urse. No perfectly
reasonable man would ever take such frightful chances as this absurd
little ass set his face to without fear. He hummed a little tune as
he packed his outfit into his shoulder-straps. "I ought to rattle
into Glenora on this grub, hadn't I?" he said.

At last he was ready to be ferried across the river, which was swift
and dangerous. Burton set him across, and as he was about to depart I
gave him a letter to post and a half-dollar to pay postage. My name
was written on the corner of the envelope. He knew me then and said,
"I've a good mind to stay right with you; I'm something of a writer
myself."

I hastened to say that he could reach Glenora two or three days in
advance of us, for the reason that we were bothered with a lame
horse. In reality, we were getting very short of provisions and were
even then on rations. "I think you'll overtake the Borland outfit," I
said. "If you don't, and you need help, camp by the road till we come
up and we'll all share as long as there's anything to share. But you
are in good trim and have as much grub as we have, so you'd better
spin along."

He "hit the trail" with a hearty joy that promised well, and I never
saw him again. His cheery smile and unshrinking cheek carried him
through a journey that appalled old packers with tents, plenty of
grub, and good horses. To me he was simply a strongly accentuated
type of the goldseeker--insanely persistent; blind to all danger,
deaf to all warning, and doomed to failure at the start.

The next day opened cold and foggy, but we entered upon a hard day's
work. Burton became the chief canoeman, while one of the Manchester
boys, stripped to the undershirt, sat in the bow to pull at the
paddle "all same Siwash." Burton's skill and good judgment enabled us
to cross without losing so much as a buckle. Some of our poor lame
horses had a hard struggle in the icy current. At about 4 P.M. we
were able to line up in the trail on the opposite side. We pressed on
up to the higher valleys in hopes of finding better feed, and camped
in the rain about two miles from the ford. The wind came from the
northwest with a suggestion of autumn in its uneasy movement. The
boys were now exceedingly anxious to get into the gold country. They
began to feel most acutely the passing of the summer. In the camp at
night the talk was upon the condition of Telegraph Creek and the
Teslin Lake Trail.

Rain, rain, rain! It seemed as though no day could pa