104 MY DOG-TEAMS. 



but I fervently hope that the emergency may not 

 arise which requires me to display my skill. 



It is the very hardest kind of hard work. That 

 merciless lash must be going continually ; and it must 

 be merciless or it is of no avail. The dogs are quick 

 to detect the least weakness of the driver, and meas- 

 ure him on the instant. If not thoroughly convinced 

 that the soundness of their skins is quite at his 

 mercy, they go where they please. If they see a 

 fox crossing the ice, or come upon a bear track, or 

 " wind " a seal, or sight a bird, away they dash over 

 snow-drifts and hummocks, pricking up their short 

 ears and curling up their long bushy tails for a wild, 

 wolfish race after the game. If the whip-lash goes 

 out with a fierce snap, the ears and the tails drop, 

 and they go on about their proper business ; but woe 

 be unto you if they get the control. I have seen my 

 own driver only to-day sorely put to his metal, and 

 not until he had brought a yell of pain from almost 

 every dog in the team did he conquer their obstinacy. 

 They were running after a fox, and were taking us 

 toward what appeared to be unsafe ice. The wind 

 was blowing hard, and the lash was sometimes driven 

 back into the driver's face, — hence the difficulty. 

 The whip, hov/ever, finally brought them to reason, 

 and in full view of the game, and within a few yards 

 of the treacherous ice, they came first down into a 

 limping trot and then stopped, most unwillingly. Of 

 course this made them very cross, and a general fight 

 — fierce and angry — now followed, which was not 

 quieted until the driver had sailed in among them and 

 knocked them to right and left with his hard hickory 

 whip-stock. I have had an adventure with the same 

 team, and know to my cost what an unruly set they 



