nto
his dreams. An ugly picture painted itself upon the dark, and
struggling against the vision, he half awoke. With the first returning
consciousness came the oppression of the yoke, the impulse to match the
mental alienation with that of the body--strong need to move away.

You can't move away in a sleeping-bag.

In a city you may be alone, free.

On the trail, you walk in bonds with your yoke-fellow, make your bed
with him, with him rise up, and with him face the lash the livelong
day.

* * * * *

"Well," sighed the Colonel, after toiling onward for a couple of hours
the next morning, "this is the worst yet."

But by the middle of the afternoon, "What did I say? Why, this
morning--_everything_ up till now has been child's play." He kept
looking at the Boy to see if he could read any sign of halt in the
tense, scarred face.

Certainly the wind was worse, the going was worse. The sled kept
breaking through and sinking to the level of the load. There it went!
in again. They tugged and hauled, and only dragged the lashing loose,
while the sled seemed soldered to the hard-packed middle of the drift.
As they reloaded, the thermometer came to light. The Colonel threw it
out, with never a word. They had no clothes now but what they stood in,
and only one thing on the sled they could have lived without--their
money, a packet of trading stores. But they had thrown away more than
they knew. Day by day, not flannels and boots alone, not merely extra
kettle, thermometer and gun went overboard, but some grace of courtesy,
some decency of life had been left behind.

About three o'clock of this same day, dim with snow, and dizzy in a
hurricane of wind, "We can't go on like this," said the Boy suddenly.

"Wish I knew the way we _could_ go on," returned the Colonel, stopping
with an air of utter helplessness, and forcing his rigid hands into his
pockets. The Boy looked at him. The man of dignity and resource, who
had been the boss of the Big Chimney Camp--what had become of him? Here
was only a big, slouching creature, with ragged beard, smoke-blackened
countenance, and eyes that wept continually.

"Come on," said his equally ruffianly-looking pardner, "we'll both go
ahead."

So they abandoned their sled for awhile, and when they had forged a
way, came back, and one pulling, the other pushing, lifting, guiding,
between them, with infinite pains they got their burden to the end of
the beaten