ng mouth emptying its pure waters into the
muddy Yukon, it has a good length of several hundred miles, and must not
be lightly mentioned. On its "left limit" were Bonanza and Eldorado
Creeks where men with underground fires burning both night and day tried
with puny strength to checkmate the stubborn ice king in order to add to
the dumps to be hopefully washed out in the springtime. Though they
burned their eyes from their sockets in these pestilential smoke holes,
and though from badly cooked and scanty meals their blackened limbs made
declaration that the dreaded scurvy was upon them; still there were
always men eager to fill the places of those who succumbed, and the work
went on.

There were creeks called Bear, Rock, Benson, Wolf, Gnat and Fox, which
with Nello, Arizona, and many more, went to make up the far-famed
Klondyke River.

Now all were fast frozen. Snow lay deep upon the ice. No babbling of
hurrying waters over pebbly creek beds was heard, but instead, the axe
of the solitary miner at wood chopping on the banks of silent streams.

As the short days passed, and the small caravan forged on, the smoke of
white men's cabins was more seldom seen; until finally the last one was
pointed out by Indian Pete, and it was soon left far behind.

Shorter grew the daylight hours. Proceeding they were forced to break
trails, although their guide appeared familiar with the region and was
heading toward the best and easiest pass in the Rockies. This tedious
snow waste once crossed, their way to the great lakes was comparatively
clear.

They soon learned to travel as well in the dusky snow-light as by
daylight, and enjoyed it better, for there was no glare of the sun on
the white mantled earth. Their dog-teams were good ones, and a source of
comfort to the travelers whose experience with this mode of migration
was limited. While the weary men slept in their little tents by night
the malamutes howled and rested at intervals. If one happened to be
startled by a bad dream he immediately communicated the fact to his
neighbors, of whom there were more than thirty, and they, either from
sympathetic interest in a brother, or because they resented being waked
thus unceremoniously in the midst of enjoyable naps, began echoing their
sentiments in the most lugubrious manner. To all sorts of notes in the
musical scale the voices of these dogs ranged, they seeming to spare no
pains to give varied entertainment. How these creatures wo