It was with much wistful regret that Jan recalled in these days the daily round of his life, after the fight with Bill, as Jean’s lead dog.  The swift, positive, and ordered evolutions of those smoothly running days seemed merely miraculous in retrospect as Jan compared his memory of them with the wretched muddle of Beeching’s wasteful scramble across the country:  They carried no trade goods, nothing save the necessary dog-food and creature-comforts for the two men; yet their sled—­an extra-large one—­was half as heavy again to pull as Jean’s had been, despite the ten primely conditioned dogs who made up Beeching’s “flash” team.

The morning was generally far advanced when Beeching and Harry started in to clear the muddle of their amateurish night’s camp, with all its preposterous litter of bedding, utensils (always unclean), and other wasteful truck such as no men can afford to carry in the northland.  But the day would be half done by the time their muddled preparations were finally completed.

And then, more often than not, one of the men would add his own not inconsiderable weight to that of the half-packed, overladen sled; and, at the best, Harry as a trail-breaker and finder was of no more use than a blind kitten would have been.  A dozen times in the day a halt would be called for some enforced repacking of the jerry-built load on the sled; and at such times some unpacking would often have to be done to provide liquor or other refreshment for the men.  There were times when, on a perfect trail, the day’s run would be no more than twenty miles; and there were days of bad trail, when even Jean would have been put to it to make more than five and twenty miles, and these incompetents, with their ten-dog team, covered a bare eight or ten miles.

Pride in his leadership was as impossible for Jan in these conditions as was content or pride in his share of the work for any other member of the team.  But that was not the worst of it.  During the first day or two of the trip Jan was staggered to find that these new masters of his had no notion of measuring dog-rations, or even of serving these with any sort of regularity as to time, or portions, or gross quantity.  They would feed some or all the dogs, at any time of day at all, and in any feckless way that came handy.  At their first and second midday halts, for instance, they flung down to the team, as though to a herd of sheep or swine, food enough for three days’ rations, their own leavings, and the orthodox dog-ration stuff, in a mixed heap.

Given decent, proper feeding, Jan would have seen to it that order was preserved and no thieving done.  Each dog should have had his own “whack,” and none have been molested.  But with all his genuine love of order and discipline, Jan was no magician.  He could not possibly apportion out a scattered refuse-heap.  He had necessarily to grab a share for himself; and, as was inevitable, the weaker members of the team went short, or got nothing.