ing stiffly, while the ice on his leggings cra

kened his mind; no Indian in his right s

ouble with you?" I asked,

to work the drill with a bow. If our moccasin strings are too rotten to bear the s

smooth, and another that had a sharp edge. Then, scraping the snow away from the base of a birch shoot a couple of inches in diameter, he laid the smooth stone at its base. Next he bade me bend the shoot close down on the smooth stone, while with the shar

the bowstring. We now carried the base stick and drill back from the creek into the thick timber, gathered a lar

drill in the hole, made one turn of the bowstring round its centre, and held it in place by pressing down with the palm of his left hand on the tip. With his right hand he grasped the bow, and waiting unt

or fourth saw he gave a howl of pain and dropped the outfit. I had no need to ask why.

the bow, faster and faster, until the drill moaned intermittently, like a miniature buzz-saw. In a mom

that my eyes had not deceived me. Smoke actually was rising. I sawed

ied. "Oh, why d

ontinued to saw with all possible rapidity, but still there was no flame; instea

e of the failure was made plain to me. Pitamakan was pressing the shredded bark too tight round the drill and int

e understood and did as he was told.

cried, as I hastily

í-is!" (It burns! It bu

d and thrust it under the fine twigs. These began to crackle and snap, and we soon had a roaring fire. Pitamakan raised his hands to the sky a

ad strength to lift and carry, some of them fallen saplings twenty and thirty feet long. I was for putting a pile of th

nd, half freezing, away back from the big blaze. Now we will have th

of heavy sticks, so that the stubs of branches at their tops interlocked, and then he laid up numerous sticks side by side, and all slanting together at the top, so as to

me cold air filtered through the bough thatching and chilled our backs. Pitamakan pulled off his capote and told me to do the same. Spreading them out, he fastened them to the sticks of the slantin

y hunger with greater insistence than ever. I could not believe it possible for us to go without eating as long as Pitamakan said

ngry,' and keep saying it, and soon it will be the truth to you. But we will not f

twinkle of amusement in them. If he was making a joke, although a sorry one, I could stand it

worked harder than I, and sleep will d

od to hear. "Oh, I meant what I said. I am not crazy. Now think

nt's reflection. "Don't joke about the bad fix w

away from them the things their powerful medicine has taught them how to make, guns and powder and ball, fire steels and sticks, knives

most experienced of them, would have been able to make a fire had they been stripped of everything

d something for us t

ey travel round through the brush? Yes, of course you have. Well, after the middle of the night, when the moon rises and gives some light, I could go out

own dullness in not having thought of it. I had been sitting up stiffly enough before the fire, anxiety over our situation keeping

aid, and in a moment was sound asle

h of us to put on fresh fuel; and then we slept again,

, but with a steadiness that promised a long period of bad weather. We did not mind g

ched them with our obsidian knives. I proposed that we sharpen the points, but Pitamakan said no; that blunt ones were better for bird shooting, because they smashed the wing bones. Pitamakan had worked somewhat on the bow

he rabbit path, and stuck the tip of it under a low branch of another tree. Next he tied the buckskin string to the sapling, so that the noose end of it hung cross-wise in the rabbit path, a couple of inches above the surface of it. Then he stuck several feathery balsam tips on each si

f young pines. Several rabbits jumped up ahead of us, snow-white, big-footed and bl

bands. As we approached a tangle of red willows, a bull, a cow, and a calf moose rose from the beds they had made in them. The cow and calf trotted away, but the bull, his hair all bristling forward, walked a few steps toward us, shaking his bi

un!" I w

n answered. "If you run

s than an actual inhabitant of the earth. His long head had a thick, drooping upper lip; a tassel of black hair swung from his lower jaw; at the withers he stood all of six feet high, and sloped back to insignificant h

now. Once more he tossed his enormous horns; but just as he started to advance, a stick snapped in the direction in which the cow and calf had gone. At that he h

soaked through to the buried coals. We dug them up and started another fire, and sat before it for some time before ventur

is time, and see what will happen to us t

o the river, when we saw that it continued on the other side up to the timber, straight toward the cave that had sheltered us. The tracks, plainly outlined in the sand

we could be!" I said. "The hide would be warm and soft

tamakan. "If we can't make bows and arrows to kill him, we

even a few days back, such a plan would have seemed foolish; but I was fast learning that necessity, starvation, will cau

t from a thicket close by, and alighted here and there in the pines and firs. We moved on a few steps, and stopped within short bow

e and dropped down into the snow. But the grouse never moved.

and tumbling down. I ran forward and fell on it the instant it struck the snow, and grasped

cared all the other birds out

they were gone. Pitamakan looked at me reproachfully as he started to pick up the f

we were some time in discovering any of them. They generally chose a big limb to light on, close to the bole of the tree. Finally

the birds, they hurtled away through the forest and out of sight. We were more fortunate a li

ut Pitamakan declared that he would not have any such doings. "We'll ea

as the best meal I ever had. And it was not so small, either; the blue grouse is a large and heavy bird, next to the sage-hen the largest of our grouse. After eating, we went out and "rustled" a g

, it is certain that we can kill eno

itamakan objected. "In a few days the snow wil

" I suggested, remembering

ing along the sole. Brother, if we are ever to see green grass and our people again, these things must we have besides food-threa

ere just as necessary. The list of them staggered me-thread and needles, moccasins, and all

of it all will be a better bow and some real arrows, arrows with ice-

gnized it. "Come on, it's a rabbit in one of the

eath, was hanging in the farther snare. Resetting the trap,

burying them under the fire, and this time letting them roas

of C