OF FOXES, MANY AND VARIOUS 2C5 



burden. Then probably reflecting that old age is not 

 desirable for a suffering dog in a bitingly keen frost, 

 he turned towards the husky with his hand in his belt. 

 Thwack thwack went the tail as much as to say: &quot; Of 

 course he wouldn t desert me after I ve hauled his 

 sleigh all my life! Thwack thwack! I d get up and 

 jump all around him if I could; there isn t a dog-gone 

 husky in all polar land with half as good a master as 

 I have!&quot; 



The man stopped. Instead of going to the dog 

 he ran back to his sleigh, loaded his arms full of frozen 

 fish and threw them down before the dog. Then he 

 put one caribou-skin under the old dog, spread another 

 over him and ran away with his train while the husky 

 was still guzzling. The fish had been poisoned to be 

 thrown out to the wolves that so often pursue Northern 

 dog trains. 



Once a party of hunters crossing the Northern 

 Eockies came on a dog train stark and stiff. Where 

 was the master who had bidden them stand while he 

 felt his way blindly through the white whirl of a bliz 

 zard for the lost path? In the middle of the last 

 century, one of that famous family of fur traders, a 

 MacKenzie, left Georgetown to go north to Red Eiver 

 in Canada. He never went back to Georgetown 

 and he never reached Red River; but his coat was 

 found fluttering from a tree, a death signal to at 

 tract the first passer-by, and the body of the lost 

 trader was discovered not far off in the snow. Un 

 less it is the year of the rabbit pest and the rabbit 

 ravagers are bold with hunger, the pursuing wolves 

 seldom give full chase. They skulk far to the rear 

 of the dog trains, licking up the stains of the bleed- 



