It was afore I come here, which is quite a lively, sociable place compared to Dodson's back country out-station, at the foot o' those there ranges beyond.

I give you my word, ma'am, it used always to make me feel as if I was dead, and living in a lonely eternity.

Them clear, bright-blue _glassers_ (glaciers, he meant, I presume) was awful lonesome, and as for a human being they never come a-nigh the place.

Well as I was saying, ma'am, one day I finds I had run out o' candles, and as the long dark evenings (for it was the height o' winter) was bad enough, even with a dip burning, to show me old Spot's face for company, I set to work, hot haste, to make some more.

It was bitter, biting cold, you bet, ma'am; and I was hard at work--just after I had had my bit o' breakfast, before I went out for to look round my boundary--melting and making my dips, so that they might be fine and hard for night.