HANS’S RETURN. 
63 
Indeed, there is not a man on board who can hope 
to linger on till the spring comes unless we have 
relief. 
“I put all this down in no desponding spirit, but as 
a record to look back upon hereafter, when the imme¬ 
diate danger has passed away, and some new emer¬ 
gency has brought its own array of cares and trials. 
My mind is hopeful and reliant: there is something 
even cheering in the constant rally of its energies to 
meet the calls of the hour. 
“March 10, Saturday.—Hans has not yet returned; 
so that he must have x’eached the settlement. His 
orders were, if no meat be obtained of the Esquimaux, 
to borrow their dogs and try for bears along the open 
water. In this resource I have confidence. The days 
are magnificent. 
. . . I had hardly written the above, when 
‘Bim, him, him!' sounded from the deck, mixed with 
the chorus of our returning dogs. The next minute 
Hans and myself were shaking hands. 
“He had much to tell us; to men in our condition 
Hans was as a man from cities. We of the wilderness 
flocked around him to hear the news. Sugar-teats of 
raw meat are passed around. ‘ Speak loud, Hans, that 
they may hear in the bunks.’ 
“The ‘wind-loved’ Anoatok he had reached on the 
first night after leaving the brig: no Esquimaux there 
of course; and he slept not warmly at a temperature of 
53° below zero. On the evening of the next day he 
reached Etab Bay, and was hailed with joyous wel- 
