in jest and half in earnest, as another blast shook the building to its
foundation.

The two Indians sat like statues of bronze, smoking their calumets in
silence, while Gaspard and Prince rose and went to the window. But the
frozen moisture on the panes effectually prevented their seeing out.

It was indeed an awful night--such a night as had not, until now,
visited the precincts of Fort Chimo. Viewed from the rocky platform on
the hill, the raging of the storm was absolutely sublime. The wind came
sometimes in short, angry gusts, sometimes in prolonged roars, through
the narrows, sweeping up clouds of snow so dense that it seemed as
though the entire mass had been uplifted from the earth, hurling it
upwards and downwards and in circling eddies, past the ravines, and
round the fort, and launching it with a fierce yell into the valley of
the Caniapuscaw. The sky was not altogether covered with clouds, and
the broken masses, as they rolled along, permitted a stray moonbeam to
dart down upon the turmoil beneath, and render darkness visible.
Sometimes the wind lulled for a second or two, as if to breathe; then it
burst forth again, splitting through the mountain gorges with a shriek
of intensity; the columns of snow sprang in thousands from every hollow,
cliff and glen, mingled in wild confusion, swayed, now hither, now
thither, in mad uncertainty, and then, caught by the steady gale, pelted
on, like the charging troops of ice-land, and swept across the frozen
plain.

Could human beings face so wild a storm as this? Ay, they could--at
least they could dare to try!

There was one traveller out upon the hills on that tremendous night.
The giant was in the midst of it; but weak as the bulrush were the
mighty limbs of Maximus before the rushing gale. Several days previous
to this the Esquimau had been sent down to his brethren at False River,
to procure some seal-meat for the dogs, and to ascertain the condition
of the natives and their success in fishing. On arriving, he found that
they had been so far successful, that starvation (their too frequent
guest) had not yet visited their dwellings of snow. But Maximus found
the old woman who had formerly saved his life very ill, and apparently
about to die. Having learned from experience the efficacy of Stanley's
medicines, he resolved to procure some for the old woman, whom he had
tenderly watched over and hunted for ever since the eventful day of the
attack. His do