192 My Dogs in the Northland 



suffered were various. Sometimes a dog 

 would freeze one of his feet. When this was 

 found out — and as a general thing the dog 

 was not slow to let us know of his trouble — 

 we built a fire, and placing him near it on a 

 deer skin, he, with his tongue and the heat, 

 soon got the frost out of it. When this had 

 been accomplished, we carefully tied a com- 

 fortable shoe upon it and generally he would 

 be all right in a few days. This, however, 

 was not always the case. I have had dogs 

 with feet festered and bleeding for weeks 

 from these cruel freezings. We were thank- 

 ful when we were able to reach home and let 

 the faithful animals rest for weeks, attended 

 to most skillfully by Rover, the unique dog 

 doctor, whose death is recorded in the pre- 

 vious chapter. Some dogs have very brittle 

 nails. These are frequently breaking off in 

 the rough trails, or getting torn out at the 

 roots, thus making an ugly, painful wound. 

 The ice on the great lakes and rivers is 

 sometimes rough and very trying to the 

 dogs. Even when it is smooth and glassy 

 it at times affects them so that the pads of 

 their feet become sore and bleed. The soft, 

 warm dog-shoes were our remedies for all 

 of these ills, and the sagacious dogs that had 



