th a rock
at the beginning and the fish would have been his.

Thus he thought, and crumpled up and sank down upon the wet earth. At
first he cried softly to himself, then he cried loudly to the pitiless
desolation that ringed him around; and for a long time after he was
shaken by great dry sobs.

He built a fire and warmed himself by drinking quarts of hot water, and
made camp on a rocky ledge in the same fashion he had the night before.
The last thing he did was to see that his matches were dry and to wind
his watch. The blankets were wet and clammy. His ankle pulsed with
pain. But he knew only that he was hungry, and through his restless
sleep he dreamed of feasts and banquets and of food served and spread in
all imaginable ways.

He awoke chilled and sick. There was no sun. The gray of earth and sky
had become deeper, more profound. A raw wind was blowing, and the first
flurries of snow were whitening the hilltops. The air about him
thickened and grew white while he made a fire and boiled more water. It
was wet snow, half rain, and the flakes were large and soggy. At first
they melted as soon as they came in contact with the earth, but ever more
fell, covering the ground, putting out the fire, spoiling his supply of
moss-fuel.

This was a signal for him to strap on his pack and stumble onward, he
knew not where. He was not concerned with the land of little sticks, nor
with Bill and the cache under the upturned canoe by the river Dease. He
was mastered by the verb "to eat." He was hunger-mad. He took no heed
of the course he pursued, so long as that course led him through the
swale bottoms. He felt his way through the wet snow to the watery muskeg
berries, and went by feel as he pulled up the rush-grass by the roots.
But it was tasteless stuff and did not satisfy. He found a weed that
tasted sour and he ate all he could find of it, which was not much, for
it was a creeping growth, easily hidden under the several inches of snow.

He had no fire that night, nor hot water, and crawled under his blanket
to sleep the broken hunger-sleep. The snow turned into a cold rain. He
awakened many times to feel it falling on his upturned face. Day came--a
gray day and no sun. It had ceased raining. The keenness of his hunger
had departed. Sensibility, as far as concerned the yearning for food,
had been exhausted. There was a dull, heavy ache in his stomach, but it
did not bother him so much. He was more