LETTER XVIII. 213 



more miles to camp. ' We'll be in in an hour, I 

 guess, if we keep this pace up, but there is some 

 bad travelling ahead/ said my guide, puffing away 

 at his pipe. ' Bad travelling ahead !' I wondered 

 what he considered the fallen timber, half hidden 

 in snow and rendered doubly trappy by the half- 

 light through which we had been travelling ever 

 since dusk. 



All at once a report woke the night echoes, 

 and then another. ' What the devil is that, 

 Jocko !' I ask. Jocko looks surprised for a 

 moment, and then answers, ' Guess your girl got 

 frightened ; shooting to let you know where the 

 camp is ; better answer.' I have six cartridges 

 left with me and only twenty more in camp, so 

 somewhat grudgingly I comply. At once my 

 reply is answered, and as I don't respond more 

 shooting ensues. ' Confound them, Jocko, they'll 

 use up all my ammunition.' ' Never mind, just 

 one more shot,' says the Indian. And so it went 

 on, until about half my ammunition had been ex- 

 pended, and we could hear an eldritch scream 

 made by the Indian Frank, from the bluff above 

 us. A quarter of an hour afterwards we stum- 

 bled over the doorstep into the glow of the fire- 

 light, and when we saw the magnificent repast 

 spread for us, and listened to the raptures poured 

 out over the stag's head we hung on the beams, 



