It was dangerous to harbor them, and it served no purpose; his part was to struggle on, swinging the net snowshoes while he grappled with the pain each step caused him.

He shrank from contemplating the distance yet to be covered; it seemed vast to him in his weakness, and he felt himself a feeble, crippled thing.

Soft snow and arctic cold opposed his advance with malignant force; but his worn-out body still obeyed the spur of his will, and he roused himself to fight for the life that had some value to another.

He must march, dividing up the distance into short stages that had less effect upon the imagination; limping forward from the ice-glazed rock abreast of him to the white hillock which loomed up dimly where the snow blurred the horizon; then again he would look ahead from some patch of scrub to the most prominent elevation that he could see.
The marks he chose and passed seemed innumerable; but the wilderness still ran on, pitilessly empty.

His leg was intensely painful; he knew that he must break down soon; and they had seen nothing of a stony rise for which they watched eagerly.