276 TWO DIANAS IN ALASKA 



desolate wastes were fertile regions in which gigantic 

 mammoths roamed amidst luxurious forests, where 

 now for centuries untold their huge bones have lain 

 deep buried beneath the soil. What sudden spell 

 was cast upon the face of Nature? What fierce 

 agency conspired to sweep from off the earth these 

 prehistoric giants? 



Over dreary wastes, where once huge pachyderms 

 roamed, the traveller now may journey countless 

 miles whilst death-like silence reigns supreme. They 

 loom insistent still, those weird and long-lost 

 memories, finding responsive notes deep down in our 

 hearts, awakening some forgotten cry, drawing us 

 back across some visionless bridge of dark ages to 

 the time of our primeval ancestors, rousing an un- 

 speakable yearning to pierce oblivion's dark shroud, 

 and live once more in scenes now dead and gone for 

 ever. This, this is the Call of the Wild, and it 

 speaks loudest to those who in childhood were 

 dreamers, who, ever enthralled by elusive charms of 

 unknown mysticism, sought to grasp the intangible, 

 lived in a world of fancy, peopled with a host of 

 unknown sprites. 



Ralph and I had been encamped for two days upon 

 the western slope of the great mountain range which 

 forms a divide between the valleys of the Kuskokwim 

 and Sushitna rivers. Our tents were pitched in a 

 sequestered nook overlooking a diminutive lake, from 

 which a tiny stream emerged and flowed onwards to 

 join the mighty Kuskokwim. 



Although none of them attained any considerable 



