and deciding on what is best to be done.”
Here the Captain said, among other things, it was his opinion that the Whitebear was damaged beyond the possibility of repair, that their only chance of escape lay in the boats, and that the distance between the place on which they stood and Upernavik, although great, was not beyond the reach of resolute men.
“Before going further, or expressing a decided opinion,” he added, “I would hear what the officers have to say on this subject. Let the first mate speak.”
“It’s my opinion,” said the mate, “that there’s only one thing to be done, namely, to start for home as soon and as fast as we can. We have good boats, plenty of provisions, and are all stout and healthy, excepting our doctor, whom we will take good care of, and expect to do no rough work.”
“Thanks, mate,” said the doctor with a laugh, “I think that, at all events, I shall keep well enough to physic you if you get ill.”
“Are you willing to take charge of the party in the event of my deciding to remain here?” asked the Captain of the mate.
“Certainly, sir,” he replied, with a look of slight surprise. “You know I am quite able to do so. The second mate, too, is as able as I am. For that matter, most of the men, I think, would find little difficulty in navigating a boat to Upernavik.”
“That is well,” returned the Captain, “because I do not intend to return with you.”
“Not return!” exclaimed the doctor; “surely you don’t mean to winter here.”
“No, not here, but further north,” replied the Captain, with a smile which most of the party returned, for they thought he was jesting.
Benjy Vane, however, did not think so. A gleeful look of triumph caused his face, as it were, to sparkle, and he said, eagerly—
“We’ll winter at the North Pole, father, eh?”
This was greeted with a general laugh.
“But seriously, uncle, what do you mean to do?” asked Leonard Vandervell, who, with his brother, was not unhopeful that the Captain meditated something desperate.
“Benjy is not far off the mark. I intend to winter at the Pole, or as near to it as I can manage to get.”
“My dear Captain Vane,” said the doctor, with an anxious look, “you cannot really mean what you say. You must be jesting, or mad.”
“Well, as to madness,” returned the Captain with a peculiar smile, “you ought to know best, for it’s a perquisite of your cloth to pronounce people mad or sane, though some of yourselves are as mad as the worst of us; but in regard to jesting, nothing, I assure you, is further from my mind. Listen!”
He rose from the box which had formed his seat, and looked earnestly round on his men. As he stood there, erect, tall, square, powerful, with legs firmly planted, and apart, as if to guard against a lurch of his ship, with his bronzed face flushed, and his dark eye flashing, they all understood that their leader’s mind was made up, and that what he had resolved upon, he would certainly attempt to carry out.
“Listen,” he repeated; “it was my purpose on leaving England, as you all know, to sail north as far as the ice would let me; to winter where we should stick fast, and organise an over-ice, or overland journey to the Pole with all the appliances of recent scientific discovery, and all the advantages of knowledge acquired by former explorers. It has pleased God to destroy my ship, but my life and my hopes are spared. So are my stores and scientific instruments. I intend, therefore, to carry out my original purpose. I believe that former explorers have erred in some points of their procedure. These errors I shall steer clear of. Former travellers have ignored some facts, and despised some appliances. These facts I will recognise; these appliances I will utilise. With a steam yacht, you, my friends, who have shown so much enthusiasm and courage up to this point, would have been of the utmost service to me. As a party in boats, or on foot, you would only hamper my movements. I mean to prosecute this enterprise almost alone. I shall join myself to the Eskimos.”
He paused at this point as if in meditation. Benjy, whose eyes and mouth had been gradually opening to their widest, almost gasped with astonishment as he glanced at his cousins, whose expressive countenances were somewhat similarly affected.
“I have had some long talks,” continued the Captain, “with that big Eskimo Chingatok, through our interpreter, and from what he says I believe my chances of success are considerable. I am all the more confirmed in this resolution because of the readiness and ability of my first mate to guide you out of the Arctic regions, and your willingness to trust him. Anders has agreed to go with me as interpreter, and now, all I want is one other man, because—”
“Put me down, father,” cried Benjy, in a burst of excitement—“I’m your man.”
“Hush, lad,” said the Captain with a little smile, “of course I shall take you with me and also your two cousins, but I want one other man to complete the party—but he must be a heartily willing man. Who will volunteer?”
There was silence for a few moments. It was broken by the doctor.
“I for one won’t volunteer,” he said, “for I’m too much shaken by this troublesome illness to think of such an expedition. If I were well it might be otherwise, but perhaps some of the others will offer.”
“You can’t expect me to do so,” said the mate, “for I’ve got to guide our party home, as agreed on; besides, under any circumstances, I would not join you, for it is simple madness. You’ll forgive me, Captain. I mean no disrespect, but I have sailed many years to these seas, and I know from experience that what you propose is beyond the power of man to accomplish.”
“Experience!” repeated the Captain, quickly. “Has your experience extended further north than this point?”
“No, sir, I have not been further north than this—nobody has. It is beyond the utmost limit yet reached, so far as I know.”
“Well, then, you cannot speak from experience about what I propose,” said the Captain, turning away. “Come, lads, I have no wish to constrain you, I merely give one of you the chance.”
Still no one came forward. Every man of the crew of the Whitebear had had more or less personal acquaintance with arctic travel and danger. They would have followed Captain Vane anywhere in the yacht, but evidently they had no taste for what he was about to undertake.
At last one stepped to the front. It was Butterface, the steward. This intensely black negro was a bulky, powerful man, with a modest spirit and a strange disbelief in his own capacities, though, in truth, these were very considerable. He came forward, stooping slightly, and rubbing his hands in a deprecating manner.
“’Scuse me, massa Capting. P’r’aps it bery presumsheeous in dis yer chile for to speak afore his betters, but as no oder man ’pears to want to volunteer, I’s willin’ to go in an’ win. Ob course I ain’t a man—on’y a nigger, but I’s a willin’ nigger, an’ kin do a few small tings—cook de grub, wash up de cups an’ sarsers, pull a oar, clean yer boots, fight de Eskimos if you wants me to, an’ ginrally to scrimmage around a’most anything. Moreover, I eats no more dan a babby—’sep wen I’s hungry—an’ I’ll foller you, massa, troo tick and tin—to de Nort Pole, or de Sout Pole, or de East Pole, or de West Pole—or any oder pole wotsomediver—all de same to Butterface, s’long’s you’ll let ’im stick by you.”
The
