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


made camp on a rocky ledge in the
same fashion he had the night before.
The last thing he did was to see that
his matches were dry and to wind his
watch. The blankets were wet and
clammy. His ankle pulsed with pain.
But he knew only that he was hungry,
and through his restless sleep he
dreamed of feasts and banquets and of
food served and spread in all magma
bic ways. He awoke chilled and sick.
There was no sun. The gray of earth
and sky had become deeper, more pro-
found. A raw wind was blowing. and
the first f1urries of snow were whiten-
ing the hilltops. The air about him
thickened and grew white while he
made fire and boiled more water. 1t
was wet snow half rain, and the flakes
were large and soggy. At first they
melted as soon as they came in con-
tact with the earth, but ever more fell,
covering the ground. putting out the
fire, spelling his supply of moss fuel
This was the signal for him to strap
on his pack and stumble onward, he
knew not where. He was not concern
ed with the land of little sticks, nor
with Bill and the cache under the up
turned canoe by the River Dease. He
was mastered with the verb ito eat"
He was hunger-mad. He took no heed
of the course he pursued, so long as
that course led him through the swale
bottoms. He felt his way through the
wet snow to the watery muskeg ber-
ries, and went by feel as he pulled up
the rushgrass by the roots. But it was
tasteless stuff and did not satisfy. He
found a weed that tasted sour, and he
ate all he could find of 1t, which was
not much, for it was a creeping growth.
easily hidden under the several inches
Of snow.
He had no fire that night, nor hot
water, and crawled under his blanket
to sleep the broken hunger-sleep. The
snow turned into cold rain. He awak-
ened many times to feel il falling on
his upturned face. Day came-a gray
day and no sun. 1t had ceased raining
The keenness Of his hunger had de-
parted. SensibiIity, so far as concern
ed the yearning for food, had been ex-
hausted. There was a dull, heavy ache
in his stomach, but it did not bother
him so much. He was more rational
and once more he was chiefly interest
ed in the land of little sticks and the
cache by the River Dease
He ripped the remnant of one Of his
blankets into strips and bound his
bleeding feet. Also he recinched the
injured ankle and prepared himself for
a day of travel. When he came to his
pack he paused long over the squat
moose-hide sack, but in the end it went
with him.
The snow had melted under the rain
and only the hilltops showed white
The sun came out and he succeeded in
locating the points of the compass
| though he knew now that he was lost.
Perhaps in his previous days wander
| ings, he had edged away too far to the
left. He now bore off to the right to
counterfeit the possible deviation from
his true course.
Though the hunger pangs were no
longer so exquisite, he realized that he
was weak. He was compelled to pause
for frequent rests when he attacked
the muskeg berries and rush-grass
patches, His tongue felt dry and large,
as though covered with a fine, hairy
growth, and it tasted bitter in his
mouth. His heart gave him a great
| deal of trouble. When he travelled a
few minutes it would begin a remorse-
! less thump, thump. thump, and then
! leap up and away in a painful flutter
of beats that choked him and made him
| go faint and dizzy.
| In the middle of the day he found
two minnOws in large pool 1t was
| impossible to bale it, but he was calm
er now and managed to catch them in
his tin bucket. They were no longer
than his little finger, but he was not
/ particularly hungry. The dull ache in
his stomach had been growing duller
and fainter. 1t seemed almost that
his stomach was doing. He ate the
fish raw, masticating with painstaking
care, for the eating was an act of pure
reason. While he had no desire to eat,
he knew that he must eat to live.
Tn he Ho
minnOws, eating two and saving the
third for breakfast. The sun had dried
stray shreds of moss, and he was able
| to warm himself with hot water. He
| had not covered more than ten miles
| that day, and the next day, travelling
| whenever his heart permitted him, he
covered no more than five miles. But
his stomach did not give him the Slight
est uneasiness. 1t had gone to sleep.
He was in a strange country, too, and
the caribou were growing more plenti-
full, also the wolves. Often their yelps
drifted across the desolation, and once
he saw three of them sinking away be-
fore his path.
Another night, and in the morning.
being more rational, he united the
leather string that fastened the squat
moose-hide sack. From its open mouth
poured a yellow stream of coarse gold
dust and nuggets. He roughly divided
the gold in halves, caching one half on
prominent ledge, wrapped in a piece
of blanket, and returning the other half
/ to the sack. He also began to use
strips of the one remaining blanket for
his feet He still chung to his gun, for
there were cartridges in that cache by
| the River Dease.
! This was a day of fog, and this day
hunger awOke in him again. He was
very weak and was afflicted with a
| giddiness which at times blinded him
1t was no uncommon thing now for him
to stumble and fall; and stumbling
| once, he fell squarely into q ptarmigan
nest. There were four newly Matched
ducks a day old-littie specks of pull
sating life no more than a mouthful;
and he ate them ravenously, thrusting
them alive into his mouth and crunch
| ing them like egg-shells between his
teeth The mother ptarmigan beat
about him with great cutlery. He used
his gun as a club with which to knock
her over, but she lodged out of reach
He threw stones at her and with one
chance shot broke a wing. Then she
fluttered away, running trailing the
1 broken wing, with him in pursuit.