In one end of the
tilt was a bench covered with spruce boughs which Si used as a bed.
There was nothing to feed the exhausted dogs, but they were
unharnessed and were glad enough to curl up in the snow, where the
drift would cover them, after the manner of northern dogs.
Then a fire was lighted in the stove. Will went out with the ax and
kettle, and presently returned with the kettle filled with water
dipped from Bartlett River after he had cut a hole through the ice.
Setting the kettle on the stove, Will, standing by the stove,
proceeded to fill and light his pipe while Doctor Grenfell opened his
dunnage bag to get the tea and sugar. Suddenly Will's pipe clattered
to the floor. Will, standing like a statue, did not stoop to pick it
up and Grenfell rescued it and rising offered it to him, when, to his
vast astonishment, he discovered that the man, standing erect upon
his feet was fast asleep. He had been nearly sixty hours without sleep
and forty-eight hours of this had been spent on the trail.
They aroused Will and had him sit down on the bench. He re-lighted his
pipe but in a moment it fell from his teeth again.
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