ten. And the best of the grub was not good, while we went on stint from
the start. Likewise the pick of the dogs was poor, and we were hard put
to keep them on their legs. At the White River our three sleds became
two sleds, and we had only come two hundred miles. But we lost nothing;
the dogs that left the traces went into the bellies of those that
remained.

"Not a greeting, not a curl of smoke, till we made Pelly. Here I had
counted on grub; and here I had counted on leaving Long Jeff, who was
whining and trail-sore. But the factor's lungs were wheezing, his eyes
bright, his cache nigh empty; and he showed us the empty cache of the
missionary, also his grave with the rocks piled high to keep off the
dogs. There was a bunch of Indians there, but babies and old men there
were none, and it was clear that few would see the spring.

"So we pulled on, light-stomached and heavy-hearted, with half a thousand
miles of snow and silence between us and Haines Mission by the sea. The
darkness was at its worst, and at midday the sun could not clear the sky-
line to the south. But the ice-jams were smaller, the going better; so I
pushed the dogs hard and traveled late and early. As I said at Forty
Mile, every inch of it was snow-shoe work. And the shoes made great
sores on our feet, which cracked and scabbed but would not heal. And
every day these sores grew more grievous, till in the morning, when we
girded on the shoes, Long Jeff cried like a child. I put him at the fore
of the light sled to break trail, but he slipped off the shoes for
comfort. Because of this the trail was not packed, his moccasins made
great holes, and into these holes the dogs wallowed. The bones of the
dogs were ready to break through their hides, and this was not good for
them. So I spoke hard words to the man, and he promised, and broke his
word. Then I beat him with the dog-whip, and after that the dogs