the Dominion, caste stands by caste, and
Lisle, having seen and studied other Englishmen of his friend's
description, knew that the feeling was stronger in the older country. To
expose a man of one's own circle to the contempt and condemnation of
outsiders is, in any walk of life, a strangely repugnant thing.

"Well," he said, "to-morrow we'll pull out and portage across the divide
to strike the Gladwynes' trail. And now I'll fry the trout and we'll have
supper."

They let the subject drop by tacit agreement during the meal, and soon
after it was over a shout from the crest of the ridge above, followed by
a smashing of underbrush, announced that their packer was making for the
camp. Lisle answered, and a cry came down:

"Got a deer, and there are duck on the lake ahead! We'll try for some as
we go up!"

Nasmyth's smile betokened deep satisfaction.

"That's a weight off my mind," he declared. "I'll smoke one pipe, and
then I think I'll go to sleep. We'll make a start with the first loads as
soon as it's light enough."

CHAPTER II

THE DIVIDE

Dawn was late the next morning; the light crept slowly through bitter
rain, and when Lisle and his companions had breakfasted sumptuously for
the first time during several days it was with reluctance that they broke
camp. Indeed, Nasmyth would have suggested remaining under shelter only
that he had come to accept Lisle's decision as final and the latter was
eager to push on. The blacktail deer would not last them long; the trout
were getting shyer every day with the increasing cold; they were a long
distance from the nearest settlement; while winter was rapidly coming on.

Nasmyth shouldered his load with the others, and they set out across a
strip of gravel strewn with boulders. Here and there networks of stranded
branches had to be floundered through, and the ragged ends rasped their
dilapidated boots and bruised their legs. Then, where the bluff rose
almost precipitously from the water, they crept along slippery ledges, or
waded through the shallower pools, with the white rapid roaring down a
few yards outshore of them. There were places where a slip would have
meant destruction, but that was nothing unusual and time was too precious
to spend in an attempt to climb the ridge which hemmed them in.

The pack-straps hurt Nasmyth's shoulders--one of them had been rubbed raw
by previous loads and it smarted painfully until he grew warm with
exertion. He was soon we