I T^ In the United States vi 



gone right through the bones of the nose, splintering 

 them at its entrance and its exit. What a horrible 

 case this would have been in a polluted war hospital ! 

 But up here, eight thousand feet above the level of 

 the sea, not a single wound suppurated, and all 

 healed as healthily as the cut finger of a healthy 

 schoolboy would have done. One morning, some 

 little time afterwards, when I was overhauling him 

 in the hospital at Denver, I saw to my astonishment 

 that one bullet, the unaccounted for sixth, had passed 

 right through the biceps of his left arm, and that the 

 wound had healed without his knowing anything about 

 it. When I have to fight my duel I shall certainly 

 appoint Estes Park as the place of meeting. It seems 

 that nothing but death himself can kill there, and, as 

 a matter of fact, poor Jim had to go elsewhere to die. 

 ' But let us go back, saga-wise, to his shooting. 

 Down a short way below the clump of aspens where 

 I found him was the log-hut in which we lived, a 

 hut of so generous a nature that it most willingly 

 gave house-room to any amount of fine snow which 

 happened to be drifting about in search of a resting- 

 place, and so, ever and anon, kindly provided us 

 with the whitest of counterpanes as we lay wrapped 

 up in our blankets on the rough floor. The only 

 drawback to this generosity was that, unless we half- 

 suffocated ourselves by covering up our faces, those 

 sprightly little gnomes of the snow tickled us to 

 madness by industriously trying to polish up our 

 innocent noses. This hut had, of course, a small 



