handed me one with the remark:
"They say raw partridge is good when a fellus' weak." It was
delicious. I ate the wing, warm with the bird's life blood, bones and
all, and George ate the other wing.

I soon found it utterly impossible to keep George's pace, and became so
exhausted that I was forced to take short rests. At length I told
George he had better go ahead and look for the flour; that I should
rest, follow his trail and overtake him later. He went on, but just
over the bare knoll we were crossing I found him sitting in the snow
waiting for me.

"I don't feel right to go ahead and leave you," he said. "Do you see
that second knoll?" He pointed to one of a series of round barren
knolls about half a mile down the river.

"Yes," I answered.

"Well, don't you remember it? No? Why, that's where we camped when we
threw the flour away, and that's where we'll stop to-night. We'd
better eat a mouthful to help us on."

He had plucked the head and neck of the grouse, and now proceeded to
cut them off near the body. To me he gave the neck, and ate the head
himself--raw, of course.

It was just dusk when we reached the knoll George had designated.
Straightway he went to a bush, ran his hand under it and pulled
out--the bag we were looking for. We opened it eagerly. As has been
said, we left about four pounds of flour in it. Now there was a lump
of green and black mould. However, we rejoiced at finding it; for it
was something and it might sustain our lives. It might send George to
the lard, and keep Hubbard and me until help could arrive.

On this side of the Susan the country for some distance had been
burned; but, while there were no standing trees, and the place was
entirely unsheltered, fallen spruce trees covered the ground in every
direction, so we found no difficulty in getting together a good pile of
dry wood for our night's fire, and we soon had a rousing big one going.
For supper we ate all of the grouse boiled with some of the flour mould
stirred in. It was a splendid supper.

I had not sat long before the fire when I felt a strange sensation in
my eyes. It was as if they had been filled with sharp splinters, and I
found it impossible to open them. I was afflicted with
smoke-blindness, which is almost identical in its effect to
snow-blindness. George filled my pipe with dried tea leaves and just a
bit of his precious tobacco; then lit it for me, as I could not see to
do it myself. Afte