Harper's Round Table, June 4, 1895

by Various

"What a fool I am! what a miserable careless fool!" he cried, in tones of despair. "I knew it was empty two days ago and meant to refill it. But I didn't, and now I must suffer the consequences. What shall I do? What shall I do? A night in this place without a fire will drive me crazy, even if I don't freeze to death before morning."

As Phil gazed about him in a very agony of apprehension his glance rested on his rifle leaning against a tree, and a ray of hope entered his heart. There was fire if he could only capture and control it. How was it that wrecked sailors, and lost hunters, and all sorts of people always managed to obtain fire from a gun, or rather from a pistol, which was practically the same thing? He tried to recall what he had read of such experiences. Oh yes! It was by flashing powder in the pan. But his gun hadn't any pan. He had never seen one that had, unless it was Kurilla's flintlock. Of course, now he remembered, it did have a place into which the Indian used to pour a little powder every time he wanted to fire his old blunderbuss. How Phil wished his Winchester were a flintlock musket just at that moment. But it wasn't, and it didn't have any pan, and loose powder was not used in connection with it. But there was plenty of powder encased in its metallic cartridges if only he could get at it, and could contrive some plan for adapting it to his purpose.

All these ideas passed like a flash, and Phil had hardly thought of powder before he was examining one of his cartridges, and trying to dig the bullet out of its metal shell with the point of his knife. But it was held too tightly, and he only pricked his fingers.

Then another plan came into his mind. He laid his rifle on the ground. Over its stock he spread a square of cotton cloth, such as he and Serge were accustomed to tear from the great piece provided among their stores whenever they needed clean handkerchiefs. On the cloth Phil laid a cartridge, that he held in position with the sharp edge of his knife blade, placed so that it would cut just at the base of the bullet. Then he struck the back of the blade a smart blow with a billet of wood, and the job was done. He had got at the powder.

He poured out two-thirds of the precious mixture, and rubbed it well into one side of the cloth, which he doubled twice and used against the log. Then, after stopping the open end of the shell with a tiny wad of lint to keep the remainder of the powder from running out, he inserted it in the chamber of his rifle. Aiming it at the cloth, with the muzzle about one foot away, and trembling with cold, or excitement, or anxiety, or with all three, he pulled the trigger.

The report that followed was hardly as loud as that of a small fire-cracker, but the success of the scheme was instant. The little flame poured from the muzzle of the rifle into that powder-impregnated square of cotton cloth ignited it at once. A moment later it was nestled amid the bundle of twigs and shavings, while Phil, on hands and knees, was puffing at it like a pair of bellows.

In two minutes more his fire was a certainty, the black shadows were already beginning to retreat before its cheery attack, and Phil Ryder's spirits had jumped from zero almost to the figure that represents light-heartedness.

Throwing off his fur parka, that he might the better appreciate its warmth later, and seizing a snow-shoe, he cleared the whole space between the first log and another that lay a few yards beyond. Into this opening he dragged all the logs and dead branches he could find, working with such energy that at the end of an hour he had a fine large pile, and was in a glow from the exercise. Now he built another fire against the further log, and piled his spare wood so that it was beyond reach of either flame.

He next spread a few spruce and hemlock boughs on the ground between the two fires, selected a medium-sized chunk of wood for a pillow, donned his parka, drew its great hood over his head, and, with his rifle by his side, lay down on a much warmer and more comfortable couch than he had dared anticipate a couple of hours before.

Phil meant to keep awake so as to tend his fires, but instead of so doing he fell asleep within an hour, and slept soundly right through the night. When he at length awoke and sat up, he was chilled and stiff with cold, for the fires were very nearly extinguished by a fall of snow that had sifted down through the forest while he slept. As the poor lad discovered this, he became filled with terror, for he knew that the back trail was obliterated, and that all hope of regaining camp by its means was cut off. Now he was indeed lost. As he gazed hopeless and bewildered about him he caught sight of something that he at first took to be a dog sitting only a few yards away, and regarding him hungrily. He spoke to it and the animal started to sneak away. Then he saw that it was a wolf, and hastened its movements with a rifle shot.