y there was a big lump of snow, such as
children put up when they mean to make a snow-man. The leading dog,
"Brin," as he wallowed about managed to reach it, at the end of his
long trace of about sixty feet. "Brin" had black marks on his face,
which made it look as though he were laughing all the time, like one
who finds this world a grand, good joke. When he clambered out on the
hummock he shook his coat and turned round and gazed calmly at his
master.

"He seemed to be grinning at me," says the Doctor.

But it was no laughing matter for the other dogs, floundering about.

Grenfell hauled himself along toward "Brin" by means of the trace
still attached to his wrist. But suddenly "Brin" stepped out of his
harness, and then the Doctor found himself sprawling and struggling in
the water, with no means of getting to the place where "Brin" had
found temporary safety.

Grenfell thought this time it was all over. He had looked Death in the
eyes before, but Death had decided to go by. This time, it did not
seem possible to escape. He did not feel any great alarm--in fact, he
became drowsy, and thought how easy it would be just to fall asleep
and forget everything, as the icy water chilled and numbed his senses.
He was like the weary traveler who drops into the snow-bank, on whom
the torpor steals by slow degrees.

Suddenly Grenfell caught sight of a big dog that had gone through the
ice and was pulling the trace after him, in a desperate effort to
reach the hummock on which "Brin" was sitting. Grenfell grabbed the
trace, and hauled himself along after the animal. He calls this "using
the dog as a bow anchor."

But the other dogs were following this poor beast's example, and they
crowded and jostled the Doctor so that it was hard for him to hold on.
One of them, in fact, got on his shoulder, very much as a drowning man
in his desperation will throw his arms round the neck of someone who
tries to rescue him, and drag him under. This pushed Grenfell still
deeper into the ice, and it was a question whether his energy would
hold out in that frigid water.

As they say on the football field, he now had only three yards to
gain, and by a mighty effort he drew himself past his living anchor
and climbed up on the piece of slob ice. He rested a moment to draw
breath, and then began to haul his beloved dogs one after another up
to a place beside him. They swam and panted through the lane in the
ice that he had broken, and seemed