In the Land of White Death

by Valerian Albanov

  But my navigational tools are now almost worthless. What would I not give for a good chart and an accurate chronometer! Still, even if I had had a better timepiece, it probably would not have withstood the constant battering. The only service this particular chronometer has rendered is to prove, each time I shoot the sun, that we are almost always drifting to the west. Inside my kayak, it has also functioned as a most comfortable seat!

  If we do manage to reach land and determine our coordinates, I should be able to trace our course on the map without error. Scanning the horizon for some sign of land is thus extremely important. But I cannot expect much assistance from my comrades in this regard, for they remain curiously indifferent to such matters. Hoping to persuade them to search the horizon from the top of a high block of ice now and then, I have promised twenty-five rubles to the first man who sights land.

  We spent the night at the very edge of a narrow lead. The wind was blowing from the northwest, force 6.* We saw polar bear tracks in three different places.

  * Force 6 on the Beaufort scale is a “strong breeze” of 22 to 27 knots (25 to 31 mph).

  MAY 31

  We had just finished our breakfast when Maximov rushed into the tent shouting that he had spotted a huge bear on the opposite side of the lead. Lunayev and I jumped up, grabbed our rifles, and ran out, hiding behind blocks of ice. We waited in silence, but when we spotted the animal, it was out of range. We were in a favorable position, however, which allowed us to follow the bear’s every movement. He raised his muzzle and sniffed the wind. The smell of roasted fat coming from our camp clearly enticed him, but he could not decide whether to move closer. If it had not been for three black spots on his head and the yellowish tinge of his fur, he would have blended in perfectly with his icy backdrop. Only his nose and eyes betrayed his presence as he moved about.

  He soon detected our presence and watched us with a lively interest for roughly five minutes. Then suddenly he turned tail and bolted for safety. There was no time to lose; we had to attack. We both fired simultaneously and hit our target. The gigantic animal fell, but got up again right away and began to trot off. So we fired off a few more rounds in succession: The bear fell once more and rolled head over heels, but again got up to flee the danger zone. He was so badly wounded, however, that this new attempt at flight was unsuccessful; he could no longer stand, and after writhing about and biting the ice, he soon lay motionless. We immediately got into a kayak and rowed to the spot where, by all appearances, he lay dead. But as we drew near, the bear jumped up on his hind legs and ran off as quickly as a racehorse. As we could not pursue him, we returned to the camp, greatly annoyed at this useless waste of ammunition.

  After a few minutes, Konrad asked permission to continue the hunt. I agreed but, for his own safety, sent his friend Smirennikov along with him. They quickly found the injured bear, which again tried to run away as they approached, but his strength failed him and after a few steps he fell dead into a pool. We all went together to fetch our magnificent prey, and carefully cut up the carcass back at the camp. Before long the cauldrons were bubbling all around us. Once again we had a superb meal, if quite unexpected, and we ate to our heart’s content. But this time, we left the liver for the goddess of the hunt!

  Today, May 31, seems to be a very lucky day. In addition to the roast bear that Diana has bestowed upon us, we have enjoyed the distinguished favors of Aeolus, blowing from the north. My calculations showed our latitude to be 81°54´, and it seemed to me, although I could not be certain, that our plumb line touched the sea bed at one hundred fathoms. I harbored the increasingly firm conviction that land must be nearby. All around us Nature had suddenly taken on a new aspect. Various signs of life were replacing the lethal silence that had reigned so far. We often saw birds now, and encountered a good number of seals. Flocks of fulmars flew overhead. These were clear signs that we were approaching those latitudes where the realm of white death would end. The ice was in constant motion, and chunks continually broke away from the large ice floes.

  In our camp, too, there were more signs of life today. Cooking utensils played a major role and the steward was displaying his talents. Under his supervision everyone was cooking, roasting, making sausages, or drying meat. The bear we killed today was no less than ten feet long from the tip of the nose to the tail. His pelt is truly beautiful. One would get a lot of money for it in a market. It is a pity that we must abandon it; but it would be impossible to haul such a load with us, now that we are preparing to discard even some of our essentials.

  Sadness has given way to exuberant high spirits, and there seems to be a contest to see who could offer the best proof that life is worth living, even in these desolate, faroff regions.

  A strong wind out of the north brought a violent snowstorm during the night.

  SUNDAY, JUNE 1

  My saint’s day! Early in the morning everyone began to offer me his best wishes. Our steward, Regald, made an effort to mark the event with a well-prepared banquet. Each of us had an enormous bear steak seasoned with onions, and a hot, juicy sausage, and for dessert we had tea with the last of the dried apples. All the guests were in a very festive mood, which was bolstered by a favorable wind driving us relentlessly southward. It was almost as though all we had to do was to sit in our tent and wait, as if a postal coach were delivering us slowly but surely to our destination. Latitude 81°49.5´.

  We are indeed drifting continually southward. But I have been worried by a secondary phenomenon that, for the moment, I have kept hidden from my companions. The ice is drifting to the south-southwest and clearly there are no obstacles to stop its progression. But how are we to reach the archipelago we are so impatiently waiting for! This thought brings bitter pangs of concern. How happy would I have been if our present drift had come to our aid when we were still to the north of Franz Josef Land. Now this rapid southward drift will inevitably cause us to miss land altogether and sweep us into the Barents Sea. In fact, we should have been moving along the western coast of the archipelago, between Franz Josef Land and Svalbard. Surprisingly, during the last few days, the ice has been moving in a very irregular fashion, which may be due to the tides.

  The possibility still remains that the ice may come into contact with the shore, no doubt very far away. All these unanswered questions depress me greatly at times. Anyone who has been in a position to observe the immensity of Nature’s power feels intimidated by his own perceptions—as if giants were testing their strength by playing with each other on a colossal chessboard. I will try to give an example: In exploring the region to the south-southeast, we were surprised to discover ski tracks on one of the ice floes. Closer examination convinced us that we were looking at our own tracks, and that this ice floe had caught up with us as a result of a change of current. How is one supposed to proceed over this sort of ice? On the surface, one achieves no more success than a squirrel in a wheel-cage. Even our reconnaissance forays are dangerous: If one goes too far from camp, one can easily get lost.

  Today we took a sounding but did not reach the bottom with a 100-fathom line. On our scouting trip we saw the fresh tracks of a female bear with two cubs, as well as the tracks of three other adult bears. Lunayev shot a seal, but before it could be retrieved, it sank. The north wind blew constantly throughout the evening, and snow fell during the night.

  JUNE 2

  At dawn the north wind turns into a howling gale. Screeching and wailing, it heaps up sheets of ice like playing cards, and shakes our tent with blustering violence, making it crack and strain. There is water rushing everywhere. It would be pointless to attempt to take out the kayaks. The ice driven by the storm does not seem to be encountering any obstacles to the south-southwest. The open sea must lie in that direction.

  I took advantage of a few moments of relative calm to make some celestial observations and came up with 81°42.5´. We have moved seven nautical miles to the south in the last twenty-four hours. Where can we be? Surely to the west of the Franz Josef arc
hipelago. Perhaps we are somewhere to the north of Alexandra Land. We can only hope that we are not too far west, somewhere between Franz Josef Land and Svalbard. Then we would be in a bad mess—we might miss Franz Josef Land altogether and still not reach Svalbard.

  If I am not mistaken, Nansen saw land when traveling with Johansen from his winter quarters on Jackson Island toward Cape Flora. It must have been low-lying land, covered in ice and snow. It would be wonderful if we could find Nansen’s route, for then I could refer to his observations, which I had carefully noted in the diary. I know nothing of Alexandra Land; on my pitiful map, the coast is indicated only by a dotted line. Obviously, it is useless to nurture any suppositions when they cannot be supported by solid proof. We must be patient. Let us wait and see. One thing is certain: We must move southeast, and under no circumstances may we deviate to the west.

  It was with mixed feelings that I curled up into my malitsa again today. For the time being we must remain idle, wait for better weather and a better route, and consider ourselves lucky to have been well fed, with enough left over to provide considerable reserves of dried meat. Despite the impossible terrain, Lunayev went out and shot a seal that we will use only for fuel. There were high waves in the lead, and when it came time to retrieve the seal, my “seamen” lost their nerve and hid behind one another. I paddled out alone to encourage them.

  For the time being the storm is shrieking its triumphant overture, crushing everything in its path. Thank God we are under cover!

  JUNE 4

  A strong northerly wind continues to blow, with snow flurries but warmer temperatures. The air is damp both outside and inside the tent, and the ground sheet is soaked, since there is no air blowing through. We have been forced to move the tent to drier positions lately, but that would be useless today, since outside everything is soggy as well. Even our clothes are soaking wet. So we sit together in silence; we feel as if we are clad in damp bandages all day. The weather is just as unbearable inside as out. Even if we had more heat it would not reduce the humidity in the tent, however zealously Lunayev provides us with seal blubber for heating—something which is not all that easy, for the seals are to be found only in the channels, and only very briefly lift their heads out of the water. Lunayev is the best shot among us; his shooting is simply masterly. The marksman must be skilled in order to hit his target, for the animal’s head is quite small. And one must shoot the animal squarely in the head, for otherwise it will swim away; it is very resistant to injury. If you encounter a seal on the ice, it immediately slithers into a water hole and disappears, for it is an excellent swimmer.

  I left the tent to inspect the horizon and spotted a polar bear very close by. He raised his head and followed my movements with keen attention. I tried to attract him by feigning fear and hid behind a large block of ice. I thought he would follow me but he turned around and disappeared. We often played hide-and-seek in this way with the “king of the eternal ice,” the outcome always being in our favor, and fatal for the bear. If you show no sign of fear when confronting a polar bear, he will generally hesitate for a moment, the three characteristic black dots of his face swinging back and forth like a pendulum, then quite abruptly run off. Polar bears show extreme endurance when they are wounded. I have witnessed cases in which, even with their hind legs broken and their spinal cords injured, they would manage to drag themselves away on their front paws alone. We once found twelve bullets in a carcass, including explosive ones of the type seal hunters use, which shatter bones and tear the flesh as they leave the body, without killing the animal immediately. A bear that is mortally wounded is a very dangerous adversary. Sometimes one may think he is dead, but then as the silent hunter draws near, the bear will grab hold of him and tear the man apart with his last remaining strength. But as a rule the creature is relatively fearful, and a first encounter with man will cause him to retreat immediately. He runs clumsily, but even deep snow cannot stop him. When a female is passing with her cubs, she is extraordinarily cautious and almost never allows herself to wander within range of a hunter. It is strangely moving to see a female loping across thin, fresh ice with her cubs. She practically crawls on her stomach with her legs widespread, and the cubs jump along behind her like frogs. Although they are excellent swimmers and divers, polar bears do not like going into the cold water in winter. One day we saw a bear that was trying to escape from us break the ice, dive in the water, and swim away under the frozen surface. After a short while he broke through the ice from below and poked his head out of the water to see if we were still pursuing him. Then he dived again and continued swimming under the ice. It was only when he was well away from us that he resurfaced.

  Neither yesterday nor today was I able to take a sun sight. The plumb line showed that we were heading south-southwest. I also noticed that the leads were contracting and expanding with great regularity, which confirmed my suspicion that the constant motion of the ice pack is due to the tides; but because we are still on the open ocean we cannot really feel their effect.

  As the weather had improved by evening, we are preparing our departure. First and foremost we have to dry our clothes, and we are going to sacrifice a sledge and a kayak to dry our wet things in front of the flames. For ten men, three sledges and three kayaks are quite sufficient. We will lash two kayaks together side by side to enable them to withstand any strong waves.

  The state of our supplies: In addition to the stocks of bear meat, we have twelve sacks of biscuits, three pounds of salt, and four pounds of dried meat for broth. There are also our warm clothing, our dishes, our skis, and our most valuable belongings of all—the guns and ammunition.

  JUNE 5

  The weather is changing before our very eyes. A slight southerly breeze has replaced the north wind, and it is overcast and damp. Hidden behind the clouds the sun shines occasionally with a dull glow. This brighter light is again giving us violent attacks of snow blindness. Every object, even a close one, appears blurred as if seen through a muslin curtain; sometimes we even see double.

  We are still drifting southward. I have calculated our position to be 81°09´, but I do not trust this to be altogether correct, as one of my eyes does not see well and I cannot clearly distinguish the horizon.

  At four in the afternoon, I could see a vague outline to the east-southeast, but I could not determine exactly what it was. Far away on the horizon were two little white clouds with a slight pinkish tinge. They were visible for a long time, never changing shape or position, until the fog finally engulfed them. As I was incapable of explaining what I had seen, I did not say anything to my companions for the time being, in order not to arouse any false hopes.

  We have never before crossed such rough terrain, full of pools, channels, and crevasses. A great amount of water sky is visible on the horizon. Flocks of little auks and white gulls fill the sky. The gulls make a terrible racket, screeching all night long, fighting over the remains of our dinner and keeping me awake. They are like evil spirits flitting around us, reveling in our unfortunate circumstances. They laugh, shriek, whistle, and scream like hysterical women. Never shall I forget their strident cries. Nor the torture of the sun, blinding us even at night in our tent through every crack and slit in the canvas.

  Today our sounding line again failed to reach bottom, although we lowered it twice. As usual, the line indicated we are drifting south. The wind is again blowing from the north. Hurrah!

  JUNE 6

  I have just recalculated my figures from yesterday’s observation and found them to be exact. We are below 81°01´. During our idle week we have managed to put behind us an entire degree of latitude, that is to say, all of sixty nautical miles. Perhaps this progress is not due to the winds alone; I am convinced that the current also has something to do with it.

  Now that we are exactly at latitude 81°, the question of our longitude is even more urgent. I am sure that we are drifting to the west of the Franz Josef archipelago, since Alexandra Land, according to my map, is farther
north than 81°, and we should have reached its northern shore long ago. There are only two possibilities: Either my map is wrong, or we are already between Franz Josef Land and Svalbard. But in the latter case we must have also gone by Gillis Land without even seeing it. I cannot decide which of these suppositions might be correct. Perhaps we shall fail to make landfall on the western edge of Alexandra Land; if so, our hopes of reaching Cape Flora and the Jackson camp with its coveted supplies will vanish. We would then have to try to reach Svalbard. But even before considering all these hypotheses there remains one vital question: Will our strength withstand the hardships that the future still holds in store? Will our sledges and kayaks stand up to more hard use? Will our perseverance and our faith eventually be rewarded? We are drifting endlessly, aimlessly.

  Seals keep showing themselves in the leads. They are larger than any we have previously seen, but we have not managed to kill a single one, they are so wary. The hysterical, indefatigable gulls fly around day and night. Today we broke up the fourth kayak and our most delapidated sledge for fuel. We will push on with only three “chariots.” We only have a small supply of biscuits left.

  JUNE 7

  Still in the same position! We seem to be sharing the same fate as Nansen.* We also have our “waiting camp.” But what will we gain?

  * In June 1895, Nansen and Johansen spent a whole month in one camp, feasting off a bearded seal they had killed, and overhauling their gear.

  The same northwesterly wind as yesterday. If it blows more to the east, it will be more to our advantage. The sky is somber and wet snow is falling. On the ice, too, there is a thaw. All around us are nothing but channels and pools of water. It is as if the ice were alive. Water sky is visible on the horizon. Am I hallucinating, or is the ice floe on which we are camped moving faster than the one to the east of us?