Adventure Magazine Cover — page 117: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Tillicums tryin’ to find a side-wall to lean up against. You’ re workin’ your cerebum too hard, a-tryin’ to keep up with me. See if you can kumtux-this: “When you-all takes a chew of plug, she’s already hard an’ solid before you bites her off. She’s that firm an’ dense you can’t put nothin’ into her. Therefor you grinds her up an’ extracts the pizen, nacher’ly lessenin’ her bulk. You reduces her. But when you stows away a wad of finecut she’s curly an’ fluffy. She’s soft an’ loose an’ dry like a wad out of a hair mattress. Nacher’ly she soaks up all the moisture offen your windpipe an’ swells up accordin’. An’ she keeps on absorbin’ until your gullet’s as dry as the inside of a thick rock. She’s the ideal chew.” “All right,” Ole agrees. “Stick to your frizzled terbacker. An’ one thing’s certain. You an’ finecut is plenty similar. You’re _ both nothin’ but a bunch of ravelin’s sur- roundin’ a lot of empty places.” Then he comes over an’ shakes hands with me, same as though he ain’t seen me for a year. Also the Irishman closes his trap an’ follows suit. After which, us an’ some of the store loafers saunters over to Joe Cooper’s an’ imbibes a few jolts of oil of joy. Pretty soon Michael breaks away an’ leaves—then me. A little later Ole joins us. We adjourn to their cabin an’ the wah- wah is on. ‘“‘Here’s the lay,” Michael begins. ‘Me ’ Ole jes’ comes across country from Seventy-Mile. We strikes your cabin on purpose on our way here. We been lookin’ over that Seventy-Mile country all Spring, an’ we don’t find ary creek that promises enough to stay with. “We're about to quit cold when we jes’ happen to camp overnight on a bar in the main stream. While I’m gettin’ supper Ole pans along the tail of said bar jes’ to kill time. That bar runs from ten cents to more’n four bits a pan, all along her tail, for two hundred feet! The pay’s anyway a foot deep an’ eight feet wide!”’ “Michael’s spoutin’ gospel,” the Swede chips in, his eyes glistenin’. ‘“‘She’s a whale! An’ the bar lays right opposite the mouth of a creek! To say nothin’ of the bar, that creek offers a lulu of a chance. But the bar’s certain. _ “One of us shovels off the pay, one runs the rocker an’ the other one prospects the III rim-rock up an’ down that creek from —— to breakfast! a sure stake the other is makin’ certain we ’ Y/ « j off > Cm "A =a \ as * Jy 2 ~ fe axes ty, Ogee SCALE MANOOK, NOW KNOWN AS RAMPART, IS ON THE YUKON ABOUT 165 MILES, OR A QUARTER-INCH ON THIS MAP, DOWN-RIVER FROM FORT YUKON don’t overlook no bets on that creek. An’ we washes that bar out in six weeks. That’s all.” Well, sir, I’m sure speechless! She’s the sweetest tale I’ve heard in many a long moon. “But why didn’t you-all tell me when you was at my shack?” I manage to inquire at last. “Well, ’tain’t exactly none. of your busi- ness, but we’ll tell you,’’ Michael answers. “Tt’s thisaway: Mean’ Ole is mighty near out of grub. That’s what brings us in. An’ we’re plumb out of dust. So we figger to come into town, first-off, an’ see will Jack trust us for a short outfit. We know you-all got a little dust stored away; but we don’t aim to come to you with the news of a strike an’ then make a borrow. Jack has done agreed to outfit us, so we sent for you.” “You two makes me sick!” I assures ’em. “At that, I appreciates your sentiments. Maybe sometime I gets even.” “‘There’s jes’ one thing wrong,’’ Ole warns me. “Last night Michael borrows an ounce an’ gets into a stud game with a chechako. This here tenderfoot has been in camp less’n a week. He comes up-river on the Weare, an’ he buzzes ashore with a few hundred dollars, a pack-horse an’ a sawbuck saddle. “He loses his wad in a couple of nights, but he’s still possessed of this here equine when he sets in with Michael last night. Michael wins the cayuse. horse in camp, an’ likely the only one on the whole Yukon. An’ now this here fool harp Eomichboo ( S) oe ee 2 ses : aay ile >t > - 2 While two of us is rockin’ out © He’s the only © co i — |. be a-ak pase a » ee