Chapter XI

SLEDGE JOURNEY TO ARDENCAPLE INLET, FROM 8TH TO 29TH
MAY, 1870.[72]

Fitting out.--High temperature.--Bad prospects for
the journey.--Great difficulty of progress in deep
snow.--Bears.--Impossibility of passing Fligely Fjord.--March
to the eastern side of Kuhn Island.--Geological
excursion.--Shooting of plants, and animal life.--Mieders
snow-blind.--Bastian Bay passed.--Anchoring by Cape
Bremen.--Ascent of Cape Bremen (3080 feet) by Lieut. Payer,
in company with Herzberg and Wagner.--Alteration in plan of
journey.--Exploration of Kuhn Island.--Erection of a Cairn on
the Peak of Cape Bremen.--Return march commenced.--Geology of
Kuhn Island.--Ascent of 3670 feet up the Black Wall on Kuhn
Island by Lieut. Payer, with Herzberg and Wagner.--Running
water.--Determination of the height of the Black Wall.--Cape
Berlin reached.--Arrival at the ship.

Returning from our sledge journey on the 27th April, we found the ship lying as we had left her, there being still seven feet thickness of ice in the harbour. Before the middle of July we could not expect our release from the ice, and then our exploring expeditions would begin. The interim could not be better employed than by repeated sledge journeys. The investigation of Ardencaple Inlet and the fjords opening into it, and then, too, the possible connexion of this bay with the sounds lying north-west of Kuhn Island, formed a most interesting object of investigation, and that at no great distance. But above all things speed was indispensable; for had we not in prospect the dreadful state of the snowy waste which must inevitably attend the rapid thaw of an Arctic midsummer?

After ten days’ rest those who had been suffering from dysentery, cramp, and rheumatism (the effects of the previous journey), had somewhat recovered; a further reason for avoiding longer delay, although we were unfortunately obliged to leave Klentzer and our brave Ellinger behind.

The hope of finding the ice in Fligely Fjord free from snow, as in the previous autumn, decided us in choosing this road to Ardencaple Inlet. The dread of a repetition of our late sufferings from want of food made us burden ourselves with all we could take, but the dead-weight was lightened as much as possible by the general sleeping-sack being made of light woollen stuff, and by reducing the size of the tent.

Our weapons consisted of three breech-loaders and a hundred cartridges; our instruments, of a theodolite, aneroid, and thermometer. We also took thirty bottles of spirits, sixty lbs. of melted walrus and bear’s fat for fuel, and nine bottles of ginger in a tin can. Our clothes were lighter, as we had relieved ourselves of the fur. In case the loosening of the coast ice should prevent our reaching the ship, we laid down a provision depôt at Cape Berlin.

Journeys at the end of the spring time are very different from those at the beginning. In the first instance, one has to suffer from the frost, and in the second, from the glowing summer heat, although in the shade the thermometer is still below freezing-point. Very troublesome, too, is the reflected sunlight on the snow-fields on this journey: the temperature rose in the tent during the day, on the 9th May, 53° Fahr.; on the 10th, 65° Fahr.; and on the 26th, to 77° Fahr., we were in a steam resembling a pot on the fire. The stony snow-fields change into pools of water at the end of May and the beginning of June, making the crossing, at all times troublesome, still more difficult by the overflowing tide. In the first days of May the cold decreased; the temperature rose from 50° to 68° Fahr.; the sun did not set; and the storms had suddenly ceased.

So far we could not wish for more favourable conditions for travelling, as we started five strong, on the 8th May (Tramnitz, Herzberg, Wagner, Mieders, and Payer), the others accompanying us as far as the next cape.

Snow had fallen some days before; but, besides this, the quantity of baggage (14 cwt.) delayed our progress, so that we were four hours reaching the south-west point of Sabine Island. A small isthmus covered with snow, which we had to cross here in order to avoid a wide circuit, showed us the great difficulty of dragging the sledge over even a small bit of land. Places quite free from snow would prevent it entirely. It must, therefore, be understood that journeys of this kind can only take place on an ice-covered sea.

We now travelled independent of daylight, as the sun never sets, so that on the morning of the 9th of May (2° Fahr.), after reaching the west coast of Sabine Island, separated from the mainland by Clavering Straits, we pitched our tents opposite the Kronenberg.

Signs of bad weather increased from the north; grey and vapourish lay the heavens above us. We slept during the day, and travelled in the afternoon. The snow became deeper and deeper, and it was with great difficulty that we could bring the sledge along; completely exhausted, we rested some hours by Cape Berlin. On the 10th of May, after four hours’ march, we had scarcely made half a German mile (two miles and a half English), and in this distance had sunk deep in the snow at every step; only by “Aussingen,”[73] with jerks, could one get the sledge along--a most depressing and fatiguing expedient. But the prospect in the Fjord, beyond a snow waste, two German miles and a half broad, which we still had to cross, was somewhat more favourable, and greatly raised our hopes; and, indeed, we did find a good road, as on the evening of the 10th of May (19° Fahr.) we started for Cape Hamburg, at the mouth of the Fligely Fjord. As a rule, we could now make more than 260 steps within five minutes; and as on the morning of the 11th (19° Fahr.) we stopped, the reddish gneiss wall of this promontory, with its winding strata and masses of granite, was only one nautical mile and a half distant. At its foot we hoped to find some smooth ice.

In order to lighten the sledge as much as possible, we proposed erecting a depôt here, so that all articles of clothing that could be dispensed with, as well as all provisions for the return journey, were placed in a sack.

_Page 452._

DEEP SNOW TRAVELLING.]

In the evening we started again (19.5° Fahr.), but at the very next step the difficulties increased to such a pitch that we were almost in despair. From seventy steps a minute it fell to twenty, and at last we stood still. The sledge sank in softened snow, and was scarcely to be moved, even by our taking circuits of a wide radius. We ourselves, during the last three days of great exertion, had sunk step by step up to our knees. That, under such circumstances, it was no easy matter to get the sledge along, need be hardly said. For days together the monotonous rhythm of the “Yo! heave, oh!” might be heard at the foot of the walls.

The bright light of the white flakes worked the exhausted travellers almost to madness. Only the third part or half of the baggage could be carried at a time; we were, therefore, obliged to go over the same bit of road three and sometimes five times. Every ten steps the sledge had to be formally dug out; indeed, the bit passed over was like a hollow way, and as the snow became softer, and the tide rose from the edge of the coast, penetrating the under layers, it became like a perfect bog, and we could do nothing but kneel and pull along in the snow. As by this means one could only advance a few hundred steps daily, and that our last night’s encampment was still within gunshot, it seemed almost impossible for us ever to reach the land, although we had approached the coast within half a nautical mile.

Thus the 11th and 12th of May passed; the snow-storms of the last few days had lost their terrific character of the earlier months, and offered no serious hindrance. The continued jerking forward of the sledge had given us all a violent headache, the throbbing of which was most painful. We had carried the greater part of the baggage 800 paces forward--our whole day’s march--and had returned to fetch the tent and the remainder, but, before taking it down, we rested for half an hour, when, upon going out, we saw three bears inspecting it, the result of which might prove its total destruction. Quickly we fired some alarm shots. This succeeded: but we feared that they had already had time to do much damage. I was particularly anxious about my large work, for in it was the whole material of the geographical discoveries of the four sledge journeys, and its destruction would have been an irreparable loss.

Nothing could have impressed us more with the astonishing strength possessed by this creature than the incredible agility with which it escaped, although sinking deeply into the bottomless snow; we, on the other hand, were a long time reaching the place of apprehended destruction. The straps of my theodolite case had been torn off, and it had received several bites; the bears had devoured a piece of sugar and a pound and a half of cheese, our whole store of these luxuries, as well as every stearine candle, and had scattered the bread; but they had only bitten the mouth of the can of ginger flat, before throwing it away, and had only pulled out the cork of the spirit-can. Had not the latter, by some lucky chance, kept upright, the whole of our store would have been lost. Even the india-rubber bottles were either cut in pieces or totally eaten up; one corner was bitten out of a packet of tobacco, but evidently spat out again. The climbing-pole had been carried some distance by the young bear, no doubt as a plaything; we found it again, but without the straps, which had been eaten. My book was probably too tough; they had only gnawed it.

Our further advance was not easier on the 13th of May; the thoroughly softened snow-drifts fell with a rush as we neared them. The transport of the different lots took place under endless difficulties; at noon the temperature only rose to 21° Fahr., but owing to the directness of the sun’s rays, it caused a glowing heat.

As at last we arrived at the hummocks of coast ice, broken by the tide, and also at the foot of the wall, and had conveyed the sledge with much trouble over ice barriers and water-pools, we discovered to our horror that the Fligely Fjord, instead of being covered, as we had conjectured, with smooth ice, was filled with endless snow. Still we need not give up all hope; it was just possible that the depth of snow might decrease towards the back of the Fjord. Again we started on a weary road between the ice barriers and the rocky shore, and at last landed on a somewhat higher snow surface--a horrible prospect! Did we not know the difficulties hidden under this seeming smoothness?

The mountains round the Fjord were, with the exception of the steep walls, perfectly white; the winter storms, in conjunction with much heavier falls than we had had in our winter harbour, seemed to have borne the masses of snow along with them, and dropped them on the front of the mountains, and sprinkled the Fjord at the same time. Nowhere could we see that stripe coming from the north caused by the storm, and always so striking on the snow-fields of the outer coast.

Snow-buntings twittered cheerfully in our neighbourhood, a raven croaked from the heights, and we were not a little astonished at the sight of a musk-ox looking down at us from a steep overhanging rock several hundred feet high. We had left the sledge behind, and whilst Wagner had wandered in a southerly direction towards the middle of the Fjord, Tramnitz and Payer went along the shore, to investigate the possibility of further advance. But, as far as we could judge from a good height, as well as from the great depth of the snow which lay on all sides, we were convinced of the impossibility of reaching Ardencaple Inlet through Fligely Sound; so, after many hours’ fruitless march, we returned to our tent.

There remained, therefore, nothing for it but to return by the difficult road, and seek to reach our goal by going round the east side of Kuhn Island. But the exertions of the last few days had so weakened us that we agreed to take a short rest before starting, but we had scarcely done so when we were surprised by a spring-tide, and we had to pack the sledge and start again, with divided luggage, at three a.m. on the 14th of May.

Fortunately the sky had clouded in the mean time, and the temperature had sunk to 10.5° Fahr. The snow-bog dried, the snow hardened, and we broke through but seldom, and in three hours we reached the camping-place which we had left some days before on the border of the snow waste. At one stroke our spirits rose so, that after a short sleep we made another long stretch that same day, and pitched our tent on the 15th of May, at seven a.m. (5.5° Fahr.)

On the soft easterly hanging slopes of Kuhn Island we saw twenty head of musk oxen, about 2000 paces from us. Tramnitz, our cleverest hunter, managed to creep near them by circuitous ways, whilst Payer and Herzberg undertook a geological excursion to a deep ravine on the coast, and made the interesting discovery that the gneiss granite ridge, which towered in such beautiful forms above the east coast of the island, was rich in extraordinary petrifactions, in strata of fuller’s clay, coal loam, and sandstone. The same formation leading to coal we had seen the previous summer on the south side of the island. Tramnitz was less fortunate; he returned empty-handed, with a broken gun and torn clothing, informing us that he had been thrown down by a musk-ox and trampled on. In a hunting expedition with Wagner, somewhat later, one of them was killed.

_Page 456._

DEATH OF THE MUSK-OX.]

The rise of the mean temperature, and uninterrupted daylight had in the meanwhile entirely altered the physiognomy of the land. Organic life woke once more in the few plants peculiar to the Arctic climate; under the snow bridges and ice vaults might be heard the whisper of trickling water; long trains of eider ducks came from the south; light-grey lemmings rushed terrified over the stony rubbish; yellowish brown caterpillars crawled with fruitless industry over the same; white hares revelled amongst the young shoots of moss; slender reindeer frequented the deep furrows of the glacier streams; and over the sunny surface of the water, although some distance from us, rose the curious head of the seal.

Meanwhile we had lost so much time that the success of our undertaking depended greatly upon a steady favourable road for the future, and above all whether the snow-fields over which our return road lay were accessible. At last we were entirely dependent upon hunting; for before the musk-ox was killed, which gave us fifty-six pounds of meat, our provisions had consisted chiefly of coffee and hard bread.

Mieders had become snow-blind; so upon starting in the evening we put him in the midst of us to drag the sledge. The application of wet bandages during the march, (which a month before had been impossible,) relieved him in the course of a week from this painful evil. The nights were foggy and sultry, and Tramnitz, who until now had attended to the observations of temperature, was also snow-blind.[74]

The snow was now soft again; and again began the horrible “Aussingen,” and forward jerking of the sledge, and though we lightened it by leaving a sack behind a block of rock, we scarcely moved from the spot, and were obliged to encamp sooner than we intended from sheer exhaustion.

On the 16th of May the temperature of the snow rose to 25.5° Fahr.; thick fog, and a heavy fall of snow prevented us starting again until the evening, and during the whole of that night’s march we could not see ten steps before us, we were constantly losing our course and were obliged at last to have recourse to the compass.

On the 17th (14° Fahr.) despite a violent snow-storm we pressed onward, passed the mouth of the romantic Bay of Bastian, and arrived on the morning of the 18th at the foot of Cape Bremen, which forms the south-easterly corner of Ardencaple Inlet.

The depth of the snow had confined our progress during the last few days to from three-quarters to one and a quarter German miles; and our strength from the exertion of pulling the sledge had greatly decreased. Icebergs only at a little distance seemed inaccessible.

The period for successful sledge journeys was now quite over, and we had to climb half-way up to an horizontal stretching mass of dolerite, in order to decide whether it would be desirable either to advance through Ardencaple Inlet or undertake a geological examination of Kuhn Island and finish our trigonometrical survey.

On the 19th therefore Payer, with Herzberg and Wagner climbed to a steep snow-field, then over a mountain steep which with rugged walls of gneiss fell in a mountain ridge towards Ardencaple Bay, the highest point of which we reached after a three and a half hour’s march.

Clear weather favoured the extensive and highly interesting view from the Sattelberg and the Pendulum Island, as far as the northern edge of Koldewey Island. For eight hours we were able to sketch the whole of the panorama, and complete the triangle of our trigonometrical measurement. Ardencaple Inlet, far below us, was as well as Fligely Fjord covered with an uninterrupted sheet of snow, the nature and depth of which Tramnitz had undertaken to investigate; the large Fjord opening in the north-west corner of Ardencaple Bay we could follow from our standing point for at least fifty miles; it then seemed to curve inwards to the west, but thus far it lay as if sketched upon a map. At its exit west from the imposing and evidently crystalline mountain mass of Cape Klinkerfues, the Wildspitze, and the Matterhorns, lay countless icebergs enclosed. The existence of large glaciers in this Fjord could not be doubted, though few were visible.

The snow surfaces between Kuhn and Shannon Islands were divided into two parts by a sharp line, the nearer one distinguished by its smoothness, and the further one by its undulatory character. But appearances were deceitful; for the smooth surface consisted of perfectly soft snow.

The increasing difficulties of advancing, the decrease of our provisions, and lastly the advanced time of year, all warned us to return to the ship within a week. During that time it would have been impossible even under the most favourable condition of the snow, to investigate the Fjord to any extent, as from our elevated standing point we could see. We therefore decided to alter our plans on the spot and to give all the time we possibly could to the exploration of Kuhn Island. Events showed that we had made a happy choice.

After raising a trigonometrical signal on the top, about six feet high, in the shape of a massive stone cone, we returned to our tent, which had been guarded by Mieders who was still snow-blind. An attempt to measure the height of the mountain by the aneroid had failed from its being disturbed.

On the 20th May (17.5° Fahr.) we began our return march, the deserted camp forming as usual a deep hole in the snow.

On the 21st (10° Fahr.) we reached the middle of a segmental projection on the east side of Kuhn Island which rose in undulations to a height of 1020 feet. This projection consisted of layers of slaty sandstone and marl, the petrifactions showing that this deposit was of the secondary formation, lying like a cloak on the westerly rising of crystalline stone. The surface of this formation was covered with an erratic covering of rubbish of the last-named stone.

On the 22nd and 23rd we explored the individual strata of the formation; they showed a perfect agreement with those on the south side of Kuhn Island, a westerly incline of 7°, coal clay, petrifactions (Inocerames, Ammonites, Belemnites, &c.), bluish-grey fuller’s clay, thin stratas of marl, and rather coarse-grained granite alternated with each other.

Coal-beds were nowhere to be seen. But about under the summit of the “black wall” we found some sandstone and small pieces of coal.

Several masses of dolerite ran horizontally through the upper bank of the sedimentary layers.

Hochstetter’s Promontory bore the same geological character, so that both these spots possibly belong to the later secondary sedimentary rocks, only interrupted by the sinking of Ardencaple Inlet.

Much damage did our stay here cause amongst a herd of musk-oxen. On the 21st Tramnitz shot a cow; on the 22nd Wagner surprised the whole herd while sleeping, and killed a bull; and on the following day another fell by Payer’s hand, who at once sketched the beast as it lay; and lastly Tramnitz brought home a calf and a hare.

On the 24th, shortly before midnight, Payer, Herzberg, and Wagner started to climb the “black wall,” to convert this favourable position of the highest (3675 feet) mountain on the island into use for surveying purposes. The way led first through a high-lying valley enclosed between beautiful walls, from the ice basin of which ran slopes of snow at an inclination of 45°, interrupted at intervals by projecting rocks; then over some syenite gneiss and brown coal sandstone to the summit, after five hours’ march.

This consists of a rugged mass about 155 feet high, in the shape of a dome, surrounded by slender dolerite columns. This sort of stone forms here, and in many other parts of Kuhn Island, a sort of causeway on the mountain ridge, frequently in connexion with dolerite amygdaloia.

The climbing of this mountain was rendered particularly important by the discovery of a new sound, which seemed to connect the south-west corner of Fligely Fjord with Ardencaple Inlet. The pack-ice outside reached to the outer horizon, though there were several navigable channels to be seen.

Payer finished his work in six hours; and, after erecting one massive stone cairn, we started for the tent, which we reached in four hours and a half.

Not far from this now ran a rushing stream down a deep cleft filled with snow. It was the first time since September that we had water without melting, water to the full; it was also the first time that we were able to wash ourselves, and drink as much as we wanted.

On the 25th of May the temperature rose to 32.9° Fahr. The dispersion of the snow went on quickly, and as we were constantly sinking in it a base was measured on the surface of the sea-ice, by the help of which we took the altitude of the Black Wall. Whilst we slept during the day the temperature rose in the tent to 73.5° Fahr.; we therefore now slept outside instead of inside the sleeping sack. Flies sunned themselves on the tent-walls, and the heat was as overpowering as under the leaden roofs of Venice. Rheumatism, pains in the loins, and similar affections now made their appearance, as for two months we had slept on the snow, without interruption, and it now melted under us from the warmth of the body and completely wetted us through.

On the 25th, after the last geological excursion had been made, we began our return to the ship. The sledge was now as heavy as when we started, from the collection of petrifactions, musk-ox horns, minerals, skins, &c.

On the 27th we reached Cape Berlin, after great exertion, and a slow march lastly through drifting snow over the snowy waste at the exit of Fligely Fjord.

The deep snow-drifts at the foot of Cape Berlin had in the meanwhile changed into kind of teeth, from the warmth and a resisting paste which stuck to the sledge, making it very heavy. Once more did we suffer (28th May, 43° Fahr.) the already-described infliction of divided baggage and the deep sinking in the snow.

Not until Clavering Straits did the road improve; when near the mouth of Falschen Bay we passed the night, in order to be ready the next day for the trigonometrical and topographical survey of a mountain more than 2275 feet high, remarkable for its craggy formation. Thick fog, however, frustrated this intention for the time, and we began our return to the ship on the 29th of May.

We reached it after an absence of twenty-one days. The pool-covered ice of our winter harbour we found in an advanced stage of melting, which the rain of the next few days hastened.

The sky soon cleared, and within a few days the ever-increasing temperature enticed out of the lately frozen soil of Greenland the first-fruits of a scanty Flora.