-hand side. Did not put up tent to-night, but slept
under mosquito tents. A hundred and sixty-five miles from
Athabasca Landing. Now we begin to feel as though we were to
see the real work."

IV

THE GRAND RAPIDS

It was much as Rob had predicted in the last entry of his diary
previously quoted. Uncle Dick hurried them through their breakfast.

"We'll see some fun to-day, boys," said he.

"How do you mean?" asked Jesse. "Are they going to try to run the
boats through?"

"They'll have to run the scows through light, so Francois tells me.
There isn't water enough to take them through loaded, so practically
each one will have to unship its cargo here.

"You see that wooden tramway running down the island?" He pointed
toward a crooked track laid roughly on cross-ties, the rails of wood.
"That is perhaps the least expensive railroad in the world, and the
one which makes the most money on its capital. I don't think it cost
the Company over eight hundred dollars. It couldn't be crookeder or
worse. And yet it pays for itself each year several times over, just
by the outside trade which it does!

"They built this railroad after the Klondike rush came through here.
Previous to that all the goods had to be taken over the 'short
portage'--you see that place over on the steep hillside at the right
side of the river--a mile and a half of it, and every pound of the
Company and Klondike baggage that went north had to be carried on
men's backs along that slippery footing. It was necessary to run these
rapids and to build this railroad. You will see how both ideas will
work to-day."

Some of the boats had been loaded so heavily that part of the cargo
had to be left above the shallow water--one more handling of the
freightage necessitated in the north-bound journey, but each boat,
carrying as much as could be floated, now came poling down through the
rocks to the head of the island.

The men, half in and half out of the water, began to unload this cargo
and to pile it in a great heap at the head of the wooden railroad.
There were two flat-cars, and rapidly these were loaded and pushed off
to the foot of the island, half or three-quarters of a mile. There
every pound of the baggage had to be unloaded once more, and after
that once more carried from the landing into the boats at the foot of
the island.

"Well, are they going to take the boats down on the cars, too?"
demanded Jesse.

"They have done t