e from her people, who were
of the Coast and whose Chilcat totem stood at the head of a salt arm of
the sea. My heart did not go out to the woman, nor did I take stock of
her looks. For she scarce took her eyes from the ground, and she was
timid and afraid, as girls will be when cast into a stranger's arms whom
they have never seen before. As I say, there was no place in my heart
for her to creep, for I had a great journey in mind, and stood in need of
one to feed my dogs and to lift a paddle with me through the long river
days. One blanket would cover the twain; so I chose Passuk.

"Have I not said I was a servant to the Government? If not, it is well
that ye know. So I was taken on a warship, sleds and dogs and evaporated
foods, and with me came Passuk. And we went north, to the winter ice-rim
of Bering Sea, where we were landed,--myself, and Passuk, and the dogs. I
was also given moneys of the Government, for I was its servant, and
charts of lands which the eyes of man had never dwelt upon, and messages.
These messages were sealed, and protected shrewdly from the weather, and
I was to deliver them to the whale-ships of the Arctic, ice-bound by the
great Mackenzie. Never was there so great a river, forgetting only our
own Yukon, the Mother of all Rivers.

"All of which is neither here nor there, for my story deals not with the
whale-ships, nor the berg-bound winter I spent by the Mackenzie.
Afterward, in the spring, when the days lengthened and there was a crust
to the snow, we came south, Passuk and I, to the Country of the Yukon. A
weary journey, but the sun pointed out the way of our feet. It was a
naked land then, as I have said, and we worked up the current, with pole
and paddle, till we came to Forty Mile. Good it was to see white faces
once again, so we put into the bank. And that winter was a hard winter.
The darkness and the cold drew down upon us, and with them the famine. To
each man the agent of the Company gave forty pounds of flour and twenty
of bacon. There were no beans. And, the dogs howled always, and there
were flat bellies and deep-lined faces, and strong men became weak, and
weak men died. There was also much scurvy.

"Then came we together in the store one night, and the empty shelves made
us feel our own emptiness the more. We talked low, by the light of the
fire, for the candles had been set aside for those who might yet gasp in
the spring. Discussion was held, and it was sa