es as we passed by. But when they saw the reindeer the whole team
set off at a run, dragging the heavy sled as if it were nothing. The
Esquimau driving the deer saw the approaching dogs and hastily drew his
equipage off the trail farther inshore, standing between the deer and
the dogs with a heavy whip. What the result would have been had the
dogs reached the deer it is hard to say. I had kept my stand on the step
behind the sled and managed to check its wild career with the brake and
to throw it over and stop the approach before the carnivora reached
their immemorial prey. Herein lies one of the difficulties of the
domestication of reindeer in Alaska, a country where so far dogs have
been the only domestic animals. Again, as we entered the outskirts of
Nome the incident was repeated, and only the hasty driving of the
reindeer into a barn prevented the dogs from seizing the deer that time.

[Sidenote: NOME]

Jimmy was long deposed from his ineffectual leadership and a little dog
named Kewalik--the one I obtained at Kikitaruk--was at the head of the
team. Kewalik had never seen so many houses before; hitherto almost
every cabin he had reached on his journeys had been a resting-place, and
he wanted to dive into every house we passed. At Candle and Council
both, our stopping-place had been near the entrance to the little town.
But now we had to pass up one long street after another and I had
continually to drag him and the team he led first from a yard on this
side of the road and then from one on the other. The dog was perfectly
bewildered and out of his head by the number of people and the number of
houses he saw. We were indeed a sorry, travel-worn, unkempt, uncivilised
band, man and dogs, with an old, battered vehicle, and we felt our
incongruity with the new environment as we entered the metropolis of the
luxury and wealth of the North. Here we passed a jeweller's shop, the
whole window aglow with the dull gleam of gold and ivory--the terrible
nugget jewellery so much affected in these parts and the walrus ivory
which is Alaska's other contribution of material for the ornamental
arts. Here we passed a veritable department store, its ground-floor
plate-glass window set as a drawing-room, with gilded, brocaded chairs,
marquetry table, and ormolu clock, and I know not what costliness of rug
and curtain. It was all so strange that it seemed unreal after that long
passage of the savage wilds, that long habitation of huts a