Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 6, 2025
I merely mention this incident to show the kind of metal our Toolooah is made of; not as a sample of Inuit character, but as a remarkable contrast to it. Our ten-mile march through Erebus Bay occupied fifteen hours, and we were all pretty well worn out when we reached the shore and encamped, still some distance below Franklin Point.
He knew he would break down when it came to that, and I am glad he didn't, for I am afraid I should too." Until the morning that we left, it had been confidently expected that Toolooah and his family, consisting of his wife and two children, would accompany us to the United States.
From this camp we went in two marches to Cape Herschel, where we left the heaviest of our baggage, with Joe and the other Inuits, taking only the white men of the party, with Toolooah and his family, and Owanork, Equeesik's youngest brother, to assist in the management of the sled, and started for Cape Felix on the 17th.
Already the sled was crowded high up in the air, and one of the stoves occupied a lofty position poised on the pinnacle of a hummock Toolooah at once got upon a loose cake of ice, and pulled himself out to the edge of the floe and brought the sled and stove down to where, when the ice came in closer, they could be pulled ashore, and were thus rescued from then imminent peril.
Lieutenant Schwatka paid a visit to the other camp on the 22d, and the day following Toolooah and I moved our camp about two miles farther east, to a large lake, where we at once set to work, the ice being already eight inches thick, to build an ice igloo of large slabs three feet by six, which standing on end and so placed as to support each other, formed the walls, which afterward were covered with the tent, and made a much warmer house than the tent alone, as it is a complete shelter against the wind.
We gave her a few needles and a spoon, for which she was very grateful, especially to her namesake, our Toolooah, to whom she gave her walking-stick and two locks of her hair, which he severed with a snow-knife as she knelt beside the sled. This was a charm to protect him from evil until he got home. Besides this old woman there were three other women on the sled.
I never expected to feel so agitated as I did when I found myself running and shouting with the natives. Toolooah fired a signal-gun, then jumped on the sled and waved a deer-skin, which had been agreed between him and Armow as announcing our identity on our return. At last the sleds drew near enough to recognize Armow, who was hastening up to us ahead of the others.
We lay over the next day, for Toolooah, who had exerted himself even beyond his great powers of endurance, was still quite exhausted, and though he expressed his readiness to resume the journey, Lieutenant Schwatka did not think it sufficiently urgent to run the risk of breaking him down altogether; not only out of personal regard for the noble fellow, but, as he was our sole dependence, losing his services would have been a sad if not a fatal disaster to the entire party.
At last we heard the dogs, and finally saw the sled, still at a great distance on the ice. The gale that had been blowing all day long, and driving the damp, cold mist into our faces, making it intensely cold and disagreeable, had subsided, and we signalled Toolooah to join us.
The heat while walking was quite as exhausting as ninety-eight degrees in the shade at New York. We saw a number of seals on the ice opposite the mouth of the inlet, and Toolooah shot one which was an unusually big specimen. In fact, the average of those we saw in this part of the country is much larger than those at Hudson's Bay.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking