In her desperation to escape, Annadoah, without a thought of the danger, essayed to cross fjords where the ice was breaking.  As she sped over deceptive unbroken areas the ice often split under her feet.  In one of the sounds jammed ice was moving.  To go around it she knew would mean a loss of three miles.  She leaped upon the heaving ice.  It rocked dangerously beneath her feet.  As she left the shore the current increased, the ice moved more swiftly.  From cake to cake she leaped with the agility of an arctic deer.  The ice floes swirled under her and tilted as her feet alighted.  Half way across, her foot slipped—­the ice fragment eluded her wild grasp and she sank into the frigid water.  She felt herself sinking; for a moment she seemed unable to continue the struggle—­then she recalled the dear burden upon her back.  She fought the swift current and grappled madly with the jamming ice.  It gathered about her—­she feared she would be buried by the force of the impact.  But with a mighty struggle she finally grasped hold of a fortunate ridge on a cake and clambered to its surface.  The baby was unscathed.  It was crying loudly in its hood.  Although her hands were almost frozen, the cold water had not entered her garments.  She leaped into the air and fled.  She next scaled the rocky face of a precipice to gain time—­the rocks cut her face and hands.  Swarms of birds, frightened from their nests, surrounded her.  Their cries filled her with terror.  Reaching, on the farther side, shallow streams over which thin ice lay, she bravely forged ahead—­the ice broke—­her feet sank into the mud.  Her breath gave out—­she felt paralyzing pangs in her lungs.  Yet the cries behind—­which had become somewhat more distant—­urged her on.  Again and again, in crossing water moving with broken ice her feet slipped into black, treacherous streams, and, swimming with native skill, she saved the child from the least harm.  By degrees its cries ceased and it fell into slumber.  Occasionally Annadoah was compelled to rest, to regain her breath.  Her reserve strength—­as is that of her people—­was tremendous.  Staggering slowly ahead, she often sank into engulfing morasses where the earth had melted and willows were sprouting.  Panting, trembling in every limb, she fought her way out.  For the better part of the journey her legs moved mechanically—­she was only half conscious.  Urged by her superhuman determination, the little woman struggled over twenty miles, and when she reached the great promontory where the house stood, her kamiks were torn, her clothing was soaked with frigid water, and her hands were bleeding from wounds inflicted by the sharp rocks.[1]

Behind her, in her delirious flight, Annadoah ever heard the threatening cries of pursuing tribesmen.

As she approached the wooden house she staggered to and fro, and at one time was perilously near the edge of the cliff.

Upon her back the infant slept peacefully.