his personal narrative, although it abounds with 

 striking incidents and details of hardship and peril. Thus, one day in March, 

 John Brown, one of the ship's crew, in company with two Innuits, started off 

 from an igloo a few miles distant to rejoin the ship. Somehow he got sepa- 

 rated from his companions, but the next morning he had not arrived. The night 

 had been intensely cold, the thermometer marking 57 degrees below freezing- 

 point. A party of a dozen set off in the attempt to find him. In two hours 

 they came upon the tracks of the wanderer, but only Hall and four others 

 could hold out ; the others, one by one, fell back. They kept on, following the 

 tracks, which now began to grow faint, being partly filled up with snow. For 

 a time the tracks went straight for the ship ; then they began to waver, now in 

 one direction, and then in another, showing that the man had lost his way. 

 They followed the tracks, in the intense cold, 60 degrees below freezing-point. 

 They were tormented by thirst, which they attempted to allay by the use of 

 ice. The first fragment which Hall put into his mouth froze it fast. He 

 managed to reduce the temperature of the ice by holding the fragments in his 

 mittened hand, so that he could place them in his mouth. After six hours, Hall's 

 companions said they could go no farther and must return ; for they had 

 brought along no snow-knife, with which they could build an igloo for the night ; 

 and if a storm should spring up, they must all be inevitably lost. Hall went on 

 alone. One of the crew named Johnston soon overtook him, saying, "Brown 

 was my shipmate, and I loved him. I will go on with you. If I were to go 

 back now, I shall always regret it." They followed the tracks, which now be- 

 gan to run in circles, interlocking one another. There were twelve of these 



