ROMANCE OF DOG SLEDGING.

Kumara Times, Issue 1014, 31 December 1879, Page 4

ROMANCE OF DOG SLEDGING.

To the novice the spectacle presented by a number of gaily-accoutred dog trains gliding merrily by is a cheerful one. The tiny bells keeping time to the footfalls of the" shaggy train; the cariole fantastically decorated in bright warm colors; the passenger cosily wrapped in furs and woollens of shades suggestive of warmth and comfort; the active driver trotting unwearily alongside, until the sledge, with all its belongings, become a mere spec of black upon the limitless expansion of snow—all conspire to commend dog sledging to the transient spectator as the ideal of winter travelling, the veritable poetry of motion. The swan-like motion of the sledge as its thin bottom yields in graceful curves and undulations, to .adapt itself to the inequalities of 'surface beneath it, is strangely suggestive of the progress of a canoa over waters faintly ruffled by a passing breeza. To lie in such a cradle, and be gently rocked over a varying landscape hour after hour, would seem an idyllic life in which satiety coold never come. But suppose the cold to be of that intensity which it is neither possible to'picture or describe; of that degree in which, after having spoken of the whip handle that burns the hand that touches it of tea that freezes while it is being drunk ; in which an instant's exposure of the face leaves the cheek or the classical nose upjn which oae prides himself white and rigid as a piece of marble; in which the traveller with head bowed to meet the crushing blast, goes wearily on as silent as the river and forssts through which he rides, and from whose rigid bosom no sound ever comes, no ripple ever breaks, no beast, jdo human face appears—a' cold of which, having said all this, there is a sense of of utter inability to convey any adequate idea, except that it means sore and certain death, with calm and peaceful face turned up to the sky, and form hard and unimpressible as if carved from granite, whose duration would expire in the few: days, of a winter's daylight, if "there - were no fire or means of making it upon the track. Suppose, too, that the gently-Undulating motion of the sledge, in accommodating itself to the inequalities of the frozen surface, which seemed so suggestive of a canoe floating, cork-like, upon rippling water, felt aow that one is seated in the'-sledge, like being dragged over a gravel Walk upon a sheet, or that the-track-has been completely snowed up, and the wretched dogs are unequal to the emergency. Mistatim, the leader is willing, but'young, thin, and weak ; the middle" one, i Shoathinga, is aged and asthmatic ; and the shafter, Kuskitaostiquarn, lame and lethargic. From morning till night the air resounds with howl ing and the cries of their drivers anathemising Shoatinga and Kuakitaostiquarn. The sledges constantly upset from running against a stump or slipping over a hillsige; and when one hauls and strains to rigqt them, the dogs lie quietly down, looking round at him, and not offering to pult an ounce to help. When the driver, aggravated beyond endurance, rushes up, stick in hand, and bent on punishment, they make frantic exertions, which only render matters worse, resuming their quiescent attitude the moment he returns again to haul at the sleigh ; and all this time perhaps the unfortunate passenger lies, bound and helpless, half buried in the snow. Under these conditions the scene changes, and the envious spectator of the poetry of motion retires with more sympathy for those old voyageurs of the fur trade who used to pay stipulated sums to the happy inventors of new and strange oaths.