, do you think?" Rob looked anxiously
up at the lofty bank which rose above them. Perhaps there was a little
trace of stubbornness in Rob's make-up, and certainly he had no wish
to abandon the project at this stage.

"We might edge her up the bank a little at a time," said Alex,
"snubbing her up by the line. I suppose we could pass it from stump to
stump, the same as _voyageurs_ had to with their big birch-barks
sometimes."

"We'll get her up somehow to-morrow," said Rob, "if you say it's
possible."

"Then there'll be some more hills," smiled Alex; "eight or ten or
twelve miles of rough country, I suppose."

"Time enough to trouble about that to-morrow, Alex. Sit down and have
a cup of tea."

They still had one or two of their smoke-dried trout and a bit of the
half-dried caribou which they had brought down with them. On the
whole they made a very fair meal.

"Try some of my biscuits, Alex," suggested John. "I baked them in the
spider--mixed the dough all by myself in the sack, the way Moise does.
Aren't they fine?"

"You're quite a cook, Mr. John. But I'm sorry we're so nearly out of
meat," said Alex. "You can't travel far on flour and tea."

"Won't there be any game in the river below the Rockies?" asked Rob.

"Oh yes, certainly; plenty of bear and moose, and this side of the
Peace River Landing, wherever there are any prairies, plenty of grouse
too; but I don't think we'll get back to the prairies--the valley is
over a thousand feet deep east of the mountains."

"Alex, how many moose have you ever killed in all your life?" asked
Rob, curiously.

"Three hundred and eighty-seven," answered Alex, quietly.

The boys looked at each other in astonishment. "I didn't know anybody
ever killed that many moose in all the world," said John.

"Many people have killed more than I have," replied Alex. "You see, at
times we have to hunt for a living, and if we don't get a moose or
something of the kind we don't eat."

"And how many bear have you ever killed, Alex?"

"Twenty-odd grizzlies I have killed or helped kill," said Alex. "We
rarely hunt them alone. Of black bear I don't know how many--we don't
count them at all, there are so many of them in this country. But now
I suppose pretty soon we will have to go over on the Hay River, or the
Liard, farther north, to get good hunting. The farms are bringing in
mowing-machines and threshing-machines into this country now. The game
can't last forever at this rate."