Ten Thousand Years in Ice

One afternoon early in August, while I was idly strolling along the seawall, enjoying the sunshine and the salt breeze, my attention was caught by an unusual commotion on the quay of Section Two. From a distance, I could see that considerable effort was being made to unload some heavy object from a vessel moored alongside. As I drew nearer, I saw by the name on the stern that it was the whaling bark _Marion_, and that the object the crew, with the help of some longshoremen, were struggling to bring ashore was an immense rectangular block, about nine feet long and four feet wide and thick. They worked as hard as if it were granite, prying it with rollers and levers along a gangway of stout planks laid from the deck to the quay. The object, whatever it was, was wrapped in layers of sacking, so I could not tell what it might be.

As I stood there speculating, someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to see a heavily bearded, sun-bronzed man in a pea-jacket and rough trousers, with a laugh in his eye. “What! Don’t you know me?” he said cheerily. I was sure I had never seen him before, though something in his voice sounded familiar. Then he exclaimed, “Don’t you remember Joe Burnham? Has a year changed me so much? If so, I’m glad of it. You couldn’t have paid me a better compliment!”

I grasped his hand in surprise. “Can it be possible, Joe? Who would have expected to meet you coming off a whaler, and with a beard like that!”

“Why, I thought you knew all about it,” he replied, equally surprised. “Just wait a minute.” He turned to give directions to the men, who had just secured the heavy load on the quay and were hoisting it onto a dray.

While he was busy, I recalled some facts that made his appearance less astonishing. Joe Burnham, son of a well-known millionaire mining man, had been recommended about a year before to travel abroad for his health, worn down by intense study. But I had no idea he had chosen to take his cure on a whaler. Knowing his love for scientific pursuits of every kind, I was not entirely surprised to meet him there. The trip had certainly done him good, for he had changed from a sickly, delicate student into a hale, hearty, robust man.

“Yes,” he remarked as he came back from the dray, which was now moving slowly off, the four sturdy horses straining under the weight, “my doctor prescribed absolute freedom from brain-work. He shook his head when I suggested Europe. Too much to be seen in Asia, he said, or in any other quarter of the globe, to ensure the perfect rest I needed. Even a yachting trip didn’t meet his approval; its monotony and loneliness would drive me to thinking. The sea part of it was fine, he admitted, but I needed something to do as well. Then a lucky inspiration struck me, and I asked if he’d object to a whaling voyage. 'The very thing,' he said. 'You have plenty of money, so you can go more as a passenger than a sailor. You won’t have much time to study aboard that kind of vessel, and I’ll risk whatever chances you get for studying the flora and fauna of the Arctic.' And that’s how I happen to be disembarking from the _Marion_ just now.”

“You’ve plenty of baggage, anyway,” I said, motioning toward the dray now disappearing toward the city. “Is it your share of blubber, or specimens of Arctic flora and fauna that your doctor warned you about?”

“Partly right and partly wrong,” Burnham said seriously. “You may be nearer the truth than you think. But this is no time or place to talk about it. Come to my house tomorrow morning, and I’ll show you something that will astonish you. I particularly want you to come,” he emphasized. “You’ll be well repaid. Meanwhile, I have more to arrange on board.” With that, he crossed the gangway and disappeared.

The next morning, around ten, I climbed the steps of the Burnham mansion and was shown to a small courtyard where my friend was waiting in his shirtsleeves, supervising the placement of the heavy object that had excited my curiosity. Workmen had just succeeded in hoisting it onto a strong trestle, about three feet off the ground. Burnham dismissed the men, then took me into his laboratory and studio, which opened onto this private courtyard. The laboratory was cluttered with scientific apparatus, while the studio was luxuriously furnished but had been rearranged: the center of the room held an improvised table with a mattress, a bureau-bed stood unfolded at one wall, and a blazing fire burned in the grate, though the day was warm.

Before I could puzzle over these preparations, Burnham called me to help fire up a portable steam engine in the corner of the yard. He attached a length of pipe to the exhaust, with a movable arm, explaining, “We’ll use steam to melt the ice.” He then began to cut away the ropes from the sack-wrapped package. When he removed the last layer of sacking, I saw an immense block of blue, pellucid ice.

And then I saw, imbedded in the heart of the transparent crystal, the form of a man.

The body lay on its back, so life-like that it was hard to believe he was dead. His eyes were dark and wide open, not glassy. Thick, curly black hair and a closely trimmed beard looked natural. He wore a light tunic of some unknown fabric, with colors still bright, and sandals on his feet. A gemmed ring sparkled on one finger. He was a handsome man around thirty, in a pose of calm repose.

I turned to Burnham, who was watching me with a smile. “Well, what do you think of my package? Was it worth bringing from the Arctic circle?”

“I congratulate you,” I said. “It will be a great acquisition for our scientists. But how will you preserve it? Keeping ice frozen must be difficult and expensive.”

“That’s not my intention,” he replied. “I mean to thaw him out.”

“And then?” I asked.

“Resuscitate him.”

I looked to see if he was joking, but his face was serious. “Why not?” he went on. “That man is as organically perfect as you or I. No fiber of his organism has changed. Suppose he drowned and was frozen shortly after; he’s no worse off now, even after thousands of years, than a man drowned five minutes ago. And my friend Dr. Dunne agrees with me.” Just then, Dr. Dunne entered the courtyard, apologizing for his lateness.

The doctor, a renowned physician, endorsed Burnham’s plan. “We can try,” he said. “This is a golden opportunity to test my treatment for drowned persons.”

“But what about the freezing?” I asked, feeling ignorant.

“So much the better,” said the doctor. “It’s easier to work when conditions are uniform.”

By then, steam was rising from the engine. Burnham directed the jet at the ice block, and soon clouds of steam filled the courtyard. In less than half an hour, the block had melted down to a thin shell around the body. We carefully carried the ice-encased man into the laboratory, where a roaring stove had warmed the room to nearly Turkish-bath heat.

“So far, so good,” Burnham said, mopping his brow. “Let’s sit down and rest while our guest—as he called the thawing body—sheds the remnant of his crystal mantle.”

We were eager to hear how he had found this wonder, so Burnham told his story:

“After leaving San Francisco in March, we sailed north for Behring Sea. I went as a volunteer, living in the cabin, and the fresh air and adventure did wonders for my health. By June we had passed Behring Straits, but our luck was poor, and a storm blew us far north until we were trapped by ice near Banks’s Land. We spent the long winter icebound. As soon as the sun appeared in April, I would go rambling with my gun. One day in May, we came upon a patch of clear, transparent ice. Looking down, I saw the body of a man embedded about sixteen feet below. I persuaded the captain to let me dig down to it. We sank a shaft until we were within two feet of the body. And beneath it, I thought I saw dim outlines of buildings, like streets and squares of white marble, but the light was weak, so I couldn’t be sure. I was determined to bring the body back, so I offered the crew a reward to dig it out.

They managed to extract a large block of ice containing the man. The captain objected at first, but I bought his agreement with a check for thirty thousand dollars—the average earnings of a whaling trip. He accepted, and we brought the block home.”

By now, the ice had nearly melted away. Dr. Dunne recommended we move rapidly. Burnham prepared a bath, and we laid the body in it. The doctor began with tepid water, gradually rising to blood heat. “The internal organs are frozen,” he explained. “First, we must clear the lungs of water.” He used a special pump to draw water from the lungs, repeating this several times until they were free.

Then he made an incision in the left arm, and a few drops of blood spurted out. “The blood has not coagulated! This is a simple case of drowning, and we can resuscitate him. He may have lain here for centuries, perhaps thousands of years, but now he will live and tell us his story.” I caught his enthusiasm.

The doctor next prepared to stimulate the heart. He placed electrodes on the chest and back, and instructed Burnham to turn on the battery while I, with a tiny bellows, inflated the lungs. The doctor injected a stimulant called _strephanthus_ into the vein. With a signal, Burnham turned on the current; the chest expanded, and I puffed the bellows. This continued for about two minutes, until the doctor shouted, “We’ve won! Look!” Blood was spurting from the severed vein. The chest rose and fell on its own. The doctor tied off the vein and sewed up the incision. We dressed the patient in Burnham’s underwear and placed him in the bed near the fire.

“He’ll wake soon,” said the doctor. “He’ll need warm soup and stimulants.”

We waited. The breathing became easier, color returned to his cheeks, and muscles twitched. At last he turned over, opened his eyes, and uttered an exclamation in a foreign tongue. Burnham brought a tray of refreshments, but the doctor insisted on starting with hot water. The patient understood, drank it, then eagerly devoured the soup and a couple of glasses of Madeira. Then he began speaking, gesturing, apparently asking where he was. None of us understood a word, though his speech sounded like ancient Greek in melody, but not in words.

Burnham suggested, “Let’s give him pen and ink and see if he can write.” The patient examined the pen and paper with interest, then wrote a few characters from right to left, in a script resembling Chaldaic or ancient Sanskrit. We couldn’t read it. But when Burnham handed him a newspaper, he examined it with intense interest, as if trying to understand it. Soon he lay back and fell asleep.

“He’ll be fine by evening,” said the doctor. “What will you do with him then?” he asked Burnham.

“I don’t want to publicize him yet,” Burnham replied. “I’ll first teach him our language. He’s evidently intelligent. Once we can communicate, we’ll learn his story.”

The events I’ve described happened on the ninth of August. Since then, Burnham has worked to teach his guest and dress him in modern clothes. Now the stranger, who calls himself Mr. Kourban Balanok, lives with Burnham as part of the family. Those who see the handsome, distinguished man walking arm-in-arm with Burnham on Kearny or Market Street would never guess that he spent nearly ten thousand years frozen in Arctic ice. But that is the truth, and as he learns English, we may soon hear his incredible account of the prehistoric world and the cataclysm that left him trapped in ice.