The question of the trader, which always arises upon the establishment of a new mission site, is an important and sometimes a vexatious one, for he wields an influence amongst the Indians second only to that of the mission itself, and may be either a great help or a great hindrance. There is a natural desire to secure a man of character for the new post, and at the same time a natural reluctance to disturb vested interests and arouse bitter enmity by diverting trade. The suggestion has often been made that the mission should itself undertake a store in the interest of the natives, but those with most experience in such matters will agree that it is the wisdom of the bishop that sets his face against mission trading. The two offices are so essentially dissimilar as to be almost incompatible with one another; either the person in charge is a missionary first and a trader afterwards, in which case the store suffers, or he is a trader first and a missionary afterwards, in which case he is not a missionary at all. A clean, sober, and honest trader, content to take his time about getting rich, is a blessing to an Indian community. There are some such, one thinks, but they are not numerous. The profits are large, though the turnover is but one a year; the capital required is small; it is a life with much leisure; but in the main it attracts only a certain class of men. A band of Indians to whom word of our visit had been sent had come down the river this far to meet us and escort us, but dog food was scarce and our arrival was delayed, and they had been compelled to return to their hunting camp whither we must follow them. We were now farther up the Tanana River than either of us had ever been before; the country had the fascination of a new country; every bend of the river held unknown possibilities, and the keenness and elation that only the penetration of a new country brings were upon the boy as well as upon myself. The river and the mountains were already drawn much closer together, and as we pursued our journey upon the one we had continual fine views of the other. The going was good--too good--for much of it was new ice and spoke of recent overflow, and all too soon we came upon the water. At the mouth of the Johnson River, one of the glacial streams, the whole river was overflowed, and we waded for a mile through water that deepened continually until there was risk of wetting our load. Then we were compelled to take to the woods and to cut a portage around the worst and deepest of it, and so passed beyond it to good ice and to an empty cabin where we spent the night, glad to be sheltered from an exceedingly bitter wind that had blown all day and had taken all the pleasure out of travel. [Sidenote: THE THERMOS BOTTLES]