When I gained the other side, he screamed louder than ever, and after running back and forth in vain search for a way of escape, he would return to the brink of the crevasse above the bridge, moaning and wailing as if in the bitterness of death.  Could this be the silent, philosophic Stickeen?  I shouted encouragement, telling him the bridge was not so bad as it looked, that I had left it flat and safe for his feet, and he could walk it easily.  But he was afraid to try.  Strange so small an animal should be capable of such big, wise fears.  I called again and again in a reassuring tone to come on and fear nothing; that he could come if he would only try.  He would hush for a moment, look down again at the bridge, and shout his unshakable conviction that he could never, never come that way; then lie back in despair, as if howling, “O-o-oh! what a place!  No-o-o, I can never go-o-o down there!” His natural composure and courage had vanished utterly in a tumultuous storm of fear.  Had the danger been less, his distress would have seemed ridiculous.  But in this dismal, merciless abyss lay the shadow of death, and his heartrending cries might well have called Heaven to his help.  Perhaps they did.  So hidden before, he was now transparent, and one could see the workings of his heart and mind like the movements of a clock out of its case.  His voice and gestures, hopes and fears, were so perfectly human that none could mistake them; while he seemed to understand every word of mine.  I was troubled at the thought of having to leave him out all night, and of the danger of not finding him in the morning.  It seemed impossible to get him to venture.  To compel him to try through fear of being abandoned, I started off as if leaving him to his fate, and disappeared back of a hummock; but this did no good; he only lay down and moaned in utter hopeless misery.  So, after hiding a few minutes, I went back to the brink of the crevasse and in a severe tone of voice shouted across to him that now I must certainly leave him, I could wait no longer, and that, if he would not come, all I could promise was that I would return to seek him next day.  I warned him that if he went back to the woods the wolves would kill him, and finished by urging him once more by words and gestures to come on, come on.

He knew very well what I meant, and at last, with the courage of despair, hushed and breathless, he crouched down on the brink in the hollow I had made for my knees, pressed his body against the ice as if trying to get the advantage of the friction of every hair, gazed into the first step, put his little feet together and slid them slowly, slowly over the edge and down into it, bunching all four in it and almost standing on his head.  Then, without lifting his feet, as well as I could see through the snow, he slowly worked them over the edge of the step and down into the next and the next in succession in the same way, and gained the end of the bridge.  Then,