100 FOUR YEARS IN THE WHITE NORTH [May 



ern party, as I had requested, a few delicacies and a 

 note containing the news of the past two months. 

 With hands and faces smeared with good things and 

 with eyes and noses buried in the can, we failed to de- 

 tect the approach of two galloping dog-teams. E-took- 

 a-shoo must have had his nose as well as his mouth 

 filled with marmalade, or he would certainly have 

 smelled that fresh seal meat with which the dogs and 

 men were reeking. It was the first real foretaste of the 

 summer. 



Although late in the year and the ice breaking up, 

 Ak-pood-a-shah-o and Oo-bloo-ya had crossed the 

 Sound and were to continue over the heights of Elles- 

 mere Land to our relief, without a thought of their 

 families and the possibility of being cut off from home, 

 thinking possibly that we had lost our dogs and were 

 slowly plodding homeward. As a reward for such faith- 

 fulness I concluded that nothing was too good for these 

 two men; and that so long as we were in the North 

 they could depend upon us for all needed supplies. 



Everything was transferred to their sledges. Our 

 dogs, but shadows of their former selves, wagged their 

 tails upon being relieved of their loads by their fat 

 brothers just from home. In six hours we were on the 

 Greenland shore, headed south through a light, soft 

 snow. Near Cape Hatherton, Noo-ka-ping-wa, a dog 

 of excellent spirit, staggered from side to side and then 

 dropped. He had covered his 1,400 miles with head and 

 tail up and was always pulling when the others quit. 

 Now, nearing the house, he seemed to say, "Well, I 

 think you can make it without my help," and gave up. 

 Slipping his harness, I stroked his head and left him, 

 knowing that he would follow on when he had renewed 



