I made for that swamp thinking I would cut
across him. I tried to run, yet I was so very, very weak. Oh! how
hard I tried to run. But when I got out there he was across on the
other side. I was away for some time, yet when I came to the boys,
they were still lain the same way, and their faces to the ground,
and did not move till I spoke to them. We were more than sorry
about the caribou, and each one said what he would do, and how much
we could eat if we killed that caribou and that we would stay right
there for a few days till we got a little stronger.
Though I was feeling so very weak myself, when we would have
nothing else but tea, as we often just had tea, nothing else, when
I would hand the boys a cup of tea each, I would ask them to pass
it back, as I would pretend I'd forgotten to put any sugar in.
They would pretend that they didn't care for sugar, and refuse to
have some. Then I would ask them if they would have some bread or
some pie.
Mr. Hubbard would say, "PIE! What is pie? What do they use it
for? Do they eat it?"
This I did often to encourage them and myself, that we might forget
the danger ahead; but it was something impossible to forget, as the
hunger and weakness pained us, and I thought we would not be able
to go many more days if we don't succeed in killing anything.
