Eskimo family and malamuie At Home. 



these Postmen of the Silent Trails. They go where soft snow and other conditions 

 make it impossible to use horses. No service is too lowly, no mission too high. They 

 pull the baby in his tiny sled, are the means of delivery for the merchant, and they carry 

 the doctor and priest to the bedside of the sick or dying in some lonely, distant cabin. 



Owing to the prohibitive tax rate on railroads which traverse practically uninhabited 

 districts in Seward Peninsula a tax which has only been abolished within the past few 

 months dogs have become the motive power instead of engines ; and in place of the 

 "toot-toot" of the locomotive as it takes a freight train out to the mines with supplies, 

 there is the "bow-wow" of the dog team "Kougarok Limited" or the "Little Creek 

 Express" as it starts down the track with a loaded flat car. 



As to "joy riding," the "Pupmobile" has every automobile completely outclassed 

 when it comes to the maximum of joy, and the minimum of danger. Given a winter 

 night when the frosty air brings the tingling blood to eheek and ringer tip, when the 

 glittering stars seem close above one's head in the clear sky, and when the trail glistens 

 like a silver ribbon in the ghostly radiance of the Northern Lights, it is a phlegmatic 

 person indeed who does not feel the thrill of excitement and delight that animates the 

 dogs as they strain in their harness to be away for a spin across the snows. 



Then there is the famous All Alaska Sweepstakes race each April from Nome on 

 Bering Sea, to Candle on the Arctic Ocean and return, a distance of 408 miles ; and the 

 dogs as well as the men who have won their laurels in this contest are the sort of men 

 and dogs who are making the History of Alaska who are creating an Empire from a 

 Wilderness. 



There are two types of dogs used in the race. The Siberians, small, prick-eared, 

 with bushy tails curled up over their backs, and with apparently decided traces of the 

 fox ; and the Alaskans who are of mixed breeds setters, pointers, collies, hounds or 

 what not with a more or less pronounced wolf strain inherited from the McKenzie 

 River Huskie or coast Malamute. 



Both types have their staunch supporters, and for excellent reasons for both 

 possess wonderful qualities that endear them to dog users and dog lovers. The 

 Siberians have not the speed, and many claim not the responsiveness and intelligence 

 of the Alaskans but they are gentle, tractable, easy to handle and are able to travel 

 more steadily and with less rest than the others. 



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