y burst out angrily. "Your
stomach's sour. That's what's ailin' you. Swallow a spoonful of sody,
an' you'll sweeten up wonderful an' be more pleasant company."

In the morning Henry was aroused by fervid blasphemy that proceeded from
the mouth of Bill. Henry propped himself up on an elbow and looked to
see his comrade standing among the dogs beside the replenished fire, his
arms raised in objurgation, his face distorted with passion.

"Hello!" Henry called. "What's up now?"

"Frog's gone," came the answer.

"No."

"I tell you yes."

Henry leaped out of the blankets and to the dogs. He counted them with
care, and then joined his partner in cursing the power of the Wild that
had robbed them of another dog.

"Frog was the strongest dog of the bunch," Bill pronounced finally.

"An' he was no fool dog neither," Henry added.

And so was recorded the second epitaph in two days.

A gloomy breakfast was eaten, and the four remaining dogs were harnessed
to the sled. The day was a repetition of the days that had gone before.
The men toiled without speech across the face of the frozen world. The
silence was unbroken save by the cries of their pursuers, that, unseen,
hung upon their rear. With the coming of night in the mid-afternoon, the
cries sounded closer as the pursuers drew in according to their custom;
and the dogs grew excited and frightened, and were guilty of panics that
tangled the traces and further depressed the two men.

"There, that'll fix you fool critters," Bill said with satisfaction that
night, standing erect at completion of his task.

Henry left the cooking to come and see. Not only had his partner tied
the dogs up, but he had tied them, after the Indian fashion, with sticks.
About the neck of each dog he had fastened a leather thong. To this, and
so close to the neck that the dog could not get his teeth to it, he had
tied a stout stick four or five feet in length. The other end of the
stick, in turn, was made fast to a stake in the ground by means of a
leather thong. The dog was unable to gnaw through the leather at his own
end of the stick. The stick prevented him from getting at the leather
that fastened the other end.

Henry nodded his head approvingly.

"It's the only contraption that'll ever hold One Ear," he said. "He can
gnaw through leather as clean as a knife an' jes' about half as quick.
They all'll be here in the mornin' hunkydory."

"You jes' bet they will," Bill aff