THE WANDERER 103 



but it fascinated him, drawing him irresistibly. If 

 the King of the Puk-wudjies himself lay in wait, 

 the deer must have answered, and he lowered him- 

 self into the rush again almost joyfully. 



The bed of the stream was easier going now, 

 and soon the dangerous trip lay behind, and a 

 curious belt of country, like nothing the young 

 one had ever seen before, ahead. 



All Alaska is volcanic. The particular portion 

 on which the moose trenched now was deeply riven 

 with treacherous fissures, which could not be seen 

 from a distance. Here and there subterranean 

 streams ran, insidiously undermining the land. In 

 wide slits, dark and bottomless, the swallows built ; 

 in others, the deep wounds of the earth had healed 

 in the passing of the years, and from the depths 

 sprung a tangle of salmon -berry bushes, whose 

 leaves, level with the top of the riven ground, 

 seemed to close the gap tenderly, as is the way 

 with the Earth-Mother. 



There was something almost uncanny about the 

 treeless volcanic space with its open rifts and 

 gloomy shadows. The stupidest beast would learn 

 discretion here ! Turning widely aside, the moose 

 went off into the safer wilderness. 



