THE WHITE WORLD 



the snowy shores of the Yukon, or on the ice of the river 

 itself. The stamina and will power of these men are 

 almost beyond belief. 



John Peche, the Canadian government messenger, who 

 late in December was the first man in from the outside 

 world after the river closed, remarking on the fact, said: 

 " You Americans are hard men to kill. Coming down 

 the river I met over three hundred men on their way out, 

 and most of them were from the States and knew nothing 

 of the cold that is cold, or how to take care of themselves 

 right. Yet they acted as if they were on a picnic, and as 

 if the devil were really dead. They didn't seem to mind 

 little inconveniences like frozen feet and cheeks, and hands 

 with the nails coming off and blistered with the frost. 

 They're reckless devils, and a more cheeky set I never met. 

 With the pants burnt off their legs and the faces on them 

 like brown parchment from the fire and frost, they had the 

 gall to give me advice about the country, to tell me how 

 many pairs of moccasins I'd need for the trip, and the like, 

 when I was born on a snow drift and got my growth under 

 the midnight sun. You Americans would storm Hades 

 if you thought the heat had melted out any gold down 

 there; and you'd put up so good a bluff and are so nervy, 

 I'll be bound you'd get some of the stuff if there was anv 

 there." 



Just above " Five Fingers," on our trip to the coast in 

 January, 1898, I saw some ravens tearing at an object 

 which on closer inspection proved to be the ribs and upper 

 portion of a man's body. There were many gruesome asso- 

 ciations on that journey in the dead of the Sub-Arctic 

 winter. Tottering out of the blue-grey haze of snow and 

 frost-laden spruces, came from time to time starving men, 

 almost as emaciated as the plague victims in India, with the 

 light of an insane fear in their eyes, whom bitter experience 

 had taught that it was better to risk death by stealing food 

 rather than to risk refusal by begging for it. 



At Fort Selkirk, in December, two half-crazed men came 

 into our cabin and without a word seized upon a loaf of 

 bread and some prunes, which was all the prepared food in 

 sight, and began eating ravenously, like beasts that ex- 

 pected to be driven away. When they had finished they 



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