CHAPTER 9.
THE LAND OF THE MUSK-OX A far cry it was from bright June at Port Chippewayan to dim October on Great Slave Lake.
Two long, laborious months Rea and Jones threaded the crooked shores of the great inland sea, to halt at the extreme northern end, where a plunging rivulet formed the source of a river.

Here they found a stone chimney and fireplace standing among the darkened, decayed ruins of a cabin.
"We mustn't lose no time," said Rea.

"I feel the winter in the wind.
An' see how dark the days are gettin' on us." "I'm for hunting musk-oxen," replied Jones.
"Man, we're facin' the northern night; we're in the land of the midnight sun.

Soon we'll be shut in for seven months.

A cabin we want, an' wood, an' meat." A forest of stunted spruce trees edged on the lake, and soon its dreary solitudes rang to the strokes of axes.