226 THE UPPER YUKON 



quash are removed, the bodies — so many 

 skinned cats — are impaled on a stick of Jack 

 pine and set sizzling before the fire. 



*'In the fur-land when the leaves fall, the 

 beaver, giving over his daub-work and wattles, 

 sets the family to work storing up the winter 

 groceries. There is the challenge of frost in 

 the air and the southward flight of birds. 

 Some old primal instinct stirs the blood of the 

 trapper; he hears the north a-callin', it is time 

 to go. The factor of the Hudson's Bay fort 

 gaily farewells him, glad to have him go; the 

 priest, the old men of the lodges and the blind 

 'old wives,' little kiddies and lean, snapping 

 dogs come out to bid him God-speed. Leaves 

 will be budding on the birches when he re- 

 turns. The curtain of silence cuts him off 

 from the fellowship of the fort for many 

 moons, once he lifts the curtain of that ghostly 

 woodland. It is paddle and portage for days 

 and weary weeks, inland and ever inland; 

 then the frost crisps into silence, the running 

 water and the lake lip. The grind of form- 

 ing ice warns our trapper it is time to change 

 birchbark for moccasin and snowshoe. The 

 canoe is cached and the trail strikes into the 

 banksian pine and birch woods. 



''The door of the forest is lonely and eerie. 



