passage. It was a sad
time for the puppy.

The boy learned, too, as fast as the dog; though a dog-sleigh is a
heart-breaking thing to manage. Each beast is harnessed, the weakest
nearest to the driver, by his own separate trace, which runs under
his left fore-leg to the main thong, where it is fastened by a sort
of button and loop which can be slipped by a turn of the wrist, thus
freeing one dog at a time. This is very necessary, because young dogs
often get the trace between their hind legs, where it cuts to the bone.
And they one and all WILL go visiting their friends as they run, jumping
in and out among the traces. Then they fight, and the result is more
mixed than a wet fishing-line next morning. A great deal of trouble can
be avoided by scientific use of the whip. Every Inuit boy prides himself
as being a master of the long lash; but it is easy to flick at a mark on
the ground, and difficult to lean forward and catch a shirking dog just
behind the shoulders when the sleigh is going at full speed. If you call
one dog's name for "visiting," and accidentally lash another, the two
will fight it out at once, and stop all the others. Again, if you travel
with a companion and begin to talk, or by yourself and sing, the dogs
will halt, turn round, and sit down to hear what you have to say. Kotuko
was run away from once or twice through forgetting to block the sleigh
when he stopped; and he broke many lashings, and ruined a few thongs
before he could be trusted with a full team of eight and the light
sleigh. Then he felt himself a person of consequence, and on smooth,
black ice, with a bold heart and a quick elbow, he smoked along over
the levels as fast as a pack in full cry. He would go ten miles to the
seal-holes, and when he was on the hunting-grounds he would twitch a
trace loose from the pitu, and free the big black leader, who was
the cleverest dog in the team. As soon as the dog had scented a
breathing-hole, Kotuko would reverse the sleigh, driving a couple of
sawed-off antlers, that stuck up like perambulator-handles from the
back-rest, deep into the snow, so that the team could not get away. Then
he would crawl forward inch by inch, and wait till the seal came up
to breathe. Then he would stab down swiftly with his spear and
running-line, and presently would haul his seal up to the lip of the
ice, while the black leader came up and helped to pull the carcass
across the ice to the sleigh. That was the time when t