Part 27 (2/2)

”I don't know nuffin' more nor you do, c.o.c.kie,” was the boy's reply; ”but it strikes dis chile dat dey have all taken leave of der senses, ebery moder's son of dem. And de captain he have gone up into de crow's-nest, which looks for all de world like a big barrel of treacle, c.o.c.kie, and he have shut hisself in der, and nuffin' does he do but wave a long stick wid a black ball at de end of it. [The fan with which Greenland captains guide their men in the direction of the seals.] Dat is all de knows; but oh! c.o.c.kie, don't you take such drefful big mouf-fuls o' hemp. Supposin' anyting happen to you, c.o.c.kie, den I hab n.o.body to talk to dat fully understand dis chile.”

The _Canny Scotia_ was moored to the ice so close to the _Arrandoon_ that the captains of the respective s.h.i.+ps could maintain a conversation without stressing their lungs to any very great extent. Talking thus, each in his own crow's-nest, they looked for all the world like a couple of chimney-sweeps conversing together from rival chimneys. The cooks were not idle in the galleys, they were busy boiling hams and huge joints of beef, and these, when cooked, were taken on deck; for sealing is hungry work, and every time a man brings a drag to the vessel's side he helps himself to a lordly slice and a biscuit.

By-and-by the draggers began to drop in fast enough, each one hauling an immense skin with the fat or blubber attached; and these skins were all hoisted on board the _Scotia_, for all hands were working for Silas.

But our heroes had the sport, and, taking it all in all, I do not think there is any sport in the world to compare to that of seal-stalking.

Without any of the cowardliness of battue shooting, in which the poor surrounded animals are helpless, and cruelly and mercilessly slain, you have far more excitement, and the sport is not unattended with danger.

To be a good seal-stalker you need the limbs of an athlete, the eye of an excellent marksman, and all the stealth and cunning of a tabby cat or a Coromanche Indian. If your nerves are not well strung, or your muscles not like iron, you may fail to leap across the lane of dark water that separates piece from piece; if you do fail and are not speedily helped out, the current may drag you beneath the bergs, or those dreadful sharks, that seldom are absent where blood is being spilled on the sea of ice, may seize and pull you down to a fearful death; if you are not a good shot, your seals will get away, for your bullet _must_ pierce either neck or head; and, lastly, if you are not cunning, if you do not stalk with stealth, your seals will escape with the speed of lightning.

On warm, sunny days the seals lie close and sleep soundly, but they always have their sentries set. Kill the sentry, and many others are at your mercy; miss him, or merely wound him, and he gives the alarm _instanter_, and all the rest jump helter-skelter into the sea, according you a beautiful view of their tail-ends, which you don't find very advantageous in the way of making a bag.

A good sealer, like a good skirmisher, takes advantage of every bit of cover, and many a death-blow is dealt from the shelter of a lump of loose ice.

The gunners to-day, as they usually do, went on after the seals in skirmis.h.i.+ng order, in one long line, each taking a breadth of about seventy or one hundred yards.

It was an hour past midnight before they left the s.h.i.+ps. When it was nine in the morning there was a kind of general a.s.sembly of the riflemen to breakfast, behind a large square hummock of packed bay ice, and only the very oldest among them could believe that it was so late. [These strange hummocks, which resemble, as already stated, huge packs of cards, are formed of pieces of bay ice about a foot thick, which has been broken up between two bergs, and finally thrown up out of the water altogether. They form quite a characteristic feature of a North Greenland icescape.] Why, to our own particular heroes it seemed scarcely an hour since they had left their s.h.i.+p, so great is the excitement of seal-stalking. But Ralph and Rory and Allan had done so well, and had managed to lay so many splendid seals dead on every piece of ice, that they earned high encomiums from the mate of the _Canny Scotia_; and even the doctor hadn't shot amiss, and proud was he to be told so.

”But, my dear sirs,” said Sandy, ”I'd like to know why a good surgeon shouldn't be a good sportsman. Don't you know that the great Liston himself was sometimes summoned to an operation at the hospital, just as he was mounting his horse to ride off to the hunt, arrayed in scarlet and cords?”

”And what did he do?” asked Rory.

”Pa.s.s the pie,” said Ralph.

”Why,” continued the doctor, enthusiastically, ”doffed his scarlet coat and donned an old gown, whipped off a leg in one minute ten and a half seconds, and was in the saddle again five minutes after that.”

”Brayvo!” cried Captain Cobb, ”doctor, you're a brick, and if ever you come out to New Jersey, come and see Cobb, and I guess he'll give you a good time of it.”

”Ray,” said Rory.

”Well, Row,” said Ray.

”Your face and hands are begrimed with powder, and there is a kind of wolfish look about you that is worth studying. You look like a frozen-out blacksmith who hasn't a penny to buy a bit of peas-pudding or a morsel of soap.”

”I'm hungry, anyhow,” said Ray. ”How good of McBain to send such a jolly breakfast! But I say, Row, d'ye remember the proverb about Claudius? Well, don't you call my face and hands black till you've washed your own. You look like a chimney-sweep who has been out of work for a week, and got no food since the day before yesterday.”

”Well, well,” says Row, ”but 'deed in troth, my dear big boy, n.o.body can wonder at your being successful as a seal-stalker, for what with the colour of your face, and the urgency, so to speak, of the two eyes of you, and that big fur cap, why the seals take you for one o' themselves, a big bladder-nose.”

”Pa.s.s the ham,” said Ray; ”Allan, some more coffee, I begin to feel like a giant refreshed.”

”I do declare upon mine honour,” said De Vere, ”dat dis is de most glorious pignig [picnic] I ever have de pleasure to attend. But just you look at mine friend Seth, how funnily he do dress.”

”It may be a funny way,” said Allan, ”but it is a most effectual one; dear old trapper Seth has killed more seals this morning than any two of us.”

Seth was dressed from top to toe in young seals' skins, the hair outwards, with the exception of the cap, which was of darker fur, and a black patch on his back. They were not loose garments, they were almost as tight as a harlequin's; but when Seth drew his fur cap over his face and threw himself on the ice, and began wriggling along, his resemblance to a saddle-seal was so preposterous that everybody burst into a hearty laugh.

”That's the way I gets so near them,” said Seth, standing once more erect.

”Look, look!” cried Rory, and every eye was turned in the direction in which he pointed; and there, in a pool of dark water not twenty yards away, a dozen beautiful heads, with round, wondering eyes, had popped up to gaze at them.

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