FINAL PREPARATIONS
Sometime in the middle of the night Larry was awakened by flakes of
snow driven into his face, and by the sound of the storm howling
around the tent. The flakes sputtered in the fire which still flared
and struggled to keep burning. The boy was warm and comfortable in
the fur bag, however, and after pulling the flap over his head to
keep out the snow, he was soon sleeping soundly. When he opened his
eyes again it was daylight, and Martin was plodding about in the
storm, building a fire close to the tent where the wind struck it
least. The snow was still falling and was even then a foot deep on
the level.
The old hunter was in high spirits: he had been hoping for the
storm, and the fact that it was a roaring blizzard made no
difference to him so long as the snow kept falling.
The inside of the tent was warm and the boy crawled out of the fur
bag reluctantly and reached for his shoes.
“Not that pair,” old Martin said; “there are your things over at the
foot of your bed. No more city clothes from now on. I nearly worked
my fingers off last night getting things ready for you.”
Larry wondered how much time the old hunter had found for sleep when
he examined the pile of clothing the hunter had laid out for him.
For most of the pieces had been altered in some way to make them so
that the boy could wear them, cut down from some of the larger
garments from the hunting outfit. Sleeves and trouser-legs had been
cut off or turned up, and buttons set over to take up the slack of
the bagging jacket in a way that showed how handy the old hunter was
with the needle. His most laborious task had been in reducing the
size of a pair of moose-skin moccasins, although he had simplified
this operation by taking in the back seam. At that they were at
least three sizes too large, as Larry pointed out.
“But when you have on two, or three, or four pairs of thick German
socks,” Martin assured him, “you won’t notice a little thing like
that. And you’ll fill out the rest of the clothes with underwear the
same way.”
Beside the pile of clothing Martin had placed some other things
which he told the boy were to be his personal belongings that were
to be carried with him all the time except when he slept. But the
hunter told him not to put them away until after they had had
breakfast, and made things a little more secure about the tent. So
Larry left the things as he found them, and went to help Martin.
He soon discovered the difference between his new clothes and the
“city” ones he had discarded. Even the fury of the blizzard could
not force the piercing cold through the thick, soft Mackinaw cloth;
and with the exception of the end of his nose, he was as warm as
toast as he worked under the hunter’s directions.
One side and the back of their tent was protected from the wind by
the wall of rock, and the fire checked the fury of the storm from
the front; but the snow drifted in on them from the unprotected
side, and they remedied this by stretching a piece of canvas across
the gap. It was no easy task, and several times the wind tore it
away before they could get it anchored securely, but when it was
finally made storm proof the enclosure before the roaring fire was
almost as warm and comfortable as a house.
“Now for your equipment,” Martin announced, when everything was
secured to his complete satisfaction.
Larry found that a light hunting hatchet and a stout hunting knife
had been added to his belt of cartridges, suspended in leather
sheaths from loops slipped over the belt. The belt itself was passed
through the loops in the jacket, so that the weight came upon his
shoulders instead of his waist, and when buckled, drew the coat
snugly around him. The gun in its sheath was slung over his shoulder
and hung at his left side. His fur mittens were fastened with
leather strings to the coat sleeves so that there was no possibility
of losing them even when slipped off.
There was a pocket compass in a hunting case about the size of a
watch which fitted into an upper pocket of his jacket which had a
button flap for holding it. As an additional precaution against
losing it a leather string reached from the inside of the pocket and
was fastened to the ring. And Larry found that his watch was secured
in his watch-pocket in a similar manner.
“We can’t take a chance on losing anything,” the hunter explained;
“for there are no jewelry stores along the road that we are going to
travel.”
Larry found that there were three water-proof match boxes to be
distributed in his trousers’ pockets, and a pocket knife that
combined several kinds of useful tools. The matches seemed to be the
ordinary parlor kind. But Martin surprised him by taking one,
dipping it in a cup of water, and then after wiping it off, lighting
it like an ordinary dry match. Even after a match had been floating
in the water for several minutes it would light and burn readily.
“They’ve all been dipped in shellac,” Martin explained. “The shellac
forms a water-proof coating that keeps out moisture but doesn’t
interfere with lighting or burning. So even if your match safe leaks
you won’t have to go without a fire.”
In one box which Larry thought contained matches he found six little
cubes looking like wax run into little square aluminum cups. Martin
explained their use by a simple demonstration. He placed one of them
on the ground where he had scraped away the snow, laid a handful of
sticks over it, struck a match and touched the wax-like substance.
It burst into a bright flame at once, and continued to burn fiercely
for several minutes, igniting the sticks about it and helping to
keep their struggling flames going until enough heat had been
generated to make a steady fire.
“That’s a new fangled thing called ‘solid alcohol,’ used to start a
tenderfoot’s fire when he is wet and cold and has no little dry
twigs at hand,” said Martin. “An old woodsmen like me ought to throw
the stuff away and scorn to use it; and forty years ago I would have
done so. But I am wiser now, I hope, and I don’t despise some of the
new things as I did then. And I remember two different occasions
when I came near losing my life in the snow because my hands were so
cold and numb, and the small wood was so scarce, that I came near
not getting my fire started at all. So now I am going to take along
a few packages of these cubes, and you must do the same. We’ll never
use it except as a last resort; but sometime it may come in handy
for starting a fire or boiling a cup of tea.
“You know we will only use two matches a day after we leave here--one
match to start our fire at noon and at night. There will be coals
from the night next morning to cook our breakfast by. It’s a mark of
bad woodsmanship to have to use more than one match to start a fire,
no matter what kind of weather is going.”
“But how about your pipe?” Larry asked. For the old man smoked
almost continually during his waking hours.
Old Martin sighed and shook his head. “No more pipe for me after we
leave here,” he said, with a little laugh. “The weight in pemmican
that I’ll take instead of the tobacco may be just the amount that
will decide the question of our getting through alive. Smoking isn’t
a necessity, but eating is.”
Larry looked at the old man to see if he were not joking; but he saw
that he was thoroughly in earnest. It made the boy realize the
serious nature of the task before them to know that the old man was
going to sacrifice the greatest solace of his life. But it roused
his determination, and his spirits were too buoyant to be long
depressed.
All day long Martin kept him busy helping at various things that
must be completed before their departure. The toboggans were hauled
into the canvas enclosure, where he and the old man packed and
unpacked the loads, adding something here, or leaving out something
there, working in the glow of the warm fire. Dog harnesses had to be
altered and extra ones tucked away on the sleds, snow-shoe lacings
examined and re-lashed, and a dozen things attended to that Larry
recognized as important when Martin pointed them out. The fire, too,
needed considerable tending to keep a huge kettle of beans cooking
which Martin declared must simmer all day if they were to be cooked
properly.
Toward night the wind subsided, and the clouds cleared away, so that
by the time they had finished their heaping plates of pork and beans
the stars were out glistening like steel points in the frosty air.
Later in the evening they heard howling in the distance--terrifying
sounds to the boy, made by a pack of big timber wolves out on a
hunt, as Martin explained. And for fear the dogs might start an
independent wolf hunt on their own account, Martin tied up the big
malamoots after he had fed them.
During the day Martin had brought several armfuls of packages into
the tent from the stores under the tarpaulin as he went back and
forth at his work. Now that supper was over and the dishes cleaned
he lighted his pipe and and seated himself beside the packages. He
was always talkative when working by the evening fire, and seemed to
find great pleasure in imparting bits of information to the boy from
his inexhaustible store of woodland experiences.
To-night as he began fumbling among the packages, he asked:
“Larry, have you decided what you are going to carry in your ditty
bag?”
“Ditty bag?” Larry repeated; “I’d know better what I was going to
carry in it if I knew what a ‘ditty bag’ was.”
“What, a veteran forest pilot like you not know what a ditty bag
is!” Martin asked in mock astonishment. “Then it’s high time for you
to learn. A ditty bag is the thing that does for the woodsman what
all the pockets in a suit of clothes do for a boy--it carries the
forty and one indispensable things that can’t be carried in some
other place. You’d better sit over here beside me and make yours up
to-night while I am fitting out mine.”
So the boy moved over to the little pile of packages ready for
instructions.
The hunter handed him a little bag made of tough water-proof
material with a string at the top for tying securely. Then he
rummaged through the packages, taking out what he wanted and placing
them in the bag. At his suggestion Larry duplicated this selection
of things for his own bag, so that in case one bag should be lost
they would still have the other. “But,” said Martin, “you must put
in some little thing for luck--anything that strikes your fancy,
after the other things are in. That’s a hunter’s superstition, like
the Indian’s ‘medicine.’”
The first useful article selected was a neat Red Cross package
containing a few useful medicines and surgical dressings for an
emergency. Next came needles of all sizes, with several skeins of
thread, and a wooden handle in which were several awls, neatly
stored in a hollow bobbin on which was wound many lengths of strong
waxed cord. A can of gunoil found a place, and a small whetstone,
rough on one side for sharpening the axes, and smooth on the other
for the knives. A tool case, containing a “good-sized carpenter
shop,” as Martin explained and made of aluminum after Mr. Ware’s own
design, found especial favor; and a broken shell extractor was
considered indispensable.
Buttons and skeins of twine of various sizes went into the bag as a
matter of course; but when the old hunter selected three packages,
each containing a dozen yards of the kind of twisted wire used for
hanging pictures of different sizes, the boy burst out laughing and
rolled on the blankets. He suspected Martin of trying to play off a
quiet hoax on him, and did not intend to be caught in the trap.
Nothing was farther from Martin’s thoughts, however, as Larry
discovered when the use of the wire was explained. It was to be used
for making the snares for catching small animals, particularly
rabbits, the hunter said, and for that purpose was unequaled. And
the old man assured him that for securing food on the march in a
snow-bound country snares were far more useful than rifles. Indian
families in many northern regions depended almost entirely upon
their snares for their supply of winter food.
“Rabbits are the bread and butter of the woodsman in the winter,”
Martin said. “The rabbits make little narrow paths in the
snow--thousands of them, running in all directions--and when they are
not disturbed and going about their business, they always follow
these paths. Now when the rabbit comes to a fallen limb lying across
his path a few inches above the ground, he likes to go under the
limb rather than hop over it. This simplifies matters for the
Indian. He simply hangs his snare in front of the hole under the
limb, and is almost sure to catch the first rabbit that comes
hopping along that particular path.
“The snare is just a simple slip-noose made large enough to let the
rabbit’s head pass through easily. If the wind is blowing the snare
can be held open and in place by tying it with blades of dead grass,
which are strong enough to hold it in place until the rabbit gets
his head through.
“The other end of the snare string is tied to a limb that is bent
down and fastened in a notch cut in a stick or a small sapling if it
happens to be in the right place. The notch is cut deep enough to
hold the bent limb, but not firmly enough but what it can be jerked
loose pretty easily.
“Now when the rabbit comes hopping along the path and starts to go
under the limb, he runs his head through the snare. When he feels
something around his neck he pulls back to get out of its way; but
that tightens the noose about his neck, and he begins leaping about
frantically to get loose. In this way he jerks the bent limb out of
the notch that holds it down, the limb flies back, and swings him up
into the air where he smothers in short order.
“Of course if the snare was simply fastened to the limb over the
path the rabbit would choke himself to death for a certainty,
because he never stops pulling and tugging at the noose while he has
a kick left in him. But then some fox or weasel would probably come
along and get him. But neither of them will get him if he is
dangling in the air: the weasel can’t reach him, and the fox is such
a crafty fellow, always looking out for traps and tricks, that he
won’t go near a dead rabbit hanging on a string, even if he is
starving.
“Now that the snow has stopped falling the rabbits will be out
to-night making paths, and to-morrow night we’ll put out some snares
just for practice. I’ll teach you a dozen ways to make snares for
different kinds of game, but the principle of all of them is the
same as the one for catching Mr. Rabbit. And he’s the boy we’re
interested in mostly.”
The old hunter rose and went out to “have a look at the snow,” as he
put it. He came back well pleased with his inspection.
“The crust will form and set hard to-night,” he said to Larry, “and
to-morrow you’ll begin your hardest and most important
lesson--learning to walk on snow-shoes. You can look forward to
taking some of the grandest headers you have ever taken in your
life,” he added, grinning.
“But--” Larry began, and then stopped.
“‘But’ what?” Martin asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Larry answered evasively. “I was just thinking of
those headers that I am going to take to-morrow, that’s all.”
“Well, go to bed and dream about them then,” the old hunter
instructed.