uck and ice!'
and another mouthful of big, strong words gurgled from that man's lips
like water from an uncorked jug.

"'Don't, Mr. Morrison, don't do that,' said I, in a voice cold as the
ice in that four foot hole, 'you may be heard by some one who will
report you to the church trustees, and then you will be expelled. At
your age it would be a positive disgrace.'

"'Shut your mouth, I tell you,' he yelled, 'I ain't no baby! I know what
I'm doing, and I know what I want to do, but it ain't mining on this
confounded tundra!'

"At this I clapped my hands over my ears to shut out such language, but
he kept on just the same.

"'Did we lease our farm for a whole year with all the machinery and
stock, pack up our household furniture and come three thousand miles
over this water like the blooming old idiots we are, to dig in a
muckhole full of ice? Did we tell our banker that he should have the
very first gold we took out of the ground to pay the two hundred dollar
mortgage on our town lots? Does this look much like lifting mortgages
from anything?'

"As I made no reply he insisted, 'Does it, I say?'

"'No, Pa Morrison, it doesn't,' I admitted, 'but wait a minute and let
me talk.'

"'Well, ain't you talking now?' he rejoined irritably.

"Without noticing his exasperating words or tone I said calmly:

"'I remember hearing Leroy say when we first arrived that the tundra is
a hard and peculiar proposition. Many have failed at mining it, but to
those who go to work at it in the right way, at the proper time it will
prove a bonanza. Now, probably you and I have not gone at it properly.'

"A surly silence ensued, during which Pa worked slowly, with anything
but a good grace. Leroy was right. The tundra was a hard and peculiar
proposition. Nothing like it had we ever seen before. For miles on three
sides of us it spread itself like a carpet of green, dotted often with
tiny pools of clear water, shining like glass in the June sunshine.
Miles away to the northward rolled the smooth-topped hills, only one of
them bearing a small, rocky crest; while further away, and forming a
background to these, lay the snow-tipped Sawtooth."

To the south of us and close at hand spread the wonderful waters upon
whose broad and beautiful bosom we had so lately sailed, and whose
gently sweeping surf was today making sweet music among the sands and
pebbles on the beach.

"Many ships lay at anchor beyond. However, it was neither the scener