string, all the time--I catch him string--I say, "Hello, Ruth!
How are ye?"--and you say, "Is that my good husband?"--and I say,
"Yes"--and you say, "No can bake good bread, no more soda"--then
I say, "Look in cache, under flour; good-by." You look and catch
plenty soda. All the time you Fort Yukon, me Arctic City. Hi-yu
medicine man!' Ruth smiled so ingenuously at the fairy story that
both men burst into laughter. A row among the dogs cut short the
wonders of the Outside, and by the time the snarling combatants
were separated, she had lashed the sleds and all was ready for
the trail.--'Mush! Baldy! Hi! Mush on!' Mason worked his whip
smartly and, as the dogs whined low in the traces, broke out the
sled with the gee pole. Ruth followed with the second team,
leaving Malemute Kid, who had helped her start, to bring up the
rear. Strong man, brute that he was, capable of felling an ox at
a blow, he could not bear to beat the poor animals, but humored
them as a dog driver rarely does--nay, almost wept with them in
their misery.

'Come, mush on there, you poor sore-footed brutes!' he murmured,
after several ineffectual attempts to start the load. But his
patience was at last rewarded, and though whimpering with pain,
they hastened to join their fellows.

No more conversation; the toil of the trail will not permit such
extravagance.

And of all deadening labors, that of the Northland trail is the
worst. Happy is the man who can weather a day's travel at the
price of silence, and that on a beaten track. And of all
heartbreaking labors, that of breaking trail is the worst. At