The Last of the Plainsmen 



Rea said was the sun. The silence and desolation 

 were heart-numbing. 



&quot; Where are the wolves? &quot; asked Jones of Rea. 



&quot; Wolves can t live on snow. They re farther 

 south after caribou, or farther north after musk-ox.&quot; 



In those few still intervals Jones remained out as 

 long as he dared, with the mercury sinking to sixty 

 degrees. He turned from the wonder of the unreal, 

 remote sun, to the marvel in the north Aurora 

 borealis ever-present, ever-changing, ever-beautiful ! 

 and he gazed in rapt attention. 



&quot; Polar lights,&quot; said Rea, as if he were speaking 

 of biscuits. u You ll freeze. It s gettin cold.&quot; 



Cold it became, to the matter of seventy degrees. 

 Frost covered the walls of the cabin and the roof, 

 except just over the fire. The reindeer were harder 

 than iron. A knife or an ax or a steel-trap burned 

 as if it had been heated in fire, and stuck to the hand. 

 The hunters experienced trouble in breathing; the air 

 hurt their lungs. 



The months dragged. Rea grew more silent day 

 by day, and as he sat before the fire his wide shoul 

 ders sagged lower and lower. Jones, unaccustomed 

 to the waiting, the restraint, the barrier of the north, 

 worked on guns, sleds, harness, till he felt he would 

 go mad. Then to save his mind he constructed a 

 windmill of caribou hides and pondered over it, 



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