inebriate. And yet,
men have so behaved since the world began, feasting, fighting, and
carousing, whether in the dark cave-mouth or by the fire of the
squatting-place, in the palaces of imperial Rome and the rock
strongholds of robber barons, or in the sky-aspiring hotels of modern
times and in the boozing-kens of sailor-town. Just so were these men,
empire-builders in the Arctic Light, boastful and drunken and
clamorous, winning surcease for a few wild moments from the grim
reality of their heroic toil. Modern heroes they, and in nowise
different from the heroes of old time. "Well, fellows, I don't know
what to say to you-all," Daylight began lamely, striving still to
control his whirling brain. "I think I'll tell you-all a story. I had
a pardner wunst, down in Juneau. He come from North Caroliney, and he
used to tell this same story to me. It was down in the mountains in
his country, and it was a wedding. There they was, the family and all
the friends. The parson was just puttin' on the last touches, and he
says, 'They as the Lord have joined let no man put asunder.'

"'Parson,' says the bridegroom, 'I rises to question your grammar in
that there sentence. I want this weddin' done right.'

"When the smoke clears away, the bride she looks around and sees a dead
parson, a dead bridegroom, a dead brother, two dead uncles, and five
dead wedding-guests.

"So she heaves a mighty strong sigh and says, 'Them new-fangled,
self-cocking revolvers sure has played hell with my prospects.'

"And so I say to you-all," Daylight added, as the roar of laughter died
down, "that them four kings of Jack Kearns sure has played hell with my
prospects. I'm busted higher'n a kite, and I'm hittin' the trail for
Dyea--"

"Goin' out?" some one called. A spasm of anger wrought on his face for
a flashing instant, but in the next his good-humor was back again.

"I know you-all are only pokin' fun asking such a question," he said,
with a smile. "Of course I ain't going out."

"Take the oath again, Daylight," the same voice cried.

"I sure will. I first come over Chilcoot in '83. I went out over the
Pass in a fall blizzard, with a rag of a shirt and a cup of raw flour.
I got my grub-stake in Juneau that winter, and in the spring I went
over the Pass once more. And once more the famine drew me out. Next
spring I went in again, and I swore then that I'd never come out till I
made my stake. Well, I ain't made it, and here I a