MY FIRST SLEDGE JOURNEY 



present at all the feedings in the village, snatching 

 a precarious bone at each and fleeing with it to a 

 solitary place. I got quite fond of Shergo, with a 

 pitying sort of fondness, but she remained entirely 

 unresponsive. For a whole day she was missing, 

 and I knew in my inmost mind that she had gone 

 with a sledge that had left at daybreak for the north. 

 Right enough, she came home late at night, limping 

 painfully among a sledge team that she had met on 

 the hills. " Take that miserable little thing back to 

 Hebron " is the translation of what Shergo heard 

 on the Saeglek mountain pass, thirty miles north 

 of Hebron, and she was ignominiously handed over 

 and tied on the southward-bound sledge, and only 

 allowed to trot the last few miles because she was 

 nearly frozen. When I set out for Okak at the 

 end of my four days' stay I sat on the sledge 

 gripping Shergo in my arms; and she whined and 

 yelped to be allowed to go northward. Home was 

 the word, however, and Shergo at last submitted. 

 Out of sight of Hebron I dropped her overboard, 

 and she galloped forward to find a vacancy among 

 the big dogs that were pulling. She ran with them 

 all day, lagging sadly in the smooth places where 

 the pace was fast, but leading triumphantly up the 

 hills where the collar work had to be done, all the 

 time pretending to her queer little self that she was 

 working. We reached Okak in eleven hours and a 

 half, with Shergo trotting wearily in the van. 



She was home again where she did not seem to 

 want to be ! She moped, and followed the wood 

 sledges, but found no satisfaction; and a few days 

 later her odd career was over, for I found her stiff 



and dead on the frozen sea beach. 



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