“‘Tis wrong now t’ be grievin’ when I has so much t’ be thankful for.  Bill’ll be takin’ th’ silver fox an’ other fur out, and when father sells un ‘twill pay for Emily’s goin’ t’ th’ doctor.  Th’ Lard saved me from freezin’, an’ I’m well an’ th’ Injuns be wonderful good t’ me.  Maybe some time they’ll be goin’ back th’ Big Hill way—­maybe ’twill be next winter—­an’ then I’ll be gettin’ home.”

In this manner the hope of youth always conquered, and his desperate situation was to some extent forgotten in the pictures he drew for himself of his reunion with the loved ones in the uncertain “Sometime” of the future.

On and on they travelled through the endless, boundless white, over wind-swept rocky hills so inhospitably barren that even the snow could not find a lodgment on them, or over wide plains where the few trees that grew had been stunted and gnarled into mere shrubs by winter blasts.  On every hand the mountains began to raise their ragged austere heads like grim giant sentinels placed there to guard the way.  Finally they turned into a pass, which brought them, on the other side of the ridge it led through, to a comparatively well-wooded valley down which a wide river wound its way northward.  The trees were larger than any Bob had seen since leaving the Big Hill trail, and this new valley seemed almost familiar to him.

As they emerged from the pass a wolf cry, long and weird, came from a distant mountainside and broke the wilderness stillness, which had become almost insufferable, and to the lad even this wild cry held a note of companionship that was pleasant to hear after the long and deathlike quiet that had prevailed.

They took to the river ice and travelled on it for several miles when, rounding a bend, they suddenly came upon a cluster of half a dozen deerskin wigwams standing in the spruce trees just above the river bank.  An Indian from one of the lodges discovered their approach, and gave a shout.  Instantly men, women and children sprang into view and came running out to welcome them.  It was a curious, medley crowd.  The men were clad in long, decorated deerskin coats such as Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn wore, and the women in deerskin skirts reaching a little way below the knees, and all wearing the fringed buckskin leggings.

The greeting was cordial and noisy, everybody shaking hands with the new arrivals, talking in the high key characteristic of them, and laughing a great deal.  Two of the men embraced Sishetakushin and Mookoomahn and shed copious tears of joy over them.  These two men it appeared were Mookoomahn’s brothers.  The women were not so demonstrative, but showed their delight in a ceaseless flow of words.

When the first greetings were over Sishetakushin told the assembled Indians how Bob had been found sleeping in the snow, and that the Great Spirit had sent the White Snow Brother to dwell in their lodges as one of them.  After this introduction and a rather magnified description of his accomplishments as a hunter they all shook Bob’s hand and welcomed him as one of the tribe.