when the hair began to slip, he scraped it clean. A broad ash
wood hoop he had made ready and when the green rawhide was strained on
it again the Indian had an Indian drum.

It was not truly dry for two or three days and as it tightened on its
frame it gave forth little sounds of click and shrinkage that told of
the strain the tensioned rawhide made. Quonab tried it that night as he
sat by the fire softly singing:

"Ho da ho-he da he."

But the next day before sunrise he climbed the hill and sitting on the
sun-up rock he hailed the Day God with the invocation, as he had not
sung it since the day they left the great rock above the Asalnuk, and
followed with the song:

"Father, we thank thee; We have found the good hunting. There is meat in
the wigwam."

Chapter 22. The Line of Traps

Now that they had the cabin for winter, and food for the present,
they must set about the serious business of trapping and lay a line of
deadfalls for use in the coming cold weather. They were a little ahead
of time, but it was very desirable to get their lines blazed through the
woods in all proposed directions in case of any other trapper coming in.
Most fur-bearing animals are to be found along the little valleys of the
stream: beaver, otter, mink, muskrat, coon, are examples. Those that
do not actually live by the water seek these places because of their
sheltered character and because their prey lives there; of this class
are the lynx, fox, fisher, and marten that feed on rabbits and mice.
Therefore a line of traps is usually along some valley and over the
divide and down some other valley back to the point of beginning.

So, late in September, Rolf and Quonab, with their bedding, a pot, food
for four days, and two axes, alternately followed and led by Skookum,
set out along a stream that entered the lake near their cabin. A quarter
mile up they built their first deadfall for martens. It took them one
hour and was left unset. The place was under a huge tree on a neck of
land around which the stream made a loop. This tree they blazed on three
sides. Two hundred yards up another good spot was found and a deadfall
made. At one place across a neck of land was a narrow trail evidently
worn by otters. "Good place for steel trap, bime-by," was Quonab's
remark.

From time to time they disturbed deer, and in a muddy place where a
deer path crossed the creek, they found, among the numerous small hoof
prints, the track of wolves, be