s he fell to say
his strongest magic:

"Backbone! Backbone!
Save my backbone!"

So as soon as the Kulloo was out of sight the arms and legs and head
began to wriggle together round the backbone, and then in a twinkling
Lox was whole again.

"I shouldn't like that to happen very often," he said, looking himself
over to see if every piece had joined in the right place. "I think I'll
go home and take a rest."

But he had traveled so far that he was six months' journey from his
home; and he had made so many enemies, and done so much mischief, that
whenever he came into a village and asked food and shelter the people
hooted and pelted him out again. The birds and the beasts got to know
when he was coming, and kept so far out of his way that he couldn't get
enough to eat, not even by his magic. Besides, he had wasted his magic
so much that scarcely any was left. The winter came on, and he was cold
as well as hungry, when at last he reached a solitary wigwam by a frozen
river. The master of the wigwam didn't know him, so he treated him
kindly, and said, when they parted next morning:

"You have only three days more to go; but the frost-wind is blowing
colder and colder, and if you don't do as I say you will never get home.
When night comes, break seven twigs from a maple-tree and stand them up
against each other, like the poles of a wigwam, and jump over them. Do
the same the next night, and the night after that if you are not quite
home; but you can only do it thrice."

Away went the joker, swaggering through the woods as if nothing had
happened to him, for now he was warm and full. But soon the wind began
to rise, and it blew sharper and sharper, and bit his face, and pricked
in through his blanket.

"I'm not going to be cold while I know how to be warm," said he; and he
built a little wigwam of sticks, and jumped over it. The sticks blazed
up, and went on burning furiously for an hour. Then they died out
suddenly. Lox groaned and went on his way. In the afternoon he stopped
again, and lit another fire to warm himself by; but again the fire went
out. When night came on he made his third fire wigwam; and that one
burned all night long, and only went out when it was time for him to
begin the day's march.

All day he tramped over the snow, never daring to stop for more than a
few minutes at a time for fear of being frozen to death. At night he
built another little wigwam; but the twigs wouldn't light, howeve