242 FOUR YEARS IN THE WHITE NORTH [April 



sight of forty leaping dogs with mouths open robbed 

 her of her courage and she went on. 



Noo-ka-ping-wa slipped his dogs from the sledge to 

 overtake and round her up. Vigorously plying his 

 twenty-six-foot whip in front of our leaping dogs, he 

 yelled for E-took-a-shoo and me to run on with rifle 

 and camera. Scarcely had I gained a vantage-spot when 

 E-took-a-shoo's team, excited beyond control, swept by 

 with a rush of whirring legs and bounding sledge, fol- 

 lowed by Arklio's ten blacks with flying traces. 



In the midst of rifle-shots and yelping dogs I de- 

 tected an unfamiliar sound of pain — the cry of a baby 

 bear. Hurling myself upon three dogs, I wrenched the 

 fluffy white ball out of their mouths and held it high 

 above my head out of the reach of the leaping dogs. The 

 little fellow, not appreciating the timely help of his 

 rescuer, buried his sharp white teeth deep in my wrist. 

 Gradually he became more tractable, sniffed of my bear- 

 skin pants, and wondered if his mother were still on her 

 hind legs. 



In the mean time Arklio had shot the bear and Noo- 

 ka-ping-wa had returned with the other cub and with 

 a bleeding lip; as he clasped the cub to his breast to 

 protect it from the dogs, it had grabbed him by the 

 mouth. Both cubs were now crying for all the world 

 like children with the croup and would not be comforted. 

 We placed them upon the dead mother and they ceased 

 whining at once and began to suck her breasts. In- 

 teresting to note, they were now no longer afraid of us, 

 knowing that if their mother did not protest it must be 

 all right. We lashed her to my sledge, placed the cubs 

 on the body, and drove to land in search of our loads. 



Our camp that night was on a small island not on 



