The next morning old Joe was occupied for some time repairing sundry
worn places in harness and sleds. The boys seized the opportunity to
write some letters home.
Both lads penned newsy epistles teeming with facts gleaned by them about
the region in which they were traveling. As a sidelight on their
experiences, we may take a peep over their shoulders while their pens
are flying and learn something of their impressions.
From Tom’s letter to a school chum we can detach some interesting
remarks on the “steeds” of the northern wilds, the faithful mamelukes
upon whom the hunter and trapper’s success and even life may depend.
“There are said to be two seasons in this land,” wrote Tom, “winter and
June-July-and-August. We are now in the midst of the latter, as you, of
course, know.
“During the summer the mamelukes—the Alaskan dogs I told you something
about in a former letter—run wild. They mostly forage for themselves
and become very bold and ferocious.
“But as soon as the winter sets in the canine free-lances are rounded up
and led off into captivity by straps, strings and wires. Sometimes one
owner gets into a dispute with another concerning his four-footed
property, and then there are lively times indeed.
“After their long holiday the dogs, especially the puppies, are very
wild. In some cases they have to be broken into their work all over
again.
“This is no picnic for the dogs, for some of the drivers are very
brutal. But they don’t dare abuse the dogs too much for fear of injuring
their own property.
“The dogs used by the government for transporting the mails—a team of
which will haul this very letter—are splendid looking brutes. They are
called Labrador ‘huskies’ and are very large and heavy-coated.
“Some of them are, without exaggeration, as big as young calves. They
carry the mail over vast, snowy wildernesses, and even sometimes to
Dawson, when the air is not too nippy. That is to say, when the
thermometer is not more than thirty degrees below.
“The dog drivers have almost a language of their own, like the ‘mule
skinners’ of our western plains. When a group of them gets together you
can hear some tall stories of the feats each man’s team has performed.
And, wild as some of these yarns may seem to an ‘outsider,’ they are not
so incredible as they appear.
“The big, well-furred, long-legged Labrador Huskies are the most
powerful, as well as the fiercest, of the sledge dogs. A load of one
hundred and fifty pounds to each dog is the usual burden—and no light
one, when you consider the trails over which they travel.
“As a rule, seven to eight or nine dogs are hitched to a sledge. The
harness is of the type called the 'Labrador.’ It consists of a single
trace. Other traces are attached to it, so that the dogs are spread out
fan-shaped from the sledge. This is done to keep them from interfering
with each other, for they will fight ‘at the drop of a hat.’ And when
they do fight—well, fur flies!
“And here is where the driver’s job comes in. His main care is to keep
his animals—some of them worth more than one hundred dollars each, from
maiming each other. Nor do his troubles end here, for he has to see to
it that the dogs don’t turn on him. You must recall that some of the
‘huskies’ are as savage as wolves, and an iron hand is required to keep
them disciplined.
“Nearly every driver carries a stout club and a ferocious looking whip
of seal-hide. He uses both impartially and unmercifully. If the dogs
thought for a moment that you were afraid of them they would turn on you
like a flash and probably kill you. That is the reason for the driver’s
seeming brutality. He literally dare not be kind, except in some
instances where, as with our present companion, Joe Picquet, he has an
exceptionally gentle team.
“Then, too, the dogs are forever attacking each other. Every once in a
while there will be a desperate battle, which can only be stopped by a
free use of the whip. But in their wolflike fury the dogs sometimes
cannot be quieted even by these means.
“Another curious bit of dog lore is this: In each team—just as in a big
school of boys—there is always one unfortunate that appears to be the
butt of the others. They take every opportunity to steal his food and
make life miserable for him. Sometimes the whole pack will make an
onslaught on the poor beast and, if not stopped in time, will tear his
flesh and rip him open, although they rarely eat him.
“Then, too, some of the dogs are mischievous in the extreme. They will
show an almost human intelligence in making life miserable for their
driver. It is their delight, sometimes, to spill the sledge and the
driver, and gallop madly off, overturning the pack and losing the mail.
I hope that will not happen to this letter, for I am writing it under
some difficulties and want you to get it.
“When this happens it’s tough luck for the driver. It means that he has
to wade miles through the snow, tracking the runaways. He usually finds
them at the next post-house, unless the sledge has become entangled in
brush or trees. When this latter occurs the dogs scoop out snug-holes
for themselves in the snow and go to sleep!
“The class of dog most used by the ordinary traveler is different from
the giant huskies. These are the mamelukes or the native Indian dog.
They are supposed to have wolf blood in them, and they certainly act up
to the supposition!
“The mamelukes are usually harnessed all in a line, one before the
other. They are shorter-haired, more active, faster and ten times meaner
than the husky—and that’s going some, let me tell you.
“Their chief delight is to get into a regular Donnybrook fight. When
this happens there is only one way to stop them, and that is to club
them till they are knocked insensible. Sounds brutal, doesn’t it? but it
is the only way to quell one of these disturbances.
“If they get a chance to they’ll bite through their harness with one nip
of their long teeth. Then, having gained their liberty, off they will
gallop and sometimes not be caught again for days.
“The mameluke is an habitual thief, too. His idea of a nice little
midnight repast is to pull the boots off your feet while you are asleep
and indulge in a hasty lunch. His seal-hide harness, also, appeals to
his epicurean tastes; in fact, he will eat anything, including his best
friend, if he gets a chance!
“Besides the mameluke, the husky is an aristocrat and a highly-bred
gentleman, although his manners are nothing to brag about. Another
accomplishment of the mameluke is opening provision boxes and getting
out the tin cans they contain.
“He carries his own can-opener in the form of his powerful teeth. His
taste is not particular. Canned tomatoes, fruit, vegetables,
sardines—in fact, anything a man can put into a can, a mameluke can get
out of it! Any leather covered goods are also appetizing to the
mameluke. Trunk covers, saddles, and so on. He’ll eat any of them
without sauce, and not leave any bones either!
“It seems strange that these dogs—which are the mainstay of the
traveler in the northern wilds—live through their whole lives without
ever getting a kind word. They have performed wonderful feats of
endurance and, with all their wolfish greed and viciousness, they have
time and time again saved human lives by their wonderful stamina.
“‘A mameluke knows only one law, and that is contained in the end of a
club or whip,’ an old driver told me once; and yet some, like Joe
Picquet, have succeeded in getting them to do much of their work through
kindness. But such cases are so very rare as to prove the rule.
“There is another remarkable difference between the husky’s character
and that of his disreputable relative. Food that he has stolen tastes
sweeter to the mameluke than any other delicacy. The fact that he has
pilfered it from the camp or the sled appears to give it an added zest.
“The husky, however, will go off fishing or hunting for himself if given
a chance. In this he shows his wild origin. Just like a wolf or a bear,
he will take his place in a stream and seize any fish that may be cast
up on the shallows.
“The average speed of a dog team in good condition is ten miles an hour,
and, as you know, in the States we call that good ‘reading’ even for a
blooded horse. The dogs travel various distances daily, depending on the
state of the trail they are following. I have heard of dogs that made
seventy miles a day. Such animals are very valuable and carefully
watched, for there are plenty of dog-thieves in this country.
“When the thermometer drops too low for horse travel, what horses there
are in the country are stabled. From then till spring the dog is the
Alaskan locomotive. With the coming of the snows the dogs become the
constant traveling companions of the men of this northland, and do
practically all the transportation work.
“The dogs can travel in weather so terrifically cold that men would not
dare to stir abroad. The lowest temperature recorded so far at Dawson
was eighty-three below zero. No need for an ice-box, then, up here in
the winter.
“But these great falls of temperature only occur occasionally, for which
we are duly thankful. When it gets so very cold the air becomes filled
with a thick fog. It is hard to see even a hundred yards. Nobody stirs
outside, and it is like a dead world.
“One curious thing about the extreme cold is the tendency it has to make
you want to hibernate just like a wood-chuck. We sleep sixteen and
fifteen hours when we are not on the trail, and could do with more.
Wouldn’t it be tough if some time we all overslept and didn’t wake up
till spring! How Jack would eat! He can put away a man’s sized portion
of grub now, anyhow.
“Travel up here is not usually done by a man alone. There is great
danger of his eyelids becoming frozen together, and perhaps ice will
form about his nostrils or mouth, half choking him and keeping him busy
removing the accumulation. There is also the Arctic drowsiness to
contend against, that overpowering desire to sleep that it is almost
impossible to fight off. If this overtook a solitary traveler it would
mean his almost certain death in some drift.
“The freezing of the waters of the rivers comes on very suddenly.
Sometimes in a night. The only warning that you get is the glow of the
sun-dogs—like little suns—scattered all round the central luminary.
“You have to watch out, then, if you are in a canoe or a rowboat. The
water may be free from ice, but as you paddle or handle the oars, you
may notice bubbles and particles of ice bobbing to the surface.
“That’s a danger signal!
“It means that the bottom of the river has begun to freeze. If you don’t
make a quick landing you are soon hemmed in by ice too thick to row or
paddle through, but too thin to walk on. You may be frozen before you
can escape.
“Well, I’ve told you enough to let you see that life up here is not a
bed of roses, but, as my uncle says, ‘it makes men’. At any rate, no
mollycoddle could get along very well in a northern winter. But we are
enjoying all of it—the rough and the smooth. We have each gained in
weight—and eat!—Fatty Dawkins at school was a mere invalid compared to
us!”
So closed Tom’s letter and, by the time it was finished, old Joe was
ready to resume the trail. The storekeeper took charge of the boys’
mail, to be delivered to the dog-teams when the post came by.