at my feet, and scampered off among the shadows. For a moment I stood still, watching the creature as he flashed across the open spaces and thinking regretfully that a fine supply of food was flitting beyond my reach. Then glancing down, I caught sight of a great mass of fungous growth upon the base of the stump from which the rabbit had jumped. One side of moss had been eaten away and bits of the nibbled fungus were strewn upon the earth.

This, then, was what the rabbit had been eating, and I realized that by setting a snare or trap beside the stump I might be able to capture him. There was no time like the present for attempting the feat, and I at once set about preparing a trap. It was merely a simple "twitch-up," such as every boy uses for catching rabbits and partridges; while a few days before the trap would have been beyond me, it was now simple, with my knowledge of hemlock roots and the self-reliance which I was so rapidly acquiring.

Cutting a number of short sticks, I pushed them into the earth about the fungus, thus inclosing it on all sides but one. On either side of the opening thus left I drove two stout stakes with notches near their upper ends. From a bit of dead-wood I then whittled out a spindle-shaped piece just long enough to reach from one of these stakes to the other. Then with a fine hemlock root I formed a noose, tied the spindle to the fiber just above the noose, and fastened the end of the root to the tip of a small sapling close by. Bending down the latter, I slipped the spindle into the notches in the stake, spread the noose across the opening, and my snare was complete.

I was proud of my work, simple as it was, and was confident that when the rabbit returned to finish his meal he would push his head through the noose, dislodge the spindle, and would be jerked into the air and killed by the spring of the sapling. I stood for a moment looking at the snare and the fungus, and suddenly roared with laughter at my own stupidity. Here I had been working for nearly an hour to set a trap which might catch the rabbit, and within a few inches was a supply of food of far more value and to be had without the least effort. Surely if a rabbit could eat the fungus, so could I; I plucked a bit of the queer growth and took it with me.

I reached my shelter without further adventure and at once prepared to cook and sample the fungus. I was not at all sure as to the best method of cooking it, and decided to try a small quantity in various ways. I therefore placed a lump among the hot coals to roast like a potato, while I hung another lump on a green stick before the fire to broil.

Hitherto broiling and roasting had been my sole means of cooking food; now, having remembered that my guide had once showed me how to boil water in birch-bark, I made a rude pot of this material, placed water and fungus within, and set the whole over a bed of hot coals covered with ashes. The bit of fungus to be broiled soon shriveled up and was transformed into a leatherylike material, tasteless and useless, while the piece roasting in the coals sputtered and sizzled, and might as well have been a bit of pine-bark at the end of a few minutes.

As both of these methods were failures, I watched with some anxiety the piece boiling in the birch-bark pot. When it had boiled for some minutes I fished a bit out and, as soon as it had cooled, proceeded to taste it. Much to my joy, it had lost its woody flavor and was as sweet and palatable as a boiled chestnut. I at once drew forth all that remained in the pot and dumped in all I had left. Words cannot express my satisfaction at thus having discovered a source of vegetable food which would assure me a supply of provisions without the trouble and labor of trapping animals, catching fish, or hunting frogs and mussels.

As soon as my meal of fungus was finished I took my frog spear, made my way to the brook and my trap. With excitement I pushed through the thick growth, for even with my newly acquired knowledge of edible fungus I felt that meat would be necessary, or at least welcome, during my tramp, and the success or failure of my first trap meant much to me. But I had no cause to worry; the snare had been sprung and had served its purpose well. Even before I reached the trap I thought my prize the largest rabbit I had ever seen. Truly, my first attempt at trapping had been a huge success. So far as food was concerned, I would have no trouble on my search for the settle

ment.

CLASS ACTIVITIES

1. Tell the part of the story which interested you most. Which part was of least interest to you?

2. What were the most pressing and important needs of the lost man? Name the one which caused him the greatest difficulty. Which of his needs do we all experience?

3. Name the different ways in which his knife was useful. Were any of the other articles in his pockets except his handkerchief of help to him?

4. Did any of the special human powers mentioned on p. 4 help the lost man? Explain.

5. Why did the lost man not make a bow and arrow? In what respects is a spear easier to make than a bow and arrow?

6. Mention ways by which one can discover what plants are edible. 7. What is the chief difference between man's method of obtaining food and the methods used by animals? See H. C. Hill, Community Life and Civic Problems, 338-339.

8. Volunteer work for Boy Scouts or Camp Fire Girls:

a. Show the class how to make fire with flint and steel.

b. Show the class how to make fire with a bow-drill or a planer.

c. Boil water in a birch-bark vessel over a Bunsen burner.

d. Describe traps you have made for catching moles, rats, or rabbits. e. Explain how to find directions by examining trees (see p. 23). f. Put on the blackboard a drawing which will explain the rabbit trap

described on p. 24.

ADDITIONAL READINGS. 1. "The Discovery of the North," R. E. Peary, in National Geographic Magazine, 20: 896–915. 2. Adrift on an Ice Pan, W. T. Grenfell. 3. “Dr. Grenfell's Winter Practice," N. Duncan, in Book One, pp. 418-422. 4. "Peary as a Leader," D. B. MacMillan, in National Geographic Magazine, 37: 293–322. 5. "Roald Amundsen," M. H. Wade, Light Bringers, 196–242. 6. “Robert Edwin Peary," ibid., 1-63. 7. "Outwitting Death in the Red Desert," in Literary Digest, 81: No. 6, pp. 36-46. 8. "The Fire Spirit," H. M. Burr, Around the Fire, 3-18.

3. TURKEY RED

FRANCES GILCHRIST WOOD

This story is made up of four main parts which are put together somewhat like the links in a chain, as follows:

See if you can tell where each link ends and a new one begins.

The old mail-sled running between Haney and Le Beau, in the days when Dakota was still a Territory, was nearing the end of its hundred-mile route.

Dakota was a desolate country in those early days: geographers still described it as The Great American Desert. Never was anything as lonesome as that endless stretch of snow, excepting the same desert burned brown by the hot wind of summer. Nothing but sky and plain and its voice, the wind, unless one might count a lonely sod shack, miles away from a neighbor, miles from anywhere.

Three men were in the sled: Dan, the mail-carrier, crusty, belligerently Western; Hillas, a younger man, hardly more than a boy, living on his claim near the end of the stage-line; the third, a stranger from "the East." He had given his name as Smith, and was as inquisitive about the country as he was silent about his business there. Dan plainly disapproved of him.

They had driven the last cold miles in silence when the stagedriver turned to his neighbor. "Letter didn't say anything about coming out to look over the country, did it?"

Hillas shook his head. "It was like all the rest, Dan. Don't want to build a railroad until the country's settled."

"Can't they see the other side? What it means to the folks already here to wait for it?"

The stranger thrust a suddenly interested face above the handsome collar of his fur coat. He looked out over the waste of snow. "You say there's no timber here?"

Dan maintained unfriendly silence, and Hillas answered: "Nothing but scrub on the banks of the creeks."

The boy shook his head. "We're too busy rustling for something to eat first. And you can't develop mines without tools.". "Tools?"

"Yes, a railroad first of all."

Dan shifted the lines from one fur-mittened hand to the other as he looked along the horizon a bit anxiously. The stranger shivered visibly.

"It's a God-forsaken country. Why don't you get out?"

Hillas, following Dan's glance around the blurred sky-line, answered absently: "Usual answer is, 'Leave? It's all I can do to stay here.""

Smith looked at him irritably. "Why should any sane man ever have chosen this frozen wilderness?"

Hillas closed his eyes wearily. "We came in the spring." "I see!" The edged voice snapped. "Visionaries!"

Hillas's eyes opened again, wide. He spoke under his breath, as if he were alone.

"Visionary, pioneer, American. Perhaps that is what we are." Suddenly the endurance in his voice went down before a wave of bitterness. "The first pioneers had to wait, too. How could they stand it so long!"

The young shoulders drooped as he thrust stiff fingers deep into his coat pockets. He slowly withdrew his right hand, holding a parcel wrapped in brown paper. He tore a flap in the cover, looked at the brightly colored contents, and returned the parcel, his chin a little higher.

Dan watched the northern sky-line restlessly. "It won't be snow. Look like a blizzard to you, Hillas?"

The traveller sat up. "Blizzard?”

"Yes," Dan drawled, "the real Dakota article, where blizzards are made. None of your Eastern imitations, but a ninety-mile wind. Only one good thing about a blizzard - it's over in a hurry. You get to shelter or you freeze to death."

A gust of wind flung a powder of snow stingingly against their faces. The traveller withdrew his head turtle-wise within the handsome collar in final condemnation. "No man in his senses would ever have deliberately come here to live."