ent on the Columbia where the
Saskatchewan trail came in," added Rob, reaching for his map.

"I know it well," said the old man--"know it like a book, the whole
country. Well, good luck to you, and I wish I was going through; but
I'll see ye up in Alasky in a couple of years, when this here railroad
gets through. I got to stay here and tend to my garden and farm and
my town lots for a while yit."

The old man now showed them with a great deal of pride his little
fields and his system of irrigation, and the rough mill which he had
made with no tools but a saw and an ax. "I used to pack in flour from
Edmonton, three hundred and fifty miles," said he, "and it wasn't any
fun, I can tell you. So I said, what's the use--why not make a mill
for myself and grind my own flour?"

"And good flour it is, too, boys," said Uncle Dick, "for I've tasted
it often and know."

"I s'pose we ought to get on a little bit farther this evening," said
John to the leader of the party, after a while.

"No, you don't," said the old man; "you'll stay right here to-night, I
tell you. Plenty of trouble on ahead without being in a hurry to get
into it, and here you can sleep dry and have plenty to eat. I haven't
got any trout in the house to-day, but there's a little lake up by
Pyramid Mountain where you can ketch plenty, and there's another one a
few miles around the corner of the Miette valley where you can get 'em
even better. Oh yes, from now on you'll have all the fish you want to
eat, and all the fun, too, I reckon, that you come for. So you're all
the way from Alasky, eh? Well, I swan! I've seen folks here from
England and New York and Oregon, but I never did see no one from
Alasky before. And you're just boys! Come in and unroll your
blankets."

IX

THE HEART OF THE MOUNTAINS

"Well, boys," said Swift, the next day after breakfast, "I wisht ye
could stay longer with me, but I reckon ye got to be on your way, so
I'll just wish ye well and go about my planting."

"So long, friend," said Uncle Dick, as they parted. "We'll see you
from time to time. When the railroad gets through we'll all be
neighbors in here."

"Sure," said the old man, none too happily. "It's a fright how close
things has got together sence I packed north from the Columby thirty
year ago. Well, I hope you'll get some trout where you camp to-night.
You'd ought to go up on my mountain and ketch some of them lake-trout.
I dun' no' where they come from, for th