3493
Right.
3494
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
3495
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
3496
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.
3497
There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
3498
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
3499
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: "You may tax your brawn and brains,
3500
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains."
3501
Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
3502
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
3503
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
3504
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows— O God! how I loathed the thing.
3505
And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
3506
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
3507
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
3508
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.
3509
Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
3510
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
3511
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
3512
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”