CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE FIRST WOODS How shall I set forth the feelings it stirred? None but the shipwrecked sailor, long drifting on the open sea, but come at last to land, can fully know the thrill it gave us. We were like starving Indians suddenly surrounded by Caribou. Wood--timber--fuel--galore! It was hard to realise--but there it was, all about us, and in the morning we were awakened by the sweet, sweet, home-like song of the Robins in the trees, singing their "Cheerup, cheerily," just as they do it in Ontario and Connecticut. Our cache was all right; so, our stock of luxuries was replenished. We now had unlimited food as well as unlimited firewood; what more could any one ask? Yet there was more. The weather was lovely; perfect summer days, and the mosquitoes were gone, yes, now actually nets and flybars were discarded for good. On every side was animal life in abundance; the shimmering lake with its Loons and islands would fit exactly the Indian's dream of the heavenly hunting-grounds. These were the happy halcyon days of the trip, and we stayed a week to rest and revel in the joys about us. In the morning I took a long walk over the familiar hills; the various skeletons we had left were picked bare, evidently by Gulls and Ravens, as no bones were broken and even the sinews were left. There were many fresh tracks of single Caribou going here and there, but no trails of large bands. I sent Weeso off to the Indian village, two miles south. He returned to say that it was deserted and that, therefore, the folk had gone after the Caribou, which doubtless were now in the woods south of Artillery Lake. Again the old man was wholly astray in his Caribou forecast. That night there was a sharp frost; the first we had had. It made nearly half an inch of ice in all kettles. Why is ice always thickest on the kettles? No doubt because they hold a small body of very still water surrounded by highly conductive metal. Billy went "to market" yesterday, killing a nice, fat little Caribou. This morning on returning to bring in the rest of the meat we found that a Wolverine had been there and lugged the most of it away. The tracks show that it was an old one accompanied by one or maybe two young ones. We followed them some distance but lost all trace in a long range of rocks. The Wolverine is one of the typical animals of the far North. It has an unenviable reputation for being the greatest plague that the hunter knows. Its habit of following to destroy all traps for the sake of the bait is the prime cause of man's hatred, and its cleverness in eluding his efforts at retaliation give it still more importance. It is, above all, the dreaded enemy of a cache, and as already seen, we took the extra precaution of putting our caches up trees that were protected by a necklace of fishhooks. Most Northern travellers have regaled us with tales of this animal's diabolical cleverness and wickedness. It is fair to say that the malice, at least, is not proven; and there is a good side to Wolverine character that should be emphasized; that is, its nearly ideal family life, coupled with the heroic bravery of the mother. I say "nearly" ideal, for so far as I can learn, the father does not assist in rearing the young. But all observers agree that the mother is absolutely fearless and devoted. More than one of the hunters have assured me that it is safer to molest a mother Bear than a mother Wolverine when accompanied by the cubs. Bellalise, a half-breed of Chipewyan, told me that twice he had found Wolverine dens, and been seriously endangered by the mother. The first was in mid-May, 1904, near Fond du Lac, north side of Lake Athabaska. He went out with an Indian to bring in a skiff left some miles off on the shore. He had no gun, and was surprised by coming on an old Wolverine in a slight hollow under the boughs of a green spruce. She rushed at him, showing all her teeth, her eyes shining blue, and uttering sounds like those of a Bear. The Indian boy hit her once with a stick, then swung himself out of danger up a tree. Bellalise ran off after getting sight of the young ones; they were four in number, about the size of a Muskrat, and pure white. Their eyes were open. The nest was just such as a dog might make, only six inches deep and lined with a little dry grass. Scattered around were bones and fur, chiefly of Rabbits. The second occasion was in 1905, within three miles of Chipewyan, and, as before, about the middle of May. The nest was much like the first one; the mother saw him coming, and charged furiously, uttering a sort of coughing. He shot her dead; then captured the young and examined the nest; there were three young this time. They were white like the others. Not far from this camp, we found a remarkable midden-yard of Lemmings. It was about 10 feet by 40 feet, the ground within the limits was thickly strewn with pellets, at the rate of 14 to the square inch, but nowhere were they piled up. At this reckoning, there were over 800,000, but there were also many outside, which probably raised the number to 1,000,000. Each pellet was long, brown, dry, and curved, i.e., the winter type. The place, a high, dry, very sheltered hollow, was evidently the winter range of a colony of Lemmings that in summer went elsewhere, I suppose to lower, damper grounds. After sunset, September 5, a bunch of three or four Caribou trotted past the tents between us and the Lake, 200 yards from us; Billy went after them, as, thanks to the Wolverine, we were out of meat, and at one shot secured a fine young buck. His last winter's coat was all shed now, his ears were turning white and the white areas were expanding on feet and buttocks; his belly was pure white. On his back and rump, chiefly the latter, were the scars of 121 bots. I could not see that they affected the skin or, hair in the least. Although all of these Caribou seem to have the normal foot-click, Preble and I worked in vain with the feet of this, dead one to make the sound; we could not by any combination of movement, or weight or simulation of natural conditions, produce anything like a "click." That same day, as we sat on a hill, a cow Caribou came curiously toward us. At 100 yards she circled slowly, gazing till she got the wind 150 yards to one side, then up went her tail and off she trotted a quarter of a mile, but again drew nearer, then circled as before till a second time the wind warned her to flee. This she did three or four times before trotting away; the habit is often seen. Next afternoon, Billy and I saw a very large buck; his neck was much swollen, his beard flowing and nearly white. He sighted us afar, and worked north-west away from us, in no great alarm. I got out of sight, ran a mile and a half, headed him off, then came on him from the north, but in spite of all I could do by running and yelling, he and his band (3 cows with 3 calves) rushed galloping between me and the lake, 75 yards away. He was too foxy to be driven back into that suspicious neighbourhood. Thus we had fine opportunities for studying wild life. In all these days there was only one unfulfilled desire: I had not seen the great herd of Caribou returning to the woods that are their winter range. This herd is said to rival in numbers the Buffalo herds of story, to reach farther than the eye can see, and to be days in passing a given point; but it is utterly erratic. It might arrive in early September. It was not sure to arrive until late October, when the winter had begun. This year all the indications were that it would be late. If we were to wait for it, it would mean going out on the ice. For this we were wholly unprepared. There were no means of getting the necessary dogs, sleds, and fur garments; my business was calling me back to the East. It was useless to discuss the matter, decision was forced on me. Therefore, without having seen that great sight, one of the world's tremendous zoological spectacles the march in one body of millions of Caribou--I reluctantly gave the order to start. On September 8 we launched the Ann Seton on her homeward voyage of 1,200 upstream miles.