s heart-breaking to shovel out snow with a hatchet. I am as
tired as a dog. This is harder work than the gold-mines at Kara by a
long way."

"Yes," Luka said, "but there is no man with a gun."

"No, that makes a difference, Luka, this is free work and the other
isn't; not that one can call it exactly free when we have no choice but
to do it."

For another four days the snow continued to fall; but as the wind had
dropped, and the snow no longer drifted, their work each morning was
comparatively easy.

"I wish it would stop," Godfrey said, "for we begin to want food for the
dogs; our stock of dried fish has been exhausted since we were shut up.
There is half a deer hanging to a branch of that tree close to the tent,
but it is eight or ten feet below the snow, and as we can't calculate
the exact position now it would be a big job to try to get at it." There
was, however, no change in the aspect of the weather on the following
morning, and Luka announced that beyond the tea and a handful or two of
flour there was nothing whatever for breakfast, while the dogs had
fasted on the previous day.

"Well, Luka, there is nothing to do but to try and get at that venison.
I have been thinking that it will be easiest to try from below; it is
much quicker work chopping out the solid snow than it is trying to make
a hole in that loose stuff at the surface. The tree was just about in a
line with the front of the tent, wasn't it? and we hung the deer on a
branch that stretched out nearly as far as the tent. I should say we
hung it about half-way along that branch and not above twelve feet from
the tent."

Luka agreed as to the position.

"Very well, then, as we know exactly the direction, and as the distance
is but twelve feet, it ought not to take us very long to chop out a
passage just big enough and high enough for one to crawl through. When
we get near the place where we think it is, we must make the tunnel a
good bit higher, for the bottom of the meat was quite five feet from the
ground so that it should be well out of reach of the dogs. Now, will you
go first or shall I?"

"I will begin," Luka said. "We must make the passage wide enough to push
the snow past us as we get it down."

"Certainly we must, Luka. Make it pretty wide at the bottom, and make
the top arched so as to stand the pressure from above."

It was easy enough work at first, but became more difficult every foot
they advanced, as the one behind had to craw