The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-09-08

/ lay IOE SUITE nllHOQL IlON6Ilcnl,
on his side. Then he slipped out of the
pack-straps and clumsily dragged him
self into sitting posture. 1t was not yet
dark, and in the lingering twilight he
groped about among the rocks for
! shreds of dry moss. When he had
! gathered a heap he built a fire-a
| smoldering, smudgy fire-and put tin
pot OF water on to boil.
He unwrapped his pack and the first
thing he did was TO count his matches.
There were sixty-seven. He counted
them three times to make sure. He
divided them into several portions,
| wrapping them in oiled paper, dispos-
ing of one bunch in his empty tobacco
pouch, OF another bunch in the inside
band of his battered hat, of a third
bunch under his shirt on the chest
This accomplished, panic came upon
him and he unwrapped them ali and
counted them again. There were still
sixty-seven.
He dried his wet footgear by the fire
The moccasins were in soggy shreds
The blanket socks were worn through
in places and his feet were raw and
bleeding. His ankle was throbbing and
he gave 1t an examination. 1t had
swollen to the size of his knee. He tore
a long strip from one of his two blan-
kets and bound the ankle tightly. He
tore other strips and bound them about
his feet to serve for both moccasins
and socks. Then he drank the pot of
water. steaming hot, wound his watch
and crawled between his blankets.
He slept like a dead man. The brief
darkness around midnight came and
went. The sun arose in the northeast
lat least the day dawned in that quar-
ter, for the sun was hidden by gray
clouds.
At o'clock he awoke, quietly lying
on his back. He gazed straight up into
the gray sky and knew that he was
hungry. As he rolled over on his ell
bow he was startled by loud snort,
and saw q bull caribou regarding him
with alert curiosity. The animal was
not more than fifty feet away, and in
stantly into the mans mind leaped the
vision and the SAVIOR of a caribou steak
sizzling and frying over fire. Me
chanically he reached for the empty
gun, drew a bead and pulled the trig-
ger. The bull snorted and Ieaped
away, his hoofs rafting and clatter-
ing as he fled acroCs the lodges.
The man crawled up to a small knoll
and surveyed the prospect. There were
no trees, no bushes, nothing but a gray
sea of moss scarcely diversified by
gray rocks, gray-colored lakelets and
gray streamlets. The sky was gray.
There was no sun or hint of sun. He
had no idea of north, and he had for
gotten the way he had come to this
spot the night before. But he was not
lost. He knew that. Soon he would
come to the land of the little sticks.
He felt that it lay off to the left
somewhere, not far-pOssibly just over
the next low hill.
He went back to put his pack into
shape for travelling. He assured him
self of the existence of his three sepa-
rate parcels of matches, though he
did not stop to count them. But he did
linger, debating, over a squat, moose
hide. sack. 1t was not large. He could
hide it under his two hands. He knew
that il weighed fifteen pounds-as
much as all the rest of the packard
ii worried him. He finally set it to one
side and proceeded TO roll the pack.
He paused to gaze at the squat moose
hide sack. He picked it up hastily with
a defiant glance about him, as though
the desolation were trying to rob hin,
. of it; and when he rose TO his feet to
stagger on into the day it wasA in
Guided in the pack on his back.
| He came upon a valley where rock
ptarmigan rose on whirrirg wings from
the lodges and mdskegs. "Ker-ker-
kerr was the cry they made. He
threw stones at them, but could not hit
them. He placed his pack on the ground
and stalked them as a cat stalks a
sparrow. The sharp rocks cut through
his pants legs till his knees left a trail
/. of blood; but the hurt was lost in the
hurt of mis- hunger. He squirmed over
the wet moss. Saturating his clothes
and chilling his body; but he was not
aware of 1t, so great was his fever for
food. And always the ptarmigan rose,
whirring, before him, till their 'ker-
ker-ker" became a mock to him, and
he cursed them and cried aloud at them
with their own cry.
AS the day wore along he came into
valleys or swales where game was more
plentiful. A band of caribou passed by,
| twenty and odd animals, tantalizingly
within rifle rangt. He felt a wild de-
sire to run after them, a gertrude that
, he could run them down. A black fox
came toward him, carrying a ptarmi-
gan in his mouth. The man shouted. II
, was a fearful cry. but the fox leaping
away in fright, did not drop the ptar-
migan.
Late in the afternoon he followed a
, stream, milky with lime, which ran
through sparse patches of rush-grass
Grasping these rushes firmly near the
root he pulled up what resembled a
, young onion sprout no larger than a
shingle-nail. 1t was tender and his
teeth sank INTO II with a crunch that
; promised deliciously of food But its
, fibres were tough. 1t was composed of
; stringy filaments saturated with water,
, like the berries, and devoid of nourish-
, ment But he threw off his pack and
went into the rush-grass on hands and
knees, crunching and munching like
some bovine creature.
He looked into every pool of water
vainly, until, as the long twilight came
on, he discovered a solitary fish, the
size of a minnow, in such a pool. He
, plunged his arm in up to the shoulder
, but II eluded him. He reached for IL
with both hands and stirred up the
, milky mud at the bottom. In his ex-
citement he fell in, wetting himself
/ to the waist. Then the water was toe
: muddy to admit of his seeing the fish
: and he was compelled to wait until the
sediment had settled.
I The pursuit was renewed, TIL the wa
: ter was again muddled. But he could
5 not wait. He unstrapped the tin buck
= ct and began to bale the pool He baleo
3 wildly at first, splashing himself and
] fiinging the water so short a distance