i6 



stick them up everywhere. They have small birds on the 

 cord and large ones on the wall, such as large owls. Then 

 the boys and young men all get down in the middle of the 

 room * * with sticks in their hands. They have two 

 tambourines to beat time on. Then the women come in, 

 all fixed up in grand style. One had a sharpened stick 

 through her nose, and was all covered with beads. Then 

 the singing began. It seemed more like an Indian war- 

 dance to me than anything else. The women would make 

 all kinds of motions. They kept good time, and I must 

 say it looked rather graceful. The boys keep time with 

 their sticks. They do not strike anything, but just make 

 motions. It lasted till about ten o'clock." 



At the beginning of December, he takes Brother Kil- 

 buck's place as teacher in the school, for the latter on the 

 third of the month starts off with a dog-team for a five 

 weeks' visit to Carmel, where he would confer with the 

 missionaries about their work. But though man may pro- 

 pose, it IS God who disposes. The difficulties of travel 

 and the heavy rains so prolong the journey thither, that 

 Christmas has passed before he reaches the other Mission- 

 station. Then, terrible storms and intensest cold delay the 

 return. Seventy-three days elapse before he reappears at 

 home, like one risen from the dead, " his hair and beard 

 long and his face all covered with black spots where it had 

 been frozen." It had been a miracle that he got through 

 with his life. " No wood often but green willow brush to 

 burn, and very little food to be gotten for his teams of 

 fifteen dogs." Meantime his wife, worn out with over- 

 work at home, had been seized with serious illness, and was 

 confined for several weeks to her bed. Her feelings during 

 the time of trial are thus recorded in a letter not written 

 for print : 



" Days and weeks went by. The weather was fearfully 

 bad. One storm raged after another, with scarcely a day's 

 intermission. We began to think seriously, when we re- 

 membered how much of his road lay among the mountains 

 where there was no wood and where no natives lived. The 

 thermometer showed as low as fifty-nine degrees below zero 

 which is ninety-one degrees below the freezing point, and 



