AFTER THE WHITE GOATS
Moise, although good-natured, none the less was fond enough of good living, and, moreover, disposed to rest very well content when the camping conditions were as good as those in which they now found themselves. He thought that it might be just as well not to be in too big a hurry.
“Suppose we did get caught on those high water, M’sieu Deek,” he said; “if we only wait some time, she’ll run down bime-by. But suppose we’ll don’t got nothing to eat but bacon and flour, and go starve to death. What then?”
“Well, Moise,” said Rob, as they sat at the breakfast-table, where the good voyageur made this remark, “we’ve got a whole lake full of trout there waiting for us to go out and catch them—if we didn’t fall off the raft again.”
“Never mind about that raft any more, young man,” said Uncle Dick. “A raft is all right if you have nothing else, and if you have to use it, but it is not compulsory here. We’ll just leave the raft business and try for some trout down here in the creek.”
“There’ll ain’t no trout on those creek,” objected Moise. “I’ll try him myself, and not get no bite. Besides, M’sieu Deek, feesh is all right for woman and dog, but meat she is more better for strong man.”
“That’s the way I feel about it,” said John, his mouth half full of bacon. “I wouldn’t mind a little fresh meat once in a while. But where are we going to get it?”
“No moose up in here,” volunteered Jesse, “and I don’t suppose any caribou either. As for sheep, I suppose there are none this side of the high peaks east of here, are there, Uncle Dick?”
“Probably not. But we’ll find caribou farther west. Besides, there are any number of white goats in these mountains all around us here. I suppose you know what they are, although I’m not sure you ever saw them in Alaska.”