Wealth, indeed, is in those packs, and
patience and cunning and utmost skill, defiance of the snows and the
crackling cold, long miles on snowshoes and the hardships of the trail,
the nights in the bough-tied huts, the pack galling the shoulders. But
what is all this beside that which waits the runner of the trail at
every 'set' in those many miles? Here he finds his leaning-pole. There
have been little tracks up its slim roadway, but those were covered by
the fall of three days back and the little creature who made them hangs
there at the end, three small feet beating the cold air feebly, a tiny
head squirming from side to side, two dull black eyes set at the
distorted world. He has caught his marten. It has not frozen, for the
snow was light and the forest still and thick, and three days have
passed, M'sieu. Three days! Mon Dieu! How much were those three days
worth? The trapper taps the squirming head and puts the bit of fur in
his pack-bag. On to the next. The beaver? Dead, M'sieu, thanks to the
good God, drowned in its own sweet water. The pack is heavy with small
bodies ere the Assiniboine reaches the place where he has laid his trap
for the silver fox.
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