To Build a Fire

A man is traveling on the Yukon Trail on a very cold day (−75 °F/−59 °C), accompanied only by a husky wolf-dog. The cold does not deter the man, a newcomer to the Yukon, who plans to meet his friends (who are referred to as boys) by six o'clock at an old junction. He walks along a creek trail, mindful of the dangerous, hidden springs, because getting wet feet on such a cold day is dangerous. The man continues on and, in an apparently safe spot, falls through the snow and gets wet up to his shins. He remembers an old-timer who had warned him that no man should travel in the Klondike alone when the temperature is colder than −50 °F (−46 °C)