s
across, and we accomplished the whole journey in twelve hours,
including one and a half hours for rest and lunch.

[Illustration: THREE OF THE DOCTOR'S DOGS]

The distance travelled and the average speed attained depends largely
on other factors than the dog power. We have covered seventy-five
miles in a day with comfort; we have done five with difficulty.
Ordinary speed would be six miles an hour, but I once did twenty-one
miles in two hours and a quarter over level ice. Sails can sometimes
be used with advantage on the komatik as an adjunct. The whole charm
of dog-team driving lies in its infinite variety of experiences, the
personal study of each dog, and the need for one's strength, courage,
and resourcefulness.

South and north of the little village of St. Anthony where we had
settled were other similar villages; and we decided that we could make
a round tour every second month at least. We soon found, however, a
great difficulty in getting started, because we always had some
patients in houses near about, whom we felt that we could not leave.
So we selected a motherly woman, whom we had learned that we could
trust to obey orders and not act on her own initiative and judgment,
and trained her as best we could to deal with some of these sick
people. Then, having borrowed and outfitted a couple of rooms in a
friend's house, we left our serious cases under her care, and started
for a month's travel with all the optimism of youth.

Weight on your komatik is a vital question, and not knowing for what
you may be called upon, makes the outfitting an art. I give the
experience of years. The sledge should be eleven feet long. Its
runners should be constructed of black spruce grown in the Far North
where wood grows slowly and is very tough, and yet quite light. The
runners should be an inch thick, eleven inches high, and about
twenty-six inches apart, the bottoms rising at the back half an inch,
as well as at the front toward the horns. The laths are fastened on
with alternate diagonal lashings, are two inches wide, and close
together. Such a komatik will "work" like a snake, adapting itself to
the inequalities of the ground, and will not spread or "buckle." Long
nails are driven up right through the runners, and clinched on the top
to prevent splitting. The runners should be shod with spring steel,
one inch wide; and a second runner, two and a half inches wide, may be
put between the lower one and the wood, to hol