pany for me as they had been from the first. What
I should ever have done in that solitude without them I don't know.
The great bushy wag of Kaiser's tail, and the loud purr of the cat,
were the two things that cheered me more than anything else. I do
believe that cat to have had the loudest purr of any cat that ever
lived. A young tiger need not have been ashamed of it. And as for the
grand wave and flourish of Kaiser's tail, it is beyond all
description.

On one of my rabbit-hunting trips, about a week after the big
blizzard, I very foolishly got both of my feet frost-bitten and paid
the full penalty. The day seemed not quite so cold, and I did not put
on the heavy pair of woolen stockings which I commonly wore outside of
my shoes and inside of my overshoes. I crouched behind a snowbank
beyond the Butte for some time waiting for a rabbit which I saw to
come within range, something which he did not do, and was so
interested in this that I did not notice what was happening to my
feet. But what had happened was quite plain enough when I got home and
a great ache set up in my toes. I got the dish-pan full of snow and
thrust my feet in, to draw out the frost gradually; but this did not
save me.

Two days later I was fairly laid up. One whole day I could scarce
crawl about the hotel office and keep the fire going. I could not get
to the barn to feed the animals, though they were suffering for food
and water; and what I called my war-fires in the other buildings I
knew were out. My feet were much swollen, and the pain and the worry
must have brought on a fever, and I lay on the lounge all day
expecting nothing less than a fit of sickness; and what will become of
me? I asked myself. I had no appetite for food, which alarmed me very
greatly. I remember no day of my life at Track's End which seemed
darker to me.

Toward night I fell asleep, and awoke with Kaiser licking my face and
whining. I remembered that I had seen in the pantry a package of
boneset, an herb by which my father set great store, holding it a
sovereign remedy for all common complaints. I roused up, and by
clinging to the back of a chair hobbled after it, and steeped myself a
large mugful, very hot, and I believe it did me good. Be this as it
may, as the saying is, I was better the next day, and managed to feed
the poor, hungry creatures at the barn; and the day after I was able
to start the fires. But for a week my feet were very painful, and I
suffered m