The Land of the Muskeg 291 



you may know better as the plain musk- 

 rat, builds high his house of roots and grass 

 against the coming of cold. When the 

 winter winds howl outside, his strange 

 abode will serve him both for food and 

 shelter. 



It is in this weird land that Pisew, the 

 lynx, steals with stealthy tread over the 

 new snow, his broad pads leaving an un- 

 mistakable track. 



He is looking for Wapoose, the rabbit, 

 who is food, in all but the plague year, for 

 all the carnivorous four-footed creatures 

 that creep and spring, and all the hungry 

 beaks of the air. It is well that Wapoose's 

 snow-shoe feet touch the snow light as 

 thistledown and that his coat is white, else 

 he might not withstand the war of exter- 

 mination waged against him. 



In this No Man's Land, Carcajous, the 

 wolverine, toils with the traps of the breeds 

 and Indians who scour the country for the 



