The puppy did not like it at all , but being fished for in this way was pure happiness beside being put to the sleigh for the first time . He just sat down on the snow , and played with the seal-hide trace that ran from his harness to the pitu , the big thong in the bows of the sleigh . Then the team started , and the puppy found the heavy ten-foot sleigh running up his back , and dragging him along the snow , while Kotuko laughed till the tears ran down his face . There followed days and days of the cruel whip that hisses like the wind over ice , and his companions all bit him because he did not know his work , and the harness chafed him , and he was dot allowed to sleep with Kotuko any more , but had to take the coldest place in the passage . It was a sad time for the puppy . The boy learned , too , as fast as the dog ; though a dog-sleigh is a heart-breaking thing to manage . Each beast is harnessed , the weakest nearest to the driver , by his own separate trace , which runs under his left fore-leg to the main thong , where it is fastened by a sort of button and loop which can be slipped by a turn of the wrist , thus freeing one dog at a time . This is very necessary , because young dogs often get the trace between their hind legs , where it cuts to the bone . And they one and all WILL go visiting their friends as they run , jumping in and out among the traces . Then they fight , and the result is more mixed than a wet fishing-line next morning . A great deal of trouble can be avoided by scientific use of the whip . Every Inuit boy prides himself as being a master of the long lash ; but it is easy to flick at a mark on the ground , and difficult to lean forward and catch a shirking dog just behind the shoulders when the sleigh is going at full speed . If you call one dog 's name for `` visiting , '' and accidentally lash another , the two will fight it out at once , and stop all the others . Again , if you travel with a companion and begin to talk , or by yourself and sing , the dogs will halt , turn round , and sit down to hear what you have to say . Kotuko was run away from once or twice through forgetting to block the sleigh when he stopped ; and he broke many lashings , and ruined a few thongs before he could be trusted with a full team of eight and the light sleigh . Then he felt himself a person of consequence , and on smooth , black ice , with a bold heart and a quick elbow , he smoked along over the levels as fast as a pack in full cry . He would go ten miles to the seal-holes , and when he was on the hunting-grounds he would twitch a trace loose from the pitu , and free the big black leader , who was the cleverest dog in the team . As soon as the dog had scented a breathing-hole , Kotuko would reverse the sleigh , driving a couple of sawed-off antlers , that stuck up like perambulator-handles from the back-rest , deep into the snow , so that the team could not get away . Then he would crawl forward inch by inch , and wait till the seal came up to breathe . Then he would stab down swiftly with his spear and running-line , and presently would haul his seal up to the lip of the ice , while the black leader came up and helped to pull the carcass across the ice to the sleigh .
That was the time when the harnessed dogs yelled and foamed with excitement , and XXXXX laid the long lash like a red-hot bar across all their faces , till the carcass froze stiff .
Kotuko antlers breathing-hole days first hunting-grounds perambulator-handles pitu seal-holes thongs