The Boy With the U. S. Life-Savers Part 29

"'Boys,' he said in a quavering voice, 'this ain't just one man, it's the whole United States.'"

CHAPTER VIII

THE BELCHING DEATH OF A VOLCANO

The whaler's story of the great Overland Expedition set Eric questioning about the work of the Coast Guard with the reindeer. He learned that, partly as a result of his handling of the trip, the government had selected Lieutenant Bertholf to make an exploration of northern Siberia for the purpose of importing Tunguse reindeer, which were reported to be bigger and better fitted for Alaska than the Lapp reindeer. He found out how over 200 head of the larger species had been successfully imported, and a couple of days later had a very vivid demonstration of the fact in seeing an Eskimo trot by, riding a Tunguse reindeer like a saddle horse.

The more the boy saw of the Eskimo, too, the more he learned to value their race strength. It was true that they were dirty and that their houses smelt horribly. But, after all, Eric reasoned, it is a little hard to keep the habit of baths in a country where, during six months in the year, a man would freeze solid in a bath like a fly in a piece of amber. The Eskimo's indifference to smells, moreover, he learned to understand one day, quite suddenly. He was pacing up and down the deck with the whaler a day or two before the _Bear_ reached Point Barrow.

"You're always worryin' over those smells," Joey had said to him.

"You've lived in a city, haven't you?"

"Nearly all my life," the boy replied.

"Have you ever been in a city what wasn't noisy with street cars, an'

wagons, an' automobile horns, an' children playing, an' music-boxes an'

pianos goin' an' all the rest of it?"

"It is noisy," Eric admitted, "but you soon get used to that."

"Hearin' is just one o' the five senses, ain't it?"

"Yes."

"An' smellin' is another?"

"Of course."

"Well, an Eskimo's nose gets to be like a city man's ear, one smells all the time an' doesn't notice it, the other hears all the while an'

doesn't care. You can't judge a people by its smell. An' when it comes to fair dealin', you won't find anywhere a squarer people to deal with than the Eskimo. You're Commissioner, ain't you?"

"Yes," the boy answered.

"An' you haven't found much crime, have you, eh?"

"Mighty little," he admitted.

"It's the same every year. They're a fine race, the Eskimo. I'll tell you just one little thing about 'em, that I don't think could be said of any other native race in the whole world."

"What's that?" the boy asked.

"You know," the whaler said, "how natives go to pieces when civilization hits 'em."

"Generally."

"What do you suppose is the reason?"

"Whisky and white men's ways," answered Eric promptly.

"Right, first shot," said the other. "Soon after Alaska was opened up, the Eskimo learned the excitin' effects of whisky. Fearin' trouble, a strict watch was kept on the sale of liquor to the natives, an' as it was easy enough to find out where the whisky had come from an' no vessel could escape from the Arctic without being known, tradin' spirits to the Eskimo soon had to be given up.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIGNALS THAT GUARDS OUR COAST.

Flags flying at Quogue Station, warning vessels far out to sea.]

"But, in order to increase business, the traders taught one old Eskimo chief, named Ah-tung-owra, how to make whisky out of flour and mola.s.ses."

"They made it themselves?"

"Yes."

"But where could they get stills? I should think it was as easy to catch a trader selling stills as selling whisky."

"They're home-made stills," the whaler explained. "There ain't much to the apparatus. It is just a five-gallon coal-oil tin, an old gun-barrel an' a wooden tub. The liquor they make tastes like chain lightnin', and makes up in strength what it hasn't got in flavor.

"But what I think wonderful is this. When the Coast Guard--it was the Revenue Cutter Service then--began its patrol of the Arctic, one of the first things it did was to show the Eskimo the result of their drunken bouts. Takin' whisky to native tribes an' then teachin' 'em to let it alone is the white man's long suit.

"But the main difference between the Eskimo an' the rest of 'em, is that these tribes listened. They asked a pile o' questions an' at last agreed that the reasons given were good an' the habit was bad. Off their own bat they broke up all the stills on the coast, an' months after the clean-up a native told me that he had told his friends inland what Bertholf had said, an' that all the stills there had been destroyed, too. There's liquor enough in the south, but by the Eskimo's own choosin' there isn't a blind tiger to-day between Cape Prince of Wales, Point Barrow and Mackenzie Bay."

In consequence of this self-control on the part of the natives, the young United States Commissioner found very little strain on his judicial powers. One of the things that did trouble him was the constant request of the natives to get married. The problem seemed so difficult that he asked advice from the first lieutenant, who, many years before, had been Commissioner on a similar a.s.signment to that of Eric.

"I don't like marrying these natives, sir," he said, "because, so far as I can make out, they haven't any idea of the legal end of it. I've been talking to Ahyatlogok, a bridegroom, and he really doesn't intend to do anything more than try out the bride for a season, Eskimo fas.h.i.+on, to see if he likes her. And if he doesn't and they both want to separate, if I've married them, they can't."

"Why not?"

"Ahyatlogok's not rich enough to take that long trip to Nome to get a divorce. It's a year's journey, nearly. And unless he does, next time the _Bear_ comes up he'll be a criminal. And yet he'll have done just what his father did before him and nearly all his neighbors are doing."

"Mr. Swift," the senior officer answered, with a slight twinkle in his eye, "do you tie a granny knot in a reef-point?"

"No, sir, never!" exclaimed Eric in surprise.

"Why not?"

"Because a granny knot jams, and a reef-point may have to be untied."

"There's your answer," said the first lieutenant, smiling as he turned away.

With these constant small matters and with all the excitements of his trip through the Arctic, Eric's summer pa.s.sed rapidly. After having touched Point Barrow, the _Bear_ came south, landing supplies at Cape Lisburne and returning to Nome. As certain repairs to the machinery were needed, and as her coal bunkers were growing empty, the _Bear_ headed to the southward for Unalaska.

The cutter was within half a day's steaming of the port when the radio began to buzz and buzz loudly, answering the call of a vessel in distress off Chirikof Island. As the steamer was known to be carrying a number of pa.s.sengers, thus endangered, the _Bear_ did not stop at Unalaska, but putting on full speed, arrived off Cape Sarichef Lighthouse at 4 o'clock in the morning, proceeding through Unimak Pa.s.s and Inside Pa.s.sage. The naval radio station from Unalga Island confirmed the report, but could give no further details.

Under full speed the _Bear_ reached the scene of the disaster the next day. Of the vessel, _Oregon Queen_, not a sign could be seen, but, save for three persons, all the crew and pa.s.sengers were safe on Chirikof Island. They were almost without food, however--many of them insufficiently clad and utterly dest.i.tute. As the _Oregon Queen_ had been bound for St. Paul, Kodiak Island, and a large number of the pa.s.sengers could depend upon a.s.sistance there, the _Bear_ picked them up, and the day following, despite extraordinary weather conditions, landed them at St. Paul. Little did the s.h.i.+pwrecked men realize that they had only escaped one danger to be imperilled by another.