these.  Before leaving Red River I had received from a gentleman, well known in the Hudson Bay Company, some most useful suggestions as to winter travel.  His residence of many years in the coldest parts of Labrador, and his long journey into the interior of that most wild and sterile land, had made him acquainted with all the vicissitudes of northern travel.  Under his direction I had procured a number of the skins of the common cabri, or small deer, had them made into a large sack of some seven feet in length and three in diameter.  The skin of this deer is very light, but possesses, for some reason with which I am unacquainted, a power of giving great warmth to the person it covers.  The sack was made with the hair turned inside, and was covered on the outside with canvass.  To make my bed, therefore, became a very simple operation:  lay down a buffalo robe, unroll the sack, and the thing was done.  To get into bed was simply to get into the sack, pull the hood over one’s head, and go to sleep.  Remember, there was no tent, no outer covering of any kind, nothing but the trees—­sometimes not many of them—­the clouds, or the stars.

During the journey with horses I had generally found the bag too warm, and had for the most part slept on it, not in it; but now its time was about to begin, and this night in the pine-bluff was to record a signal triumph for the sack principle applied to shake-downs.

About three o’clock in the morning the men got up, unable to sleep on account of the cold, and set the fire going.  The noise soon awoke me, but I lay quiet inside the bag, knowing what was going on outside.  Now, amongst its other advantages, the sack possessed one of no small value.  It enabled me to tell at once on awaking what the cold was doing outside; if it was cold in the sack, or if the hood was fastened down by frozen breath to the opening, then it must be a howler outside; then it was time to get ready the greasiest breakfast and put on the thickest duffel-socks and mittens.  On the morning of the 22nd all these symptoms were manifest; the bag was not warm, the hood was frozen fast against the opening, and one or two smooth-haired dogs were shivering close beside my feet and on top of the bag.  Tearing under the frozen mouth of the sack, I got out into the open.  Beyond a doubt it was cold; I don’t mean cold in the ordinary manner, cold such as you can localize to your feet, or your fingers, or your nose, but cold all over, crushing cold.  Putting on coat and moccassins as close to the fire as possible, I ran to the tree on which I had hung the thermometer on the previous evening; it stood at 37 below zero at 3:30 in the morning.  I had slept well; the cabri sack was a very Ajax among roosts; it defied the elements.  Having eaten a tolerably fat breakfast and swallowed a good many cups of hot tea, we packed the sleds, harnessed the dogs, and got away from the pine bluff two hours before daybreak.  Oh, how biting cold it was!  On in the grey snow light with a terrible