the leaves went to my heart with a
hint of home, and I remembered with a start how absolutely windless
the sullen forest of the Skeena had been.

Near by a dam was built across the river, and a fishing trap made out
of willows was set in the current. Piles of caribou hair showed that
the Indians found game in the autumn. We took time to explore some
old fishing huts filled with curious things,--skins, toboggans,
dog-collars, cedar ropes, and many other traps of small value to
anybody. Most curious of all we found some flint-lock muskets made
exactly on the models of one hundred years ago, but dated 1883! It
seemed impossible that guns of such ancient models should be
manufactured up to the present date; but there they were all
carefully marked "London, 1883."

It was a long day of rest and regeneration. We took a bath in the
clear, cold waters of the stream, washed our clothing and hung it up
to dry, beat the mud out of our towels, and so made ready for the
onward march. We should have stayed longer, but the ebbing away of
our grub pile made us apprehensive. To return was impossible.

THE CLOUDS

Circling the mountains the gray clouds go
Heavy with storms as a mother with child,
Seeking release from their burden of snow
With calm slow motion they cross the wild--
Stately and sombre, they catch and cling
To the barren crags of the peaks in the west,
Weary with waiting, and mad for rest.

THE GREAT STIKEEN DIVIDE

A land of mountains based in hills of fir,
Empty, lone, and cold. A land of streams
Whose roaring voices drown the whirr
Of aspen leaves, and fill the heart with dreams
Of dearth and death. The peaks are stern and white
The skies above are grim and gray,
And the rivers cleave their sounding way
Through endless forests dark as night,
Toward the ocean's far-off line of spray.

CHAPTER XV

IN THE COLD GREEN MOUNTAINS

The Nasse River, like the Skeena and the Stikeen, rises in the
interior mountains, and flows in a south-westerly direction, breaking
through the coast range into the Pacific Ocean, not far from the
mouth of the Stikeen.

It is a much smaller stream than the Skeena, which is, moreover,
immensely larger than the maps show. We believed we were about to
pass from the watershed of the Nasse to the east fork of the Iskoot,
on which those far-shining prairies were said to lie, with their
flowery meadows