"WHITE FANG\n\n\nPART I\n\n\nCHAPTER I--THE TRAIL OF THE MEAT\n\n\nDark spruce forest frowned on either side the frozen waterway.  The trees\nhad been stripped by a recent wind of their white covering of frost, and\nthey seemed to lean towards each other, black and ominous, in the fading\nlight.  A vast silence reigned over the land.  The land itself was a\ndesolation, lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold that the spirit\nof it was not even that of sadness.  There was a hint in it of laughter,\nbut of a laughter more terrible than any sadness--a laughter that was\nmirthless as the smile of the sphinx, a laughter cold as the frost and\npartaking of the grimness of infallibility.  It was the masterful and\nincommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at the futility of life and\nthe effort of life.  It was the Wild, the savage, frozen-hearted\nNorthland Wild.\n\nBut there _was_ life, abroad in the land and defiant.  Down the frozen\nwaterway toiled a string of wolfish dogs.  Their bristly fur was rimed\nwith frost.  Their breath froze in the air as it left their mouths,\nspouting forth in spumes of vapour that settled upon the hair of their\nbodies and formed into crystals of frost.  Leather harness was on the\ndogs, and leather traces attached them to a sled which dragged along\nbehind.  The sled was without runners.  It was made of stout birch-bark,\nand its full surface rested on the snow.  The front end of the sled was\nturned up, like a scroll, in order to force down and under the bore of\nsoft snow that surged like a wave before it.  On the sled, securely\nlashed, was a long and narrow oblong box.  There were other things on the\nsled--blankets, an axe, and a coffee-pot and frying-pan; but prominent,\noccupying most of the space, was the long and narrow oblong box.\n\nIn advance of the dogs, on wide snowshoes, toiled a man.  At the rear of\nthe sled toiled a second man.  On the sled, in the box, lay a third man\nwhose toil was over,--a man whom the Wild had conquered and beaten down\nuntil he would never move nor struggle again.  It is not the way of the\nWild to like movement.  Life is an offence to it, for life is movement;\nand the Wild aims always to destroy movement.  It freezes the water to\nprevent it running to the sea; it drives the sap out of the trees till\nthey are frozen to their mighty hearts; and most ferociously and terribly\nof all does the Wild harry and crush into submission man--man who is the\nmost restless of life, ever in revolt against the dictum that all\nmovement must in the end come to the cessation of movement.\n\nBut at front and rear, unawed and indomitable, toiled the two men who\nwere not yet dead.  Their bodies were covered with fur and soft-tanned\nleather.  Eyelashes and cheeks and lips were so coated with the crystals\nfrom their frozen breath that their faces were not discernible.  This\ngave them the seeming of ghostly masques, undertakers in a spectral world\nat the funeral of some ghost.  But under it all they were men,\npenetrating the land of desolation and mockery and silence, puny\nadventurers bent on colossal adventure, pitting themselves against the\nmight of a world as remote and alien and pulseless as the abysses of\nspace.\n\nThey travelled on without speech, saving their breath for the work of\ntheir bodies.  On every side was the silence, pressing upon them with a\ntangible presence.  It affected their minds as the many atmospheres of\ndeep water affect the body of the diver.  It crushed them with the weight\nof unending vastness and unalterable decree.  It crushed them into the\nremotest recesses of their own minds, pressing out of them, like juices\nfrom the grape, all the false ardours and exaltations and undue\nself-values of the human soul, until they perceived themselves finite and\nsmall, specks and motes, moving with weak cunning and little wisdom\namidst the play and inter-play of the great blind elements and forces.\n\nAn hour went by, and a second hour.  The pale light of the short sunless\nday was beginning to fade, when a faint far cry arose on the still air.\nIt soared upward with a swift rush, till it reached its topmost note,\nwhere it persisted, palpitant and tense, and then slowly died away.  It\nmight have been a lost soul wailing, had it not been invested with a\ncertain sad fierceness and hungry eagerness.  The front man turned his\nhead until his eyes met the eyes of the man behind.  And then, across the\nnarrow oblong box, each nodded to the other.\n\nA second cry arose, piercing the silence with needle-like shrillness.\nBoth men located the sound.  It was to the rear, somewhere in the snow\nexpanse they had just traversed.  A third and answering cry arose, also\nto the rear and to the left of the second cry.\n\n\"They're after us, Bill,\" said the man at the front.\n\nHis voice sounded hoarse and unreal, and he had spoken with apparent\neffort.\n\n\"Meat is scarce,\" answered his comrade.  \"I ain't seen a rabbit sign for\ndays.\"\n\nThereafter they spoke no more, though their ears were keen for the\nhunting-cries that continued to rise behind them.\n\nAt the fall of darkness they swung the dogs into a cluster of spruce\ntrees on the edge of the waterway and made a camp.  The coffin, at the\nside of the fire, served for seat and table.  The wolf-dogs, clustered on\nthe far side of the fire, snarled and bickered among themselves, but\nevinced no inclination to stray off into the darkness.\n\n\"Seems to me, Henry, they're stayin' remarkable close to camp,\" Bill\ncommented.\n\nHenry, squatting over the fire and settling the pot of coffee with a\npiece of ice, nodded.  Nor did he speak till he had taken his seat on the\ncoffin and begun to eat.\n\n\"They know where their hides is safe,\" he said.  \"They'd sooner eat grub\nthan be grub.  They're pretty wise, them dogs.\"\n\nBill shook his head.  \"Oh, I don't know.\"\n\nHis comrade looked at him curiously.  \"First time I ever heard you say\nanything about their not bein' wise.\"\n\n\"Henry,\" said the other, munching with deliberation the beans he was\neating, \"did you happen to notice the way them dogs kicked up when I was\na-feedin' 'em?\"\n\n\"They did cut up more'n usual,\" Henry acknowledged.\n\n\"How many dogs 've we got, Henry?\"\n\n\"Six.\"\n\n\"Well, Henry . . . \" Bill stopped for a moment, in order that his words\nmight gain greater significance.  \"As I was sayin', Henry, we've got six\ndogs.  I took six fish out of the bag.  I gave one fish to each dog, an',\nHenry, I was one fish short.\"\n\n\"You counted wrong.\"\n\n\"We've got six dogs,\" the other reiterated dispassionately.  \"I took out\nsix fish.  One Ear didn't get no fish.  I came back to the bag afterward\nan' got 'm his fish.\"\n\n\"We've only got six dogs,\" Henry said.\n\n\"Henry,\" Bill went on.  \"I won't say they was all dogs, but there was\nseven of 'm that got fish.\"\n\nHenry stopped eating to glance across the fire and count the dogs.\n\n\"There's only six now,\" he said.\n\n\"I saw the other one run off across the snow,\" Bill announced with cool\npositiveness.  \"I saw seven.\"\n\nHenry looked at him commiseratingly, and said, \"I'll be almighty glad\nwhen this trip's over.\"\n\n\"What d'ye mean by that?\" Bill demanded.\n\n\"I mean that this load of ourn is gettin' on your nerves, an' that you're\nbeginnin' to see things.\"\n\n\"I thought of that,\" Bill answered gravely.  \"An' so, when I saw it run\noff across the snow, I looked in the snow an' saw its tracks.  Then I\ncounted the dogs an' there was still six of 'em.  The tracks is there in\nthe snow now.  D'ye want to look at 'em?  I'll show 'em to you.\"\n\nHenry did not reply, but munched on in silence, until, the meal finished,\nhe topped it with a final cup of coffee.  He wiped his mouth with the\nback of his hand and said:\n\n\"Then you're thinkin' as it was--\"\n\nA long wailing cry, fiercely sad, from somewhere in the darkness, had\ninterrupted him.  He stopped to listen to it, then he finished his\nsentence with a wave of his hand toward the sound of the cry, \"--one of\nthem?\"\n\nBill nodded.  \"I'd a blame sight sooner think that than anything else.\nYou noticed yourself the row the dogs made.\"\n\nCry after cry, and answering cries, were turning the silence into a\nbedlam.  From every side the cries arose, and the dogs betrayed their\nfear by huddling together and so close to the fire that their hair was\nscorched by the heat.  Bill threw on more wood, before lighting his pipe.\n\n\"I'm thinking you're down in the mouth some,\" Henry said.\n\n\"Henry . . . \"  He sucked meditatively at his pipe for some time before\nhe went on.  \"Henry, I was a-thinkin' what a blame sight luckier he is\nthan you an' me'll ever be.\"\n\nHe indicated the third person by a downward thrust of the thumb to the\nbox on which they sat.\n\n\"You an' me, Henry, when we die, we'll be lucky if we get enough stones\nover our carcases to keep the dogs off of us.\"\n\n\"But we ain't got people an' money an' all the rest, like him,\" Henry\nrejoined.  \"Long-distance funerals is somethin' you an' me can't exactly\nafford.\"\n\n\"What gets me, Henry, is what a chap like this, that's a lord or\nsomething in his own country, and that's never had to bother about grub\nnor blankets; why he comes a-buttin' round the Godforsaken ends of the\nearth--that's what I can't exactly see.\"\n\n\"He might have lived to a ripe old age if he'd stayed at home,\" Henry\nagreed.\n\nBill opened his mouth to speak, but changed his mind.  Instead, he\npointed towards the wall of darkness that pressed about them from every\nside.  There was no suggestion of form in the utter blackness; only could\nbe seen a pair of eyes gleaming like live coals.  Henry indicated with\nhis head a second pair, and a third.  A circle of the gleaming eyes had\ndrawn about their camp.  Now and again a pair of eyes moved, or\ndisappeared to appear again a moment later.\n\nThe unrest of the dogs had been increasing, and they stampeded, in a\nsurge of sudden fear, to the near side of the fire, cringing and crawling\nabout the legs of the men.  In the scramble one of the dogs had been\noverturned on the edge of the fire, and it had yelped with pain and\nfright as the smell of its singed coat possessed the air.  The commotion\ncaused the circle of eyes to shift restlessly for a moment and even to\nwithdraw a bit, but it settled down again as the dogs became quiet.\n\n\"Henry, it's a blame misfortune to be out of ammunition.\"\n\nBill had finished his pipe and was helping his companion to spread the\nbed of fur and blanket upon the spruce boughs which he had laid over the\nsnow before supper.  Henry grunted, and began unlacing his moccasins.\n\n\"How many cartridges did you say you had left?\" he asked.\n\n\"Three,\" came the answer.  \"An' I wisht 'twas three hundred.  Then I'd\nshow 'em what for, damn 'em!\"\n\nHe shook his fist angrily at the gleaming eyes, and began securely to\nprop his moccasins before the fire.\n\n\"An' I wisht this cold snap'd break,\" he went on.  \"It's ben fifty below\nfor two weeks now.  An' I wisht I'd never started on this trip, Henry.  I\ndon't like the looks of it.  I don't feel right, somehow.  An' while I'm\nwishin', I wisht the trip was over an' done with, an' you an' me\na-sittin' by the fire in Fort McGurry just about now an' playing\ncribbage--that's what I wisht.\"\n\nHenry grunted and crawled into bed.  As he dozed off he was aroused by\nhis comrade's voice.\n\n\"Say, Henry, that other one that come in an' got a fish--why didn't the\ndogs pitch into it?  That's what's botherin' me.\"\n\n\"You're botherin' too much, Bill,\" came the sleepy response.  \"You was\nnever like this before.  You jes' shut up now, an' go to sleep, an'\nyou'll be all hunkydory in the mornin'.  Your stomach's sour, that's\nwhat's botherin' you.\"\n\nThe men slept, breathing heavily, side by side, under the one covering.\nThe fire died down, and the gleaming eyes drew closer the circle they had\nflung about the camp.  The dogs clustered together in fear, now and again\nsnarling menacingly as a pair of eyes drew close.  Once their uproar\nbecame so loud that Bill woke up.  He got out of bed carefully, so as not\nto disturb the sleep of his comrade, and threw more wood on the fire.  As\nit began to flame up, the circle of eyes drew farther back.  He glanced\ncasually at the huddling dogs.  He rubbed his eyes and looked at them\nmore sharply.  Then he crawled back into the blankets.\n\n\"Henry,\" he said.  \"Oh, Henry.\"\n\nHenry groaned as he passed from sleep to waking, and demanded, \"What's\nwrong now?\"\n\n\"Nothin',\" came the answer; \"only there's seven of 'em again.  I just\ncounted.\"\n\nHenry acknowledged receipt of the information with a grunt that slid into\na snore as he drifted back into sleep.\n\nIn the morning it was Henry who awoke first and routed his companion out\nof bed.  Daylight was yet three hours away, though it was already six\no'clock; and in the darkness Henry went about preparing breakfast, while\nBill rolled the blankets and made the sled ready for lashing.\n\n\"Say, Henry,\" he asked suddenly, \"how many dogs did you say we had?\"\n\n\"Six.\"\n\n\"Wrong,\" Bill proclaimed triumphantly.\n\n\"Seven again?\" Henry queried.\n\n\"No, five; one's gone.\"\n\n\"The hell!\"  Henry cried in wrath, leaving the cooking to come and count\nthe dogs.\n\n\"You're right, Bill,\" he concluded.  \"Fatty's gone.\"\n\n\"An' he went like greased lightnin' once he got started.  Couldn't 've\nseen 'm for smoke.\"\n\n\"No chance at all,\" Henry concluded.  \"They jes' swallowed 'm alive.  I\nbet he was yelpin' as he went down their throats, damn 'em!\"\n\n\"He always was a fool dog,\" said Bill.\n\n\"But no fool dog ought to be fool enough to go off an' commit suicide\nthat way.\"  He looked over the remainder of the team with a speculative\neye that summed up instantly the salient traits of each animal.  \"I bet\nnone of the others would do it.\"\n\n\"Couldn't drive 'em away from the fire with a club,\" Bill agreed.  \"I\nalways did think there was somethin' wrong with Fatty anyway.\"\n\nAnd this was the epitaph of a dead dog on the Northland trail--less scant\nthan the epitaph of many another dog, of many a man.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II--THE SHE-WOLF\n\n\nBreakfast eaten and the slim camp-outfit lashed to the sled, the men\nturned their backs on the cheery fire and launched out into the darkness.\nAt once began to rise the cries that were fiercely sad--cries that called\nthrough the darkness and cold to one another and answered back.\nConversation ceased.  Daylight came at nine o'clock.  At midday the sky\nto the south warmed to rose-colour, and marked where the bulge of the\nearth intervened between the meridian sun and the northern world.  But\nthe rose-colour swiftly faded.  The grey light of day that remained\nlasted until three o'clock, when it, too, faded, and the pall of the\nArctic night descended upon the lone and silent land.\n\nAs darkness came on, the hunting-cries to right and left and rear drew\ncloser--so close that more than once they sent surges of fear through the\ntoiling dogs, throwing them into short-lived panics.\n\nAt the conclusion of one such panic, when he and Henry had got the dogs\nback in the traces, Bill said:\n\n\"I wisht they'd strike game somewheres, an' go away an' leave us alone.\"\n\n\"They do get on the nerves horrible,\"  Henry sympathised.\n\nThey spoke no more until camp was made.\n\nHenry was bending over and adding ice to the babbling pot of beans when\nhe was startled by the sound of a blow, an exclamation from Bill, and a\nsharp snarling cry of pain from among the dogs.  He straightened up in\ntime to see a dim form disappearing across the snow into the shelter of\nthe dark.  Then he saw Bill, standing amid the dogs, half triumphant,\nhalf crestfallen, in one hand a stout club, in the other the tail and\npart of the body of a sun-cured salmon.\n\n\"It got half of it,\" he announced; \"but I got a whack at it jes' the\nsame.  D'ye hear it squeal?\"\n\n\"What'd it look like?\" Henry asked.\n\n\"Couldn't see.  But it had four legs an' a mouth an' hair an' looked like\nany dog.\"\n\n\"Must be a tame wolf, I reckon.\"\n\n\"It's damned tame, whatever it is, comin' in here at feedin' time an'\ngettin' its whack of fish.\"\n\nThat night, when supper was finished and they sat on the oblong box and\npulled at their pipes, the circle of gleaming eyes drew in even closer\nthan before.\n\n\"I wisht they'd spring up a bunch of moose or something, an' go away an'\nleave us alone,\" Bill said.\n\nHenry grunted with an intonation that was not all sympathy, and for a\nquarter of an hour they sat on in silence, Henry staring at the fire, and\nBill at the circle of eyes that burned in the darkness just beyond the\nfirelight.\n\n\"I wisht we was pullin' into McGurry right now,\" he began again.\n\n\"Shut up your wishin' and your croakin',\" Henry burst out angrily.  \"Your\nstomach's sour.  That's what's ailin' you.  Swallow a spoonful of sody,\nan' you'll sweeten up wonderful an' be more pleasant company.\"\n\nIn the morning Henry was aroused by fervid blasphemy that proceeded from\nthe mouth of Bill.  Henry propped himself up on an elbow and looked to\nsee his comrade standing among the dogs beside the replenished fire, his\narms raised in objurgation, his face distorted with passion.\n\n\"Hello!\" Henry called.  \"What's up now?\"\n\n\"Frog's gone,\" came the answer.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"I tell you yes.\"\n\nHenry leaped out of the blankets and to the dogs.  He counted them with\ncare, and then joined his partner in cursing the power of the Wild that\nhad robbed them of another dog.\n\n\"Frog was the strongest dog of the bunch,\" Bill pronounced finally.\n\n\"An' he was no fool dog neither,\" Henry added.\n\nAnd so was recorded the second epitaph in two days.\n\nA gloomy breakfast was eaten, and the four remaining dogs were harnessed\nto the sled.  The day was a repetition of the days that had gone before.\nThe men toiled without speech across the face of the frozen world.  The\nsilence was unbroken save by the cries of their pursuers, that, unseen,\nhung upon their rear.  With the coming of night in the mid-afternoon, the\ncries sounded closer as the pursuers drew in according to their custom;\nand the dogs grew excited and frightened, and were guilty of panics that\ntangled the traces and further depressed the two men.\n\n\"There, that'll fix you fool critters,\" Bill said with satisfaction that\nnight, standing erect at completion of his task.\n\nHenry left the cooking to come and see.  Not only had his partner tied\nthe dogs up, but he had tied them, after the Indian fashion, with sticks.\nAbout the neck of each dog he had fastened a leather thong.  To this, and\nso close to the neck that the dog could not get his teeth to it, he had\ntied a stout stick four or five feet in length.  The other end of the\nstick, in turn, was made fast to a stake in the ground by means of a\nleather thong.  The dog was unable to gnaw through the leather at his own\nend of the stick.  The stick prevented him from getting at the leather\nthat fastened the other end.\n\nHenry nodded his head approvingly.\n\n\"It's the only contraption that'll ever hold One Ear,\" he said.  \"He can\ngnaw through leather as clean as a knife an' jes' about half as quick.\nThey all'll be here in the mornin' hunkydory.\"\n\n\"You jes' bet they will,\" Bill affirmed.  \"If one of em' turns up\nmissin', I'll go without my coffee.\"\n\n\"They jes' know we ain't loaded to kill,\" Henry remarked at bed-time,\nindicating the gleaming circle that hemmed them in.  \"If we could put a\ncouple of shots into 'em, they'd be more respectful.  They come closer\nevery night.  Get the firelight out of your eyes an' look hard--there!\nDid you see that one?\"\n\nFor some time the two men amused themselves with watching the movement of\nvague forms on the edge of the firelight.  By looking closely and\nsteadily at where a pair of eyes burned in the darkness, the form of the\nanimal would slowly take shape.  They could even see these forms move at\ntimes.\n\nA sound among the dogs attracted the men's attention.  One Ear was\nuttering quick, eager whines, lunging at the length of his stick toward\nthe darkness, and desisting now and again in order to make frantic\nattacks on the stick with his teeth.\n\n\"Look at that, Bill,\" Henry whispered.\n\nFull into the firelight, with a stealthy, sidelong movement, glided a\ndoglike animal.  It moved with commingled mistrust and daring, cautiously\nobserving the men, its attention fixed on the dogs.  One Ear strained the\nfull length of the stick toward the intruder and whined with eagerness.\n\n\"That fool One Ear don't seem scairt much,\" Bill said in a low tone.\n\n\"It's a she-wolf,\" Henry whispered back, \"an' that accounts for Fatty an'\nFrog.  She's the decoy for the pack.  She draws out the dog an' then all\nthe rest pitches in an' eats 'm up.\"\n\nThe fire crackled.  A log fell apart with a loud spluttering noise.  At\nthe sound of it the strange animal leaped back into the darkness.\n\n\"Henry, I'm a-thinkin',\" Bill announced.\n\n\"Thinkin' what?\"\n\n\"I'm a-thinkin' that was the one I lambasted with the club.\"\n\n\"Ain't the slightest doubt in the world,\" was Henry's response.\n\n\"An' right here I want to remark,\" Bill went on, \"that that animal's\nfamilyarity with campfires is suspicious an' immoral.\"\n\n\"It knows for certain more'n a self-respectin' wolf ought to know,\" Henry\nagreed.  \"A wolf that knows enough to come in with the dogs at feedin'\ntime has had experiences.\"\n\n\"Ol' Villan had a dog once that run away with the wolves,\" Bill cogitates\naloud.  \"I ought to know.  I shot it out of the pack in a moose pasture\nover 'on Little Stick.  An' Ol' Villan cried like a baby.  Hadn't seen it\nfor three years, he said.  Ben with the wolves all that time.\"\n\n\"I reckon you've called the turn, Bill.  That wolf's a dog, an' it's\neaten fish many's the time from the hand of man.\"\n\n\"An if I get a chance at it, that wolf that's a dog'll be jes' meat,\"\nBill declared.  \"We can't afford to lose no more animals.\"\n\n\"But you've only got three cartridges,\" Henry objected.\n\n\"I'll wait for a dead sure shot,\" was the reply.\n\nIn the morning Henry renewed the fire and cooked breakfast to the\naccompaniment of his partner's snoring.\n\n\"You was sleepin' jes' too comfortable for anything,\" Henry told him, as\nhe routed him out for breakfast.  \"I hadn't the heart to rouse you.\"\n\nBill began to eat sleepily.  He noticed that his cup was empty and\nstarted to reach for the pot.  But the pot was beyond arm's length and\nbeside Henry.\n\n\"Say, Henry,\" he chided gently, \"ain't you forgot somethin'?\"\n\nHenry looked about with great carefulness and shook his head.  Bill held\nup the empty cup.\n\n\"You don't get no coffee,\" Henry announced.\n\n\"Ain't run out?\" Bill asked anxiously.\n\n\"Nope.\"\n\n\"Ain't thinkin' it'll hurt my digestion?\"\n\n\"Nope.\"\n\nA flush of angry blood pervaded Bill's face.\n\n\"Then it's jes' warm an' anxious I am to be hearin' you explain\nyourself,\" he said.\n\n\"Spanker's gone,\" Henry answered.\n\nWithout haste, with the air of one resigned to misfortune Bill turned his\nhead, and from where he sat counted the dogs.\n\n\"How'd it happen?\" he asked apathetically.\n\nHenry shrugged his shoulders.  \"Don't know.  Unless One Ear gnawed 'm\nloose.  He couldn't a-done it himself, that's sure.\"\n\n\"The darned cuss.\"  Bill spoke gravely and slowly, with no hint of the\nanger that was raging within.  \"Jes' because he couldn't chew himself\nloose, he chews Spanker loose.\"\n\n\"Well, Spanker's troubles is over anyway; I guess he's digested by this\ntime an' cavortin' over the landscape in the bellies of twenty different\nwolves,\" was Henry's epitaph on this, the latest lost dog.  \"Have some\ncoffee, Bill.\"\n\nBut Bill shook his head.\n\n\"Go on,\" Henry pleaded, elevating the pot.\n\nBill shoved his cup aside.  \"I'll be ding-dong-danged if I do.  I said I\nwouldn't if ary dog turned up missin', an' I won't.\"\n\n\"It's darn good coffee,\" Henry said enticingly.\n\nBut Bill was stubborn, and he ate a dry breakfast washed down with\nmumbled curses at One Ear for the trick he had played.\n\n\"I'll tie 'em up out of reach of each other to-night,\" Bill said, as they\ntook the trail.\n\nThey had travelled little more than a hundred yards, when Henry, who was\nin front, bent down and picked up something with which his snowshoe had\ncollided.  It was dark, and he could not see it, but he recognised it by\nthe touch.  He flung it back, so that it struck the sled and bounced\nalong until it fetched up on Bill's snowshoes.\n\n\"Mebbe you'll need that in your business,\" Henry said.\n\nBill uttered an exclamation.  It was all that was left of Spanker--the\nstick with which he had been tied.\n\n\"They ate 'm hide an' all,\" Bill announced.  \"The stick's as clean as a\nwhistle.  They've ate the leather offen both ends.  They're damn hungry,\nHenry, an' they'll have you an' me guessin' before this trip's over.\"\n\nHenry laughed defiantly.  \"I ain't been trailed this way by wolves\nbefore, but I've gone through a whole lot worse an' kept my health.  Takes\nmore'n a handful of them pesky critters to do for yours truly, Bill, my\nson.\"\n\n\"I don't know, I don't know,\" Bill muttered ominously.\n\n\"Well, you'll know all right when we pull into McGurry.\"\n\n\"I ain't feelin' special enthusiastic,\" Bill persisted.\n\n\"You're off colour, that's what's the matter with you,\" Henry dogmatised.\n\"What you need is quinine, an' I'm goin' to dose you up stiff as soon as\nwe make McGurry.\"\n\nBill grunted his disagreement with the diagnosis, and lapsed into\nsilence.  The day was like all the days.  Light came at nine o'clock.  At\ntwelve o'clock the southern horizon was warmed by the unseen sun; and\nthen began the cold grey of afternoon that would merge, three hours\nlater, into night.\n\nIt was just after the sun's futile effort to appear, that Bill slipped\nthe rifle from under the sled-lashings and said:\n\n\"You keep right on, Henry, I'm goin' to see what I can see.\"\n\n\"You'd better stick by the sled,\" his partner protested.  \"You've only\ngot three cartridges, an' there's no tellin' what might happen.\"\n\n\"Who's croaking now?\" Bill demanded triumphantly.\n\nHenry made no reply, and plodded on alone, though often he cast anxious\nglances back into the grey solitude where his partner had disappeared.  An\nhour later, taking advantage of the cut-offs around which the sled had to\ngo, Bill arrived.\n\n\"They're scattered an' rangin' along wide,\" he said: \"keeping up with us\nan' lookin' for game at the same time.  You see, they're sure of us, only\nthey know they've got to wait to get us.  In the meantime they're willin'\nto pick up anything eatable that comes handy.\"\n\n\"You mean they _think_ they're sure of us,\" Henry objected pointedly.\n\nBut Bill ignored him.  \"I seen some of them.  They're pretty thin.  They\nain't had a bite in weeks I reckon, outside of Fatty an' Frog an'\nSpanker; an' there's so many of 'em that that didn't go far.  They're\nremarkable thin.  Their ribs is like wash-boards, an' their stomachs is\nright up against their backbones.  They're pretty desperate, I can tell\nyou.  They'll be goin' mad, yet, an' then watch out.\"\n\nA few minutes later, Henry, who was now travelling behind the sled,\nemitted a low, warning whistle.  Bill turned and looked, then quietly\nstopped the dogs.  To the rear, from around the last bend and plainly\ninto view, on the very trail they had just covered, trotted a furry,\nslinking form.  Its nose was to the trail, and it trotted with a\npeculiar, sliding, effortless gait.  When they halted, it halted,\nthrowing up its head and regarding them steadily with nostrils that\ntwitched as it caught and studied the scent of them.\n\n\"It's the she-wolf,\" Bill answered.\n\nThe dogs had lain down in the snow, and he walked past them to join his\npartner in the sled.  Together they watched the strange animal that had\npursued them for days and that had already accomplished the destruction\nof half their dog-team.\n\nAfter a searching scrutiny, the animal trotted forward a few steps.  This\nit repeated several times, till it was a short hundred yards away.  It\npaused, head up, close by a clump of spruce trees, and with sight and\nscent studied the outfit of the watching men.  It looked at them in a\nstrangely wistful way, after the manner of a dog; but in its wistfulness\nthere was none of the dog affection.  It was a wistfulness bred of\nhunger, as cruel as its own fangs, as merciless as the frost itself.\n\nIt was large for a wolf, its gaunt frame advertising the lines of an\nanimal that was among the largest of its kind.\n\n\"Stands pretty close to two feet an' a half at the shoulders,\" Henry\ncommented.  \"An' I'll bet it ain't far from five feet long.\"\n\n\"Kind of strange colour for a wolf,\" was Bill's criticism.  \"I never seen\na red wolf before.  Looks almost cinnamon to me.\"\n\nThe animal was certainly not cinnamon-coloured.  Its coat was the true\nwolf-coat.  The dominant colour was grey, and yet there was to it a faint\nreddish hue--a hue that was baffling, that appeared and disappeared, that\nwas more like an illusion of the vision, now grey, distinctly grey, and\nagain giving hints and glints of a vague redness of colour not\nclassifiable in terms of ordinary experience.\n\n\"Looks for all the world like a big husky sled-dog,\" Bill said.  \"I\nwouldn't be s'prised to see it wag its tail.\"\n\n\"Hello, you husky!\" he called.  \"Come here, you whatever-your-name-is.\"\n\n\"Ain't a bit scairt of you,\" Henry laughed.\n\nBill waved his hand at it threateningly and shouted loudly; but the\nanimal betrayed no fear.  The only change in it that they could notice\nwas an accession of alertness.  It still regarded them with the merciless\nwistfulness of hunger.  They were meat, and it was hungry; and it would\nlike to go in and eat them if it dared.\n\n\"Look here, Henry,\" Bill said, unconsciously lowering his voice to a\nwhisper because of what he imitated.  \"We've got three cartridges.  But\nit's a dead shot.  Couldn't miss it.  It's got away with three of our\ndogs, an' we oughter put a stop to it.  What d'ye say?\"\n\nHenry nodded his consent.  Bill cautiously slipped the gun from under the\nsled-lashing.  The gun was on the way to his shoulder, but it never got\nthere.  For in that instant the she-wolf leaped sidewise from the trail\ninto the clump of spruce trees and disappeared.\n\nThe two men looked at each other.  Henry whistled long and\ncomprehendingly.\n\n\"I might have knowed it,\" Bill chided himself aloud as he replaced the\ngun.  \"Of course a wolf that knows enough to come in with the dogs at\nfeedin' time, 'd know all about shooting-irons.  I tell you right now,\nHenry, that critter's the cause of all our trouble.  We'd have six dogs\nat the present time, 'stead of three, if it wasn't for her.  An' I tell\nyou right now, Henry, I'm goin' to get her.  She's too smart to be shot\nin the open.  But I'm goin' to lay for her.  I'll bushwhack her as sure\nas my name is Bill.\"\n\n\"You needn't stray off too far in doin' it,\" his partner admonished.  \"If\nthat pack ever starts to jump you, them three cartridges'd be wuth no\nmore'n three whoops in hell.  Them animals is damn hungry, an' once they\nstart in, they'll sure get you, Bill.\"\n\nThey camped early that night.  Three dogs could not drag the sled so fast\nnor for so long hours as could six, and they were showing unmistakable\nsigns of playing out.  And the men went early to bed, Bill first seeing\nto it that the dogs were tied out of gnawing-reach of one another.\n\nBut the wolves were growing bolder, and the men were aroused more than\nonce from their sleep.  So near did the wolves approach, that the dogs\nbecame frantic with terror, and it was necessary to replenish the fire\nfrom time to time in order to keep the adventurous marauders at safer\ndistance.\n\n\"I've hearn sailors talk of sharks followin' a ship,\" Bill remarked, as\nhe crawled back into the blankets after one such replenishing of the\nfire.  \"Well, them wolves is land sharks.  They know their business\nbetter'n we do, an' they ain't a-holdin' our trail this way for their\nhealth.  They're goin' to get us.  They're sure goin' to get us, Henry.\"\n\n\"They've half got you a'ready, a-talkin' like that,\" Henry retorted\nsharply.  \"A man's half licked when he says he is.  An' you're half eaten\nfrom the way you're goin' on about it.\"\n\n\"They've got away with better men than you an' me,\" Bill answered.\n\n\"Oh, shet up your croakin'.  You make me all-fired tired.\"\n\nHenry rolled over angrily on his side, but was surprised that Bill made\nno similar display of temper.  This was not Bill's way, for he was easily\nangered by sharp words.  Henry thought long over it before he went to\nsleep, and as his eyelids fluttered down and he dozed off, the thought in\nhis mind was: \"There's no mistakin' it, Bill's almighty blue.  I'll have\nto cheer him up to-morrow.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III--THE HUNGER CRY\n\n\nThe day began auspiciously.  They had lost no dogs during the night, and\nthey swung out upon the trail and into the silence, the darkness, and the\ncold with spirits that were fairly light.  Bill seemed to have forgotten\nhis forebodings of the previous night, and even waxed facetious with the\ndogs when, at midday, they overturned the sled on a bad piece of trail.\n\nIt was an awkward mix-up.  The sled was upside down and jammed between a\ntree-trunk and a huge rock, and they were forced to unharness the dogs in\norder to straighten out the tangle.  The two men were bent over the sled\nand trying to right it, when Henry observed One Ear sidling away.\n\n\"Here, you, One Ear!\" he cried, straightening up and turning around on\nthe dog.\n\nBut One Ear broke into a run across the snow, his traces trailing behind\nhim.  And there, out in the snow of their back track, was the she-wolf\nwaiting for him.  As he neared her, he became suddenly cautious.  He\nslowed down to an alert and mincing walk and then stopped.  He regarded\nher carefully and dubiously, yet desirefully.  She seemed to smile at\nhim, showing her teeth in an ingratiating rather than a menacing way.  She\nmoved toward him a few steps, playfully, and then halted.  One Ear drew\nnear to her, still alert and cautious, his tail and ears in the air, his\nhead held high.\n\nHe tried to sniff noses with her, but she retreated playfully and coyly.\nEvery advance on his part was accompanied by a corresponding retreat on\nher part.  Step by step she was luring him away from the security of his\nhuman companionship.  Once, as though a warning had in vague ways flitted\nthrough his intelligence, he turned his head and looked back at the\noverturned sled, at his team-mates, and at the two men who were calling\nto him.\n\nBut whatever idea was forming in his mind, was dissipated by the\nshe-wolf, who advanced upon him, sniffed noses with him for a fleeting\ninstant, and then resumed her coy retreat before his renewed advances.\n\nIn the meantime, Bill had bethought himself of the rifle.  But it was\njammed beneath the overturned sled, and by the time Henry had helped him\nto right the load, One Ear and the she-wolf were too close together and\nthe distance too great to risk a shot.\n\nToo late One Ear learned his mistake.  Before they saw the cause, the two\nmen saw him turn and start to run back toward them.  Then, approaching at\nright angles to the trail and cutting off his retreat they saw a dozen\nwolves, lean and grey, bounding across the snow.  On the instant, the she-\nwolf's coyness and playfulness disappeared.  With a snarl she sprang upon\nOne Ear.  He thrust her off with his shoulder, and, his retreat cut off\nand still intent on regaining the sled, he altered his course in an\nattempt to circle around to it.  More wolves were appearing every moment\nand joining in the chase.  The she-wolf was one leap behind One Ear and\nholding her own.\n\n\"Where are you goin'?\" Henry suddenly demanded, laying his hand on his\npartner's arm.\n\nBill shook it off.  \"I won't stand it,\" he said.  \"They ain't a-goin' to\nget any more of our dogs if I can help it.\"\n\nGun in hand, he plunged into the underbrush that lined the side of the\ntrail.  His intention was apparent enough.  Taking the sled as the centre\nof the circle that One Ear was making, Bill planned to tap that circle at\na point in advance of the pursuit.  With his rifle, in the broad\ndaylight, it might be possible for him to awe the wolves and save the\ndog.\n\n\"Say, Bill!\" Henry called after him.  \"Be careful!  Don't take no\nchances!\"\n\nHenry sat down on the sled and watched.  There was nothing else for him\nto do.  Bill had already gone from sight; but now and again, appearing\nand disappearing amongst the underbrush and the scattered clumps of\nspruce, could be seen One Ear.  Henry judged his case to be hopeless.  The\ndog was thoroughly alive to its danger, but it was running on the outer\ncircle while the wolf-pack was running on the inner and shorter circle.\nIt was vain to think of One Ear so outdistancing his pursuers as to be\nable to cut across their circle in advance of them and to regain the\nsled.\n\nThe different lines were rapidly approaching a point.  Somewhere out\nthere in the snow, screened from his sight by trees and thickets, Henry\nknew that the wolf-pack, One Ear, and Bill were coming together.  All too\nquickly, far more quickly than he had expected, it happened.  He heard a\nshot, then two shots, in rapid succession, and he knew that Bill's\nammunition was gone.  Then he heard a great outcry of snarls and yelps.\nHe recognised One Ear's yell of pain and terror, and he heard a wolf-cry\nthat bespoke a stricken animal.  And that was all.  The snarls ceased.\nThe yelping died away.  Silence settled down again over the lonely land.\n\nHe sat for a long while upon the sled.  There was no need for him to go\nand see what had happened.  He knew it as though it had taken place\nbefore his eyes.  Once, he roused with a start and hastily got the axe\nout from underneath the lashings.  But for some time longer he sat and\nbrooded, the two remaining dogs crouching and trembling at his feet.\n\nAt last he arose in a weary manner, as though all the resilience had gone\nout of his body, and proceeded to fasten the dogs to the sled.  He passed\na rope over his shoulder, a man-trace, and pulled with the dogs.  He did\nnot go far.  At the first hint of darkness he hastened to make a camp,\nand he saw to it that he had a generous supply of firewood.  He fed the\ndogs, cooked and ate his supper, and made his bed close to the fire.\n\nBut he was not destined to enjoy that bed.  Before his eyes closed the\nwolves had drawn too near for safety.  It no longer required an effort of\nthe vision to see them.  They were all about him and the fire, in a\nnarrow circle, and he could see them plainly in the firelight lying down,\nsitting up, crawling forward on their bellies, or slinking back and\nforth.  They even slept.  Here and there he could see one curled up in\nthe snow like a dog, taking the sleep that was now denied himself.\n\nHe kept the fire brightly blazing, for he knew that it alone intervened\nbetween the flesh of his body and their hungry fangs.  His two dogs\nstayed close by him, one on either side, leaning against him for\nprotection, crying and whimpering, and at times snarling desperately when\na wolf approached a little closer than usual.  At such moments, when his\ndogs snarled, the whole circle would be agitated, the wolves coming to\ntheir feet and pressing tentatively forward, a chorus of snarls and eager\nyelps rising about him.  Then the circle would lie down again, and here\nand there a wolf would resume its broken nap.\n\nBut this circle had a continuous tendency to draw in upon him.  Bit by\nbit, an inch at a time, with here a wolf bellying forward, and there a\nwolf bellying forward, the circle would narrow until the brutes were\nalmost within springing distance.  Then he would seize brands from the\nfire and hurl them into the pack.  A hasty drawing back always resulted,\naccompanied by angry yelps and frightened snarls when a well-aimed brand\nstruck and scorched a too daring animal.\n\nMorning found the man haggard and worn, wide-eyed from want of sleep.  He\ncooked breakfast in the darkness, and at nine o'clock, when, with the\ncoming of daylight, the wolf-pack drew back, he set about the task he had\nplanned through the long hours of the night.  Chopping down young\nsaplings, he made them cross-bars of a scaffold by lashing them high up\nto the trunks of standing trees.  Using the sled-lashing for a heaving\nrope, and with the aid of the dogs, he hoisted the coffin to the top of\nthe scaffold.\n\n\"They got Bill, an' they may get me, but they'll sure never get you,\nyoung man,\" he said, addressing the dead body in its tree-sepulchre.\n\nThen he took the trail, the lightened sled bounding along behind the\nwilling dogs; for they, too, knew that safety lay open in the gaining of\nFort McGurry.  The wolves were now more open in their pursuit, trotting\nsedately behind and ranging along on either side, their red tongues\nlolling out, their lean sides showing the undulating ribs with every\nmovement.  They were very lean, mere skin-bags stretched over bony\nframes, with strings for muscles--so lean that Henry found it in his mind\nto marvel that they still kept their feet and did not collapse forthright\nin the snow.\n\nHe did not dare travel until dark.  At midday, not only did the sun warm\nthe southern horizon, but it even thrust its upper rim, pale and golden,\nabove the sky-line.  He received it as a sign.  The days were growing\nlonger.  The sun was returning.  But scarcely had the cheer of its light\ndeparted, than he went into camp.  There were still several hours of grey\ndaylight and sombre twilight, and he utilised them in chopping an\nenormous supply of fire-wood.\n\nWith night came horror.  Not only were the starving wolves growing\nbolder, but lack of sleep was telling upon Henry.  He dozed despite\nhimself, crouching by the fire, the blankets about his shoulders, the axe\nbetween his knees, and on either side a dog pressing close against him.\nHe awoke once and saw in front of him, not a dozen feet away, a big grey\nwolf, one of the largest of the pack.  And even as he looked, the brute\ndeliberately stretched himself after the manner of a lazy dog, yawning\nfull in his face and looking upon him with a possessive eye, as if, in\ntruth, he were merely a delayed meal that was soon to be eaten.\n\nThis certitude was shown by the whole pack.  Fully a score he could\ncount, staring hungrily at him or calmly sleeping in the snow.  They\nreminded him of children gathered about a spread table and awaiting\npermission to begin to eat.  And he was the food they were to eat!  He\nwondered how and when the meal would begin.\n\nAs he piled wood on the fire he discovered an appreciation of his own\nbody which he had never felt before.  He watched his moving muscles and\nwas interested in the cunning mechanism of his fingers.  By the light of\nthe fire he crooked his fingers slowly and repeatedly now one at a time,\nnow all together, spreading them wide or making quick gripping movements.\nHe studied the nail-formation, and prodded the finger-tips, now sharply,\nand again softly, gauging the while the nerve-sensations produced.  It\nfascinated him, and he grew suddenly fond of this subtle flesh of his\nthat worked so beautifully and smoothly and delicately.  Then he would\ncast a glance of fear at the wolf-circle drawn expectantly about him, and\nlike a blow the realisation would strike him that this wonderful body of\nhis, this living flesh, was no more than so much meat, a quest of\nravenous animals, to be torn and slashed by their hungry fangs, to be\nsustenance to them as the moose and the rabbit had often been sustenance\nto him.\n\nHe came out of a doze that was half nightmare, to see the red-hued she-\nwolf before him.  She was not more than half a dozen feet away sitting in\nthe snow and wistfully regarding him.  The two dogs were whimpering and\nsnarling at his feet, but she took no notice of them.  She was looking at\nthe man, and for some time he returned her look.  There was nothing\nthreatening about her.  She looked at him merely with a great\nwistfulness, but he knew it to be the wistfulness of an equally great\nhunger.  He was the food, and the sight of him excited in her the\ngustatory sensations.  Her mouth opened, the saliva drooled forth, and\nshe licked her chops with the pleasure of anticipation.\n\nA spasm of fear went through him.  He reached hastily for a brand to\nthrow at her.  But even as he reached, and before his fingers had closed\non the missile, she sprang back into safety; and he knew that she was\nused to having things thrown at her.  She had snarled as she sprang away,\nbaring her white fangs to their roots, all her wistfulness vanishing,\nbeing replaced by a carnivorous malignity that made him shudder.  He\nglanced at the hand that held the brand, noticing the cunning delicacy of\nthe fingers that gripped it, how they adjusted themselves to all the\ninequalities of the surface, curling over and under and about the rough\nwood, and one little finger, too close to the burning portion of the\nbrand, sensitively and automatically writhing back from the hurtful heat\nto a cooler gripping-place; and in the same instant he seemed to see a\nvision of those same sensitive and delicate fingers being crushed and\ntorn by the white teeth of the she-wolf.  Never had he been so fond of\nthis body of his as now when his tenure of it was so precarious.\n\nAll night, with burning brands, he fought off the hungry pack.  When he\ndozed despite himself, the whimpering and snarling of the dogs aroused\nhim.  Morning came, but for the first time the light of day failed to\nscatter the wolves.  The man waited in vain for them to go.  They\nremained in a circle about him and his fire, displaying an arrogance of\npossession that shook his courage born of the morning light.\n\nHe made one desperate attempt to pull out on the trail.  But the moment\nhe left the protection of the fire, the boldest wolf leaped for him, but\nleaped short.  He saved himself by springing back, the jaws snapping\ntogether a scant six inches from his thigh.  The rest of the pack was now\nup and surging upon him, and a throwing of firebrands right and left was\nnecessary to drive them back to a respectful distance.\n\nEven in the daylight he did not dare leave the fire to chop fresh wood.\nTwenty feet away towered a huge dead spruce.  He spent half the day\nextending his campfire to the tree, at any moment a half dozen burning\nfaggots ready at hand to fling at his enemies.  Once at the tree, he\nstudied the surrounding forest in order to fell the tree in the direction\nof the most firewood.\n\nThe night was a repetition of the night before, save that the need for\nsleep was becoming overpowering.  The snarling of his dogs was losing its\nefficacy.  Besides, they were snarling all the time, and his benumbed and\ndrowsy senses no longer took note of changing pitch and intensity.  He\nawoke with a start.  The she-wolf was less than a yard from him.\nMechanically, at short range, without letting go of it, he thrust a brand\nfull into her open and snarling mouth.  She sprang away, yelling with\npain, and while he took delight in the smell of burning flesh and hair,\nhe watched her shaking her head and growling wrathfully a score of feet\naway.\n\nBut this time, before he dozed again, he tied a burning pine-knot to his\nright hand.  His eyes were closed but few minutes when the burn of the\nflame on his flesh awakened him.  For several hours he adhered to this\nprogramme.  Every time he was thus awakened he drove back the wolves with\nflying brands, replenished the fire, and rearranged the pine-knot on his\nhand.  All worked well, but there came a time when he fastened the pine-\nknot insecurely.  As his eyes closed it fell away from his hand.\n\nHe dreamed.  It seemed to him that he was in Fort McGurry.  It was warm\nand comfortable, and he was playing cribbage with the Factor.  Also, it\nseemed to him that the fort was besieged by wolves.  They were howling at\nthe very gates, and sometimes he and the Factor paused from the game to\nlisten and laugh at the futile efforts of the wolves to get in.  And\nthen, so strange was the dream, there was a crash.  The door was burst\nopen.  He could see the wolves flooding into the big living-room of the\nfort.  They were leaping straight for him and the Factor.  With the\nbursting open of the door, the noise of their howling had increased\ntremendously.  This howling now bothered him.  His dream was merging into\nsomething else--he knew not what; but through it all, following him,\npersisted the howling.\n\nAnd then he awoke to find the howling real.  There was a great snarling\nand yelping.  The wolves were rushing him.  They were all about him and\nupon him.  The teeth of one had closed upon his arm.  Instinctively he\nleaped into the fire, and as he leaped, he felt the sharp slash of teeth\nthat tore through the flesh of his leg.  Then began a fire fight.  His\nstout mittens temporarily protected his hands, and he scooped live coals\ninto the air in all directions, until the campfire took on the semblance\nof a volcano.\n\nBut it could not last long.  His face was blistering in the heat, his\neyebrows and lashes were singed off, and the heat was becoming unbearable\nto his feet.  With a flaming brand in each hand, he sprang to the edge of\nthe fire.  The wolves had been driven back.  On every side, wherever the\nlive coals had fallen, the snow was sizzling, and every little while a\nretiring wolf, with wild leap and snort and snarl, announced that one\nsuch live coal had been stepped upon.\n\nFlinging his brands at the nearest of his enemies, the man thrust his\nsmouldering mittens into the snow and stamped about to cool his feet.  His\ntwo dogs were missing, and he well knew that they had served as a course\nin the protracted meal which had begun days before with Fatty, the last\ncourse of which would likely be himself in the days to follow.\n\n\"You ain't got me yet!\" he cried, savagely shaking his fist at the hungry\nbeasts; and at the sound of his voice the whole circle was agitated,\nthere was a general snarl, and the she-wolf slid up close to him across\nthe snow and watched him with hungry wistfulness.\n\nHe set to work to carry out a new idea that had come to him.  He extended\nthe fire into a large circle.  Inside this circle he crouched, his\nsleeping outfit under him as a protection against the melting snow.  When\nhe had thus disappeared within his shelter of flame, the whole pack came\ncuriously to the rim of the fire to see what had become of him.  Hitherto\nthey had been denied access to the fire, and they now settled down in a\nclose-drawn circle, like so many dogs, blinking and yawning and\nstretching their lean bodies in the unaccustomed warmth.  Then the she-\nwolf sat down, pointed her nose at a star, and began to howl.  One by one\nthe wolves joined her, till the whole pack, on haunches, with noses\npointed skyward, was howling its hunger cry.\n\nDawn came, and daylight.  The fire was burning low.  The fuel had run\nout, and there was need to get more.  The man attempted to step out of\nhis circle of flame, but the wolves surged to meet him.  Burning brands\nmade them spring aside, but they no longer sprang back.  In vain he\nstrove to drive them back.  As he gave up and stumbled inside his circle,\na wolf leaped for him, missed, and landed with all four feet in the\ncoals.  It cried out with terror, at the same time snarling, and\nscrambled back to cool its paws in the snow.\n\nThe man sat down on his blankets in a crouching position.  His body\nleaned forward from the hips.  His shoulders, relaxed and drooping, and\nhis head on his knees advertised that he had given up the struggle.  Now\nand again he raised his head to note the dying down of the fire.  The\ncircle of flame and coals was breaking into segments with openings in\nbetween.  These openings grew in size, the segments diminished.\n\n\"I guess you can come an' get me any time,\" he mumbled.  \"Anyway, I'm\ngoin' to sleep.\"\n\nOnce he awakened, and in an opening in the circle, directly in front of\nhim, he saw the she-wolf gazing at him.\n\nAgain he awakened, a little later, though it seemed hours to him.  A\nmysterious change had taken place--so mysterious a change that he was\nshocked wider awake.  Something had happened.  He could not understand at\nfirst.  Then he discovered it.  The wolves were gone.  Remained only the\ntrampled snow to show how closely they had pressed him.  Sleep was\nwelling up and gripping him again, his head was sinking down upon his\nknees, when he roused with a sudden start.\n\nThere were cries of men, and churn of sleds, the creaking of harnesses,\nand the eager whimpering of straining dogs.  Four sleds pulled in from\nthe river bed to the camp among the trees.  Half a dozen men were about\nthe man who crouched in the centre of the dying fire.  They were shaking\nand prodding him into consciousness.  He looked at them like a drunken\nman and maundered in strange, sleepy speech.\n\n\"Red she-wolf. . . . Come in with the dogs at feedin' time. . . . First\nshe ate the dog-food. . . . Then she ate the dogs. . . . An' after that\nshe ate Bill. . . . \"\n\n\"Where's Lord Alfred?\" one of the men bellowed in his ear, shaking him\nroughly.\n\nHe shook his head slowly.  \"No, she didn't eat him. . . . He's roostin'\nin a tree at the last camp.\"\n\n\"Dead?\" the man shouted.\n\n\"An' in a box,\" Henry answered.  He jerked his shoulder petulantly away\nfrom the grip of his questioner.  \"Say, you lemme alone. . . . I'm jes'\nplump tuckered out. . . . Goo' night, everybody.\"\n\nHis eyes fluttered and went shut.  His chin fell forward on his chest.\nAnd even as they eased him down upon the blankets his snores were rising\non the frosty air.\n\nBut there was another sound.  Far and faint it was, in the remote\ndistance, the cry of the hungry wolf-pack as it took the trail of other\nmeat than the man it had just missed.\n\n\n\n\nPART II\n\n\nCHAPTER I--THE BATTLE OF THE FANGS\n\n\nIt was the she-wolf who had first caught the sound of men's voices and\nthe whining of the sled-dogs; and it was the she-wolf who was first to\nspring away from the cornered man in his circle of dying flame.  The pack\nhad been loath to forego the kill it had hunted down, and it lingered for\nseveral minutes, making sure of the sounds, and then it, too, sprang away\non the trail made by the she-wolf.\n\nRunning at the forefront of the pack was a large grey wolf--one of its\nseveral leaders.  It was he who directed the pack's course on the heels\nof the she-wolf.  It was he who snarled warningly at the younger members\nof the pack or slashed at them with his fangs when they ambitiously tried\nto pass him.  And it was he who increased the pace when he sighted the\nshe-wolf, now trotting slowly across the snow.\n\nShe dropped in alongside by him, as though it were her appointed\nposition, and took the pace of the pack.  He did not snarl at her, nor\nshow his teeth, when any leap of hers chanced to put her in advance of\nhim.  On the contrary, he seemed kindly disposed toward her--too kindly\nto suit her, for he was prone to run near to her, and when he ran too\nnear it was she who snarled and showed her teeth.  Nor was she above\nslashing his shoulder sharply on occasion.  At such times he betrayed no\nanger.  He merely sprang to the side and ran stiffly ahead for several\nawkward leaps, in carriage and conduct resembling an abashed country\nswain.\n\nThis was his one trouble in the running of the pack; but she had other\ntroubles.  On her other side ran a gaunt old wolf, grizzled and marked\nwith the scars of many battles.  He ran always on her right side.  The\nfact that he had but one eye, and that the left eye, might account for\nthis.  He, also, was addicted to crowding her, to veering toward her till\nhis scarred muzzle touched her body, or shoulder, or neck.  As with the\nrunning mate on the left, she repelled these attentions with her teeth;\nbut when both bestowed their attentions at the same time she was roughly\njostled, being compelled, with quick snaps to either side, to drive both\nlovers away and at the same time to maintain her forward leap with the\npack and see the way of her feet before her.  At such times her running\nmates flashed their teeth and growled threateningly across at each other.\nThey might have fought, but even wooing and its rivalry waited upon the\nmore pressing hunger-need of the pack.\n\nAfter each repulse, when the old wolf sheered abruptly away from the\nsharp-toothed object of his desire, he shouldered against a young three-\nyear-old that ran on his blind right side.  This young wolf had attained\nhis full size; and, considering the weak and famished condition of the\npack, he possessed more than the average vigour and spirit.  Nevertheless,\nhe ran with his head even with the shoulder of his one-eyed elder.  When\nhe ventured to run abreast of the older wolf (which was seldom), a snarl\nand a snap sent him back even with the shoulder again.  Sometimes,\nhowever, he dropped cautiously and slowly behind and edged in between the\nold leader and the she-wolf.  This was doubly resented, even triply\nresented.  When she snarled her displeasure, the old leader would whirl\non the three-year-old.  Sometimes she whirled with him.  And sometimes\nthe young leader on the left whirled, too.\n\nAt such times, confronted by three sets of savage teeth, the young wolf\nstopped precipitately, throwing himself back on his haunches, with fore-\nlegs stiff, mouth menacing, and mane bristling.  This confusion in the\nfront of the moving pack always caused confusion in the rear.  The wolves\nbehind collided with the young wolf and expressed their displeasure by\nadministering sharp nips on his hind-legs and flanks.  He was laying up\ntrouble for himself, for lack of food and short tempers went together;\nbut with the boundless faith of youth he persisted in repeating the\nmanoeuvre every little while, though it never succeeded in gaining\nanything for him but discomfiture.\n\nHad there been food, love-making and fighting would have gone on apace,\nand the pack-formation would have been broken up.  But the situation of\nthe pack was desperate.  It was lean with long-standing hunger.  It ran\nbelow its ordinary speed.  At the rear limped the weak members, the very\nyoung and the very old.  At the front were the strongest.  Yet all were\nmore like skeletons than full-bodied wolves.  Nevertheless, with the\nexception of the ones that limped, the movements of the animals were\neffortless and tireless.  Their stringy muscles seemed founts of\ninexhaustible energy.  Behind every steel-like contraction of a muscle,\nlay another steel-like contraction, and another, and another, apparently\nwithout end.\n\nThey ran many miles that day.  They ran through the night.  And the next\nday found them still running.  They were running over the surface of a\nworld frozen and dead.  No life stirred.  They alone moved through the\nvast inertness.  They alone were alive, and they sought for other things\nthat were alive in order that they might devour them and continue to\nlive.\n\nThey crossed low divides and ranged a dozen small streams in a\nlower-lying country before their quest was rewarded.  Then they came upon\nmoose.  It was a big bull they first found.  Here was meat and life, and\nit was guarded by no mysterious fires nor flying missiles of flame.  Splay\nhoofs and palmated antlers they knew, and they flung their customary\npatience and caution to the wind.  It was a brief fight and fierce.  The\nbig bull was beset on every side.  He ripped them open or split their\nskulls with shrewdly driven blows of his great hoofs.  He crushed them\nand broke them on his large horns.  He stamped them into the snow under\nhim in the wallowing struggle.  But he was foredoomed, and he went down\nwith the she-wolf tearing savagely at his throat, and with other teeth\nfixed everywhere upon him, devouring him alive, before ever his last\nstruggles ceased or his last damage had been wrought.\n\nThere was food in plenty.  The bull weighed over eight hundred\npounds--fully twenty pounds of meat per mouth for the forty-odd wolves of\nthe pack.  But if they could fast prodigiously, they could feed\nprodigiously, and soon a few scattered bones were all that remained of\nthe splendid live brute that had faced the pack a few hours before.\n\nThere was now much resting and sleeping.  With full stomachs, bickering\nand quarrelling began among the younger males, and this continued through\nthe few days that followed before the breaking-up of the pack.  The\nfamine was over.  The wolves were now in the country of game, and though\nthey still hunted in pack, they hunted more cautiously, cutting out heavy\ncows or crippled old bulls from the small moose-herds they ran across.\n\nThere came a day, in this land of plenty, when the wolf-pack split in\nhalf and went in different directions.  The she-wolf, the young leader on\nher left, and the one-eyed elder on her right, led their half of the pack\ndown to the Mackenzie River and across into the lake country to the east.\nEach day this remnant of the pack dwindled.  Two by two, male and female,\nthe wolves were deserting.  Occasionally a solitary male was driven out\nby the sharp teeth of his rivals.  In the end there remained only four:\nthe she-wolf, the young leader, the one-eyed one, and the ambitious three-\nyear-old.\n\nThe she-wolf had by now developed a ferocious temper.  Her three suitors\nall bore the marks of her teeth.  Yet they never replied in kind, never\ndefended themselves against her.  They turned their shoulders to her most\nsavage slashes, and with wagging tails and mincing steps strove to\nplacate her wrath.  But if they were all mildness toward her, they were\nall fierceness toward one another.  The three-year-old grew too ambitious\nin his fierceness.  He caught the one-eyed elder on his blind side and\nripped his ear into ribbons.  Though the grizzled old fellow could see\nonly on one side, against the youth and vigour of the other he brought\ninto play the wisdom of long years of experience.  His lost eye and his\nscarred muzzle bore evidence to the nature of his experience.  He had\nsurvived too many battles to be in doubt for a moment about what to do.\n\nThe battle began fairly, but it did not end fairly.  There was no telling\nwhat the outcome would have been, for the third wolf joined the elder,\nand together, old leader and young leader, they attacked the ambitious\nthree-year-old and proceeded to destroy him.  He was beset on either side\nby the merciless fangs of his erstwhile comrades.  Forgotten were the\ndays they had hunted together, the game they had pulled down, the famine\nthey had suffered.  That business was a thing of the past.  The business\nof love was at hand--ever a sterner and crueller business than that of\nfood-getting.\n\nAnd in the meanwhile, the she-wolf, the cause of it all, sat down\ncontentedly on her haunches and watched.  She was even pleased.  This was\nher day--and it came not often--when manes bristled, and fang smote fang\nor ripped and tore the yielding flesh, all for the possession of her.\n\nAnd in the business of love the three-year-old, who had made this his\nfirst adventure upon it, yielded up his life.  On either side of his body\nstood his two rivals.  They were gazing at the she-wolf, who sat smiling\nin the snow.  But the elder leader was wise, very wise, in love even as\nin battle.  The younger leader turned his head to lick a wound on his\nshoulder.  The curve of his neck was turned toward his rival.  With his\none eye the elder saw the opportunity.  He darted in low and closed with\nhis fangs.  It was a long, ripping slash, and deep as well.  His teeth,\nin passing, burst the wall of the great vein of the throat.  Then he\nleaped clear.\n\nThe young leader snarled terribly, but his snarl broke midmost into a\ntickling cough.  Bleeding and coughing, already stricken, he sprang at\nthe elder and fought while life faded from him, his legs going weak\nbeneath him, the light of day dulling on his eyes, his blows and springs\nfalling shorter and shorter.\n\nAnd all the while the she-wolf sat on her haunches and smiled.  She was\nmade glad in vague ways by the battle, for this was the love-making of\nthe Wild, the sex-tragedy of the natural world that was tragedy only to\nthose that died.  To those that survived it was not tragedy, but\nrealisation and achievement.\n\nWhen the young leader lay in the snow and moved no more, One Eye stalked\nover to the she-wolf.  His carriage was one of mingled triumph and\ncaution.  He was plainly expectant of a rebuff, and he was just as\nplainly surprised when her teeth did not flash out at him in anger.  For\nthe first time she met him with a kindly manner.  She sniffed noses with\nhim, and even condescended to leap about and frisk and play with him in\nquite puppyish fashion.  And he, for all his grey years and sage\nexperience, behaved quite as puppyishly and even a little more foolishly.\n\nForgotten already were the vanquished rivals and the love-tale\nred-written on the snow.  Forgotten, save once, when old One Eye stopped\nfor a moment to lick his stiffening wounds.  Then it was that his lips\nhalf writhed into a snarl, and the hair of his neck and shoulders\ninvoluntarily bristled, while he half crouched for a spring, his claws\nspasmodically clutching into the snow-surface for firmer footing.  But it\nwas all forgotten the next moment, as he sprang after the she-wolf, who\nwas coyly leading him a chase through the woods.\n\nAfter that they ran side by side, like good friends who have come to an\nunderstanding.  The days passed by, and they kept together, hunting their\nmeat and killing and eating it in common.  After a time the she-wolf\nbegan to grow restless.  She seemed to be searching for something that\nshe could not find.  The hollows under fallen trees seemed to attract\nher, and she spent much time nosing about among the larger snow-piled\ncrevices in the rocks and in the caves of overhanging banks.  Old One Eye\nwas not interested at all, but he followed her good-naturedly in her\nquest, and when her investigations in particular places were unusually\nprotracted, he would lie down and wait until she was ready to go on.\n\nThey did not remain in one place, but travelled across country until they\nregained the Mackenzie River, down which they slowly went, leaving it\noften to hunt game along the small streams that entered it, but always\nreturning to it again.  Sometimes they chanced upon other wolves, usually\nin pairs; but there was no friendliness of intercourse displayed on\neither side, no gladness at meeting, no desire to return to the\npack-formation.  Several times they encountered solitary wolves.  These\nwere always males, and they were pressingly insistent on joining with One\nEye and his mate.  This he resented, and when she stood shoulder to\nshoulder with him, bristling and showing her teeth, the aspiring solitary\nones would back off, turn-tail, and continue on their lonely way.\n\nOne moonlight night, running through the quiet forest, One Eye suddenly\nhalted.  His muzzle went up, his tail stiffened, and his nostrils dilated\nas he scented the air.  One foot also he held up, after the manner of a\ndog.  He was not satisfied, and he continued to smell the air, striving\nto understand the message borne upon it to him.  One careless sniff had\nsatisfied his mate, and she trotted on to reassure him.  Though he\nfollowed her, he was still dubious, and he could not forbear an\noccasional halt in order more carefully to study the warning.\n\nShe crept out cautiously on the edge of a large open space in the midst\nof the trees.  For some time she stood alone.  Then One Eye, creeping and\ncrawling, every sense on the alert, every hair radiating infinite\nsuspicion, joined her.  They stood side by side, watching and listening\nand smelling.\n\nTo their ears came the sounds of dogs wrangling and scuffling, the\nguttural cries of men, the sharper voices of scolding women, and once the\nshrill and plaintive cry of a child.  With the exception of the huge\nbulks of the skin-lodges, little could be seen save the flames of the\nfire, broken by the movements of intervening bodies, and the smoke rising\nslowly on the quiet air.  But to their nostrils came the myriad smells of\nan Indian camp, carrying a story that was largely incomprehensible to One\nEye, but every detail of which the she-wolf knew.\n\nShe was strangely stirred, and sniffed and sniffed with an increasing\ndelight.  But old One Eye was doubtful.  He betrayed his apprehension,\nand started tentatively to go.  She turned and touched his neck with her\nmuzzle in a reassuring way, then regarded the camp again.  A new\nwistfulness was in her face, but it was not the wistfulness of hunger.\nShe was thrilling to a desire that urged her to go forward, to be in\ncloser to that fire, to be squabbling with the dogs, and to be avoiding\nand dodging the stumbling feet of men.\n\nOne Eye moved impatiently beside her; her unrest came back upon her, and\nshe knew again her pressing need to find the thing for which she\nsearched.  She turned and trotted back into the forest, to the great\nrelief of One Eye, who trotted a little to the fore until they were well\nwithin the shelter of the trees.\n\nAs they slid along, noiseless as shadows, in the moonlight, they came\nupon a run-way.  Both noses went down to the footprints in the snow.\nThese footprints were very fresh.  One Eye ran ahead cautiously, his mate\nat his heels.  The broad pads of their feet were spread wide and in\ncontact with the snow were like velvet.  One Eye caught sight of a dim\nmovement of white in the midst of the white.  His sliding gait had been\ndeceptively swift, but it was as nothing to the speed at which he now\nran.  Before him was bounding the faint patch of white he had discovered.\n\nThey were running along a narrow alley flanked on either side by a growth\nof young spruce.  Through the trees the mouth of the alley could be seen,\nopening out on a moonlit glade.  Old One Eye was rapidly overhauling the\nfleeing shape of white.  Bound by bound he gained.  Now he was upon it.\nOne leap more and his teeth would be sinking into it.  But that leap was\nnever made.  High in the air, and straight up, soared the shape of white,\nnow a struggling snowshoe rabbit that leaped and bounded, executing a\nfantastic dance there above him in the air and never once returning to\nearth.\n\nOne Eye sprang back with a snort of sudden fright, then shrank down to\nthe snow and crouched, snarling threats at this thing of fear he did not\nunderstand.  But the she-wolf coolly thrust past him.  She poised for a\nmoment, then sprang for the dancing rabbit.  She, too, soared high, but\nnot so high as the quarry, and her teeth clipped emptily together with a\nmetallic snap.  She made another leap, and another.\n\nHer mate had slowly relaxed from his crouch and was watching her.  He now\nevinced displeasure at her repeated failures, and himself made a mighty\nspring upward.  His teeth closed upon the rabbit, and he bore it back to\nearth with him.  But at the same time there was a suspicious crackling\nmovement beside him, and his astonished eye saw a young spruce sapling\nbending down above him to strike him.  His jaws let go their grip, and he\nleaped backward to escape this strange danger, his lips drawn back from\nhis fangs, his throat snarling, every hair bristling with rage and\nfright.  And in that moment the sapling reared its slender length upright\nand the rabbit soared dancing in the air again.\n\nThe she-wolf was angry.  She sank her fangs into her mate's shoulder in\nreproof; and he, frightened, unaware of what constituted this new\nonslaught, struck back ferociously and in still greater fright, ripping\ndown the side of the she-wolf's muzzle.  For him to resent such reproof\nwas equally unexpected to her, and she sprang upon him in snarling\nindignation.  Then he discovered his mistake and tried to placate her.\nBut she proceeded to punish him roundly, until he gave over all attempts\nat placation, and whirled in a circle, his head away from her, his\nshoulders receiving the punishment of her teeth.\n\nIn the meantime the rabbit danced above them in the air.  The she-wolf\nsat down in the snow, and old One Eye, now more in fear of his mate than\nof the mysterious sapling, again sprang for the rabbit.  As he sank back\nwith it between his teeth, he kept his eye on the sapling.  As before, it\nfollowed him back to earth.  He crouched down under the impending blow,\nhis hair bristling, but his teeth still keeping tight hold of the rabbit.\nBut the blow did not fall.  The sapling remained bent above him.  When he\nmoved it moved, and he growled at it through his clenched jaws; when he\nremained still, it remained still, and he concluded it was safer to\ncontinue remaining still.  Yet the warm blood of the rabbit tasted good\nin his mouth.\n\nIt was his mate who relieved him from the quandary in which he found\nhimself.  She took the rabbit from him, and while the sapling swayed and\nteetered threateningly above her she calmly gnawed off the rabbit's head.\nAt once the sapling shot up, and after that gave no more trouble,\nremaining in the decorous and perpendicular position in which nature had\nintended it to grow.  Then, between them, the she-wolf and One Eye\ndevoured the game which the mysterious sapling had caught for them.\n\nThere were other run-ways and alleys where rabbits were hanging in the\nair, and the wolf-pair prospected them all, the she-wolf leading the way,\nold One Eye following and observant, learning the method of robbing\nsnares--a knowledge destined to stand him in good stead in the days to\ncome.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II--THE LAIR\n\n\nFor two days the she-wolf and One Eye hung about the Indian camp.  He was\nworried and apprehensive, yet the camp lured his mate and she was loath\nto depart.  But when, one morning, the air was rent with the report of a\nrifle close at hand, and a bullet smashed against a tree trunk several\ninches from One Eye's head, they hesitated no more, but went off on a\nlong, swinging lope that put quick miles between them and the danger.\n\nThey did not go far--a couple of days' journey.  The she-wolf's need to\nfind the thing for which she searched had now become imperative.  She was\ngetting very heavy, and could run but slowly.  Once, in the pursuit of a\nrabbit, which she ordinarily would have caught with ease, she gave over\nand lay down and rested.  One Eye came to her; but when he touched her\nneck gently with his muzzle she snapped at him with such quick fierceness\nthat he tumbled over backward and cut a ridiculous figure in his effort\nto escape her teeth.  Her temper was now shorter than ever; but he had\nbecome more patient than ever and more solicitous.\n\nAnd then she found the thing for which she sought.  It was a few miles up\na small stream that in the summer time flowed into the Mackenzie, but\nthat then was frozen over and frozen down to its rocky bottom--a dead\nstream of solid white from source to mouth.  The she-wolf was trotting\nwearily along, her mate well in advance, when she came upon the\noverhanging, high clay-bank.  She turned aside and trotted over to it.\nThe wear and tear of spring storms and melting snows had underwashed the\nbank and in one place had made a small cave out of a narrow fissure.\n\nShe paused at the mouth of the cave and looked the wall over carefully.\nThen, on one side and the other, she ran along the base of the wall to\nwhere its abrupt bulk merged from the softer-lined landscape.  Returning\nto the cave, she entered its narrow mouth.  For a short three feet she\nwas compelled to crouch, then the walls widened and rose higher in a\nlittle round chamber nearly six feet in diameter.  The roof barely\ncleared her head.  It was dry and cosey.  She inspected it with\npainstaking care, while One Eye, who had returned, stood in the entrance\nand patiently watched her.  She dropped her head, with her nose to the\nground and directed toward a point near to her closely bunched feet, and\naround this point she circled several times; then, with a tired sigh that\nwas almost a grunt, she curled her body in, relaxed her legs, and dropped\ndown, her head toward the entrance.  One Eye, with pointed, interested\nears, laughed at her, and beyond, outlined against the white light, she\ncould see the brush of his tail waving good-naturedly.  Her own ears,\nwith a snuggling movement, laid their sharp points backward and down\nagainst the head for a moment, while her mouth opened and her tongue\nlolled peaceably out, and in this way she expressed that she was pleased\nand satisfied.\n\nOne Eye was hungry.  Though he lay down in the entrance and slept, his\nsleep was fitful.  He kept awaking and cocking his ears at the bright\nworld without, where the April sun was blazing across the snow.  When he\ndozed, upon his ears would steal the faint whispers of hidden trickles of\nrunning water, and he would rouse and listen intently.  The sun had come\nback, and all the awakening Northland world was calling to him.  Life was\nstirring.  The feel of spring was in the air, the feel of growing life\nunder the snow, of sap ascending in the trees, of buds bursting the\nshackles of the frost.\n\nHe cast anxious glances at his mate, but she showed no desire to get up.\nHe looked outside, and half a dozen snow-birds fluttered across his field\nof vision.  He started to get up, then looked back to his mate again, and\nsettled down and dozed.  A shrill and minute singing stole upon his\nhearing.  Once, and twice, he sleepily brushed his nose with his paw.\nThen he woke up.  There, buzzing in the air at the tip of his nose, was a\nlone mosquito.  It was a full-grown mosquito, one that had lain frozen in\na dry log all winter and that had now been thawed out by the sun.  He\ncould resist the call of the world no longer.  Besides, he was hungry.\n\nHe crawled over to his mate and tried to persuade her to get up.  But she\nonly snarled at him, and he walked out alone into the bright sunshine to\nfind the snow-surface soft under foot and the travelling difficult.  He\nwent up the frozen bed of the stream, where the snow, shaded by the\ntrees, was yet hard and crystalline.  He was gone eight hours, and he\ncame back through the darkness hungrier than when he had started.  He had\nfound game, but he had not caught it.  He had broken through the melting\nsnow crust, and wallowed, while the snowshoe rabbits had skimmed along on\ntop lightly as ever.\n\nHe paused at the mouth of the cave with a sudden shock of suspicion.\nFaint, strange sounds came from within.  They were sounds not made by his\nmate, and yet they were remotely familiar.  He bellied cautiously inside\nand was met by a warning snarl from the she-wolf.  This he received\nwithout perturbation, though he obeyed it by keeping his distance; but he\nremained interested in the other sounds--faint, muffled sobbings and\nslubberings.\n\nHis mate warned him irritably away, and he curled up and slept in the\nentrance.  When morning came and a dim light pervaded the lair, he again\nsought after the source of the remotely familiar sounds.  There was a new\nnote in his mate's warning snarl.  It was a jealous note, and he was very\ncareful in keeping a respectful distance.  Nevertheless, he made out,\nsheltering between her legs against the length of her body, five strange\nlittle bundles of life, very feeble, very helpless, making tiny\nwhimpering noises, with eyes that did not open to the light.  He was\nsurprised.  It was not the first time in his long and successful life\nthat this thing had happened.  It had happened many times, yet each time\nit was as fresh a surprise as ever to him.\n\nHis mate looked at him anxiously.  Every little while she emitted a low\ngrowl, and at times, when it seemed to her he approached too near, the\ngrowl shot up in her throat to a sharp snarl.  Of her own experience she\nhad no memory of the thing happening; but in her instinct, which was the\nexperience of all the mothers of wolves, there lurked a memory of fathers\nthat had eaten their new-born and helpless progeny.  It manifested itself\nas a fear strong within her, that made her prevent One Eye from more\nclosely inspecting the cubs he had fathered.\n\nBut there was no danger.  Old One Eye was feeling the urge of an impulse,\nthat was, in turn, an instinct that had come down to him from all the\nfathers of wolves.  He did not question it, nor puzzle over it.  It was\nthere, in the fibre of his being; and it was the most natural thing in\nthe world that he should obey it by turning his back on his new-born\nfamily and by trotting out and away on the meat-trail whereby he lived.\n\nFive or six miles from the lair, the stream divided, its forks going off\namong the mountains at a right angle.  Here, leading up the left fork, he\ncame upon a fresh track.  He smelled it and found it so recent that he\ncrouched swiftly, and looked in the direction in which it disappeared.\nThen he turned deliberately and took the right fork.  The footprint was\nmuch larger than the one his own feet made, and he knew that in the wake\nof such a trail there was little meat for him.\n\nHalf a mile up the right fork, his quick ears caught the sound of gnawing\nteeth.  He stalked the quarry and found it to be a porcupine, standing\nupright against a tree and trying his teeth on the bark.  One Eye\napproached carefully but hopelessly.  He knew the breed, though he had\nnever met it so far north before; and never in his long life had\nporcupine served him for a meal.  But he had long since learned that\nthere was such a thing as Chance, or Opportunity, and he continued to\ndraw near.  There was never any telling what might happen, for with live\nthings events were somehow always happening differently.\n\nThe porcupine rolled itself into a ball, radiating long, sharp needles in\nall directions that defied attack.  In his youth One Eye had once sniffed\ntoo near a similar, apparently inert ball of quills, and had the tail\nflick out suddenly in his face.  One quill he had carried away in his\nmuzzle, where it had remained for weeks, a rankling flame, until it\nfinally worked out.  So he lay down, in a comfortable crouching position,\nhis nose fully a foot away, and out of the line of the tail.  Thus he\nwaited, keeping perfectly quiet.  There was no telling.  Something might\nhappen.  The porcupine might unroll.  There might be opportunity for a\ndeft and ripping thrust of paw into the tender, unguarded belly.\n\nBut at the end of half an hour he arose, growled wrathfully at the\nmotionless ball, and trotted on.  He had waited too often and futilely in\nthe past for porcupines to unroll, to waste any more time.  He continued\nup the right fork.  The day wore along, and nothing rewarded his hunt.\n\nThe urge of his awakened instinct of fatherhood was strong upon him.  He\nmust find meat.  In the afternoon he blundered upon a ptarmigan.  He came\nout of a thicket and found himself face to face with the slow-witted\nbird.  It was sitting on a log, not a foot beyond the end of his nose.\nEach saw the other.  The bird made a startled rise, but he struck it with\nhis paw, and smashed it down to earth, then pounced upon it, and caught\nit in his teeth as it scuttled across the snow trying to rise in the air\nagain.  As his teeth crunched through the tender flesh and fragile bones,\nhe began naturally to eat.  Then he remembered, and, turning on the back-\ntrack, started for home, carrying the ptarmigan in his mouth.\n\nA mile above the forks, running velvet-footed as was his custom, a\ngliding shadow that cautiously prospected each new vista of the trail, he\ncame upon later imprints of the large tracks he had discovered in the\nearly morning.  As the track led his way, he followed, prepared to meet\nthe maker of it at every turn of the stream.\n\nHe slid his head around a corner of rock, where began an unusually large\nbend in the stream, and his quick eyes made out something that sent him\ncrouching swiftly down.  It was the maker of the track, a large female\nlynx.  She was crouching as he had crouched once that day, in front of\nher the tight-rolled ball of quills.  If he had been a gliding shadow\nbefore, he now became the ghost of such a shadow, as he crept and circled\naround, and came up well to leeward of the silent, motionless pair.\n\nHe lay down in the snow, depositing the ptarmigan beside him, and with\neyes peering through the needles of a low-growing spruce he watched the\nplay of life before him--the waiting lynx and the waiting porcupine, each\nintent on life; and, such was the curiousness of the game, the way of\nlife for one lay in the eating of the other, and the way of life for the\nother lay in being not eaten.  While old One Eye, the wolf crouching in\nthe covert, played his part, too, in the game, waiting for some strange\nfreak of Chance, that might help him on the meat-trail which was his way\nof life.\n\nHalf an hour passed, an hour; and nothing happened.  The ball of quills\nmight have been a stone for all it moved; the lynx might have been frozen\nto marble; and old One Eye might have been dead.  Yet all three animals\nwere keyed to a tenseness of living that was almost painful, and scarcely\never would it come to them to be more alive than they were then in their\nseeming petrifaction.\n\nOne Eye moved slightly and peered forth with increased eagerness.\nSomething was happening.  The porcupine had at last decided that its\nenemy had gone away.  Slowly, cautiously, it was unrolling its ball of\nimpregnable armour.  It was agitated by no tremor of anticipation.\nSlowly, slowly, the bristling ball straightened out and lengthened.  One\nEye watching, felt a sudden moistness in his mouth and a drooling of\nsaliva, involuntary, excited by the living meat that was spreading itself\nlike a repast before him.\n\nNot quite entirely had the porcupine unrolled when it discovered its\nenemy.  In that instant the lynx struck.  The blow was like a flash of\nlight.  The paw, with rigid claws curving like talons, shot under the\ntender belly and came back with a swift ripping movement.  Had the\nporcupine been entirely unrolled, or had it not discovered its enemy a\nfraction of a second before the blow was struck, the paw would have\nescaped unscathed; but a side-flick of the tail sank sharp quills into it\nas it was withdrawn.\n\nEverything had happened at once--the blow, the counter-blow, the squeal\nof agony from the porcupine, the big cat's squall of sudden hurt and\nastonishment.  One Eye half arose in his excitement, his ears up, his\ntail straight out and quivering behind him.  The lynx's bad temper got\nthe best of her.  She sprang savagely at the thing that had hurt her.  But\nthe porcupine, squealing and grunting, with disrupted anatomy trying\nfeebly to roll up into its ball-protection, flicked out its tail again,\nand again the big cat squalled with hurt and astonishment.  Then she fell\nto backing away and sneezing, her nose bristling with quills like a\nmonstrous pin-cushion.  She brushed her nose with her paws, trying to\ndislodge the fiery darts, thrust it into the snow, and rubbed it against\ntwigs and branches, and all the time leaping about, ahead, sidewise, up\nand down, in a frenzy of pain and fright.\n\nShe sneezed continually, and her stub of a tail was doing its best toward\nlashing about by giving quick, violent jerks.  She quit her antics, and\nquieted down for a long minute.  One Eye watched.  And even he could not\nrepress a start and an involuntary bristling of hair along his back when\nshe suddenly leaped, without warning, straight up in the air, at the same\ntime emitting a long and most terrible squall.  Then she sprang away, up\nthe trail, squalling with every leap she made.\n\nIt was not until her racket had faded away in the distance and died out\nthat One Eye ventured forth.  He walked as delicately as though all the\nsnow were carpeted with porcupine quills, erect and ready to pierce the\nsoft pads of his feet.  The porcupine met his approach with a furious\nsquealing and a clashing of its long teeth.  It had managed to roll up in\na ball again, but it was not quite the old compact ball; its muscles were\ntoo much torn for that.  It had been ripped almost in half, and was still\nbleeding profusely.\n\nOne Eye scooped out mouthfuls of the blood-soaked snow, and chewed and\ntasted and swallowed.  This served as a relish, and his hunger increased\nmightily; but he was too old in the world to forget his caution.  He\nwaited.  He lay down and waited, while the porcupine grated its teeth and\nuttered grunts and sobs and occasional sharp little squeals.  In a little\nwhile, One Eye noticed that the quills were drooping and that a great\nquivering had set up.  The quivering came to an end suddenly.  There was\na final defiant clash of the long teeth.  Then all the quills drooped\nquite down, and the body relaxed and moved no more.\n\nWith a nervous, shrinking paw, One Eye stretched out the porcupine to its\nfull length and turned it over on its back.  Nothing had happened.  It\nwas surely dead.  He studied it intently for a moment, then took a\ncareful grip with his teeth and started off down the stream, partly\ncarrying, partly dragging the porcupine, with head turned to the side so\nas to avoid stepping on the prickly mass.  He recollected something,\ndropped the burden, and trotted back to where he had left the ptarmigan.\nHe did not hesitate a moment.  He knew clearly what was to be done, and\nthis he did by promptly eating the ptarmigan.  Then he returned and took\nup his burden.\n\nWhen he dragged the result of his day's hunt into the cave, the she-wolf\ninspected it, turned her muzzle to him, and lightly licked him on the\nneck.  But the next instant she was warning him away from the cubs with a\nsnarl that was less harsh than usual and that was more apologetic than\nmenacing.  Her instinctive fear of the father of her progeny was toning\ndown.  He was behaving as a wolf-father should, and manifesting no unholy\ndesire to devour the young lives she had brought into the world.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III--THE GREY CUB\n\n\nHe was different from his brothers and sisters.  Their hair already\nbetrayed the reddish hue inherited from their mother, the she-wolf; while\nhe alone, in this particular, took after his father.  He was the one\nlittle grey cub of the litter.  He had bred true to the straight wolf-\nstock--in fact, he had bred true to old One Eye himself, physically, with\nbut a single exception, and that was he had two eyes to his father's one.\n\nThe grey cub's eyes had not been open long, yet already he could see with\nsteady clearness.  And while his eyes were still closed, he had felt,\ntasted, and smelled.  He knew his two brothers and his two sisters very\nwell.  He had begun to romp with them in a feeble, awkward way, and even\nto squabble, his little throat vibrating with a queer rasping noise (the\nforerunner of the growl), as he worked himself into a passion.  And long\nbefore his eyes had opened he had learned by touch, taste, and smell to\nknow his mother--a fount of warmth and liquid food and tenderness.  She\npossessed a gentle, caressing tongue that soothed him when it passed over\nhis soft little body, and that impelled him to snuggle close against her\nand to doze off to sleep.\n\nMost of the first month of his life had been passed thus in sleeping; but\nnow he could see quite well, and he stayed awake for longer periods of\ntime, and he was coming to learn his world quite well.  His world was\ngloomy; but he did not know that, for he knew no other world.  It was dim-\nlighted; but his eyes had never had to adjust themselves to any other\nlight.  His world was very small.  Its limits were the walls of the lair;\nbut as he had no knowledge of the wide world outside, he was never\noppressed by the narrow confines of his existence.\n\nBut he had early discovered that one wall of his world was different from\nthe rest.  This was the mouth of the cave and the source of light.  He\nhad discovered that it was different from the other walls long before he\nhad any thoughts of his own, any conscious volitions.  It had been an\nirresistible attraction before ever his eyes opened and looked upon it.\nThe light from it had beat upon his sealed lids, and the eyes and the\noptic nerves had pulsated to little, sparklike flashes, warm-coloured and\nstrangely pleasing.  The life of his body, and of every fibre of his\nbody, the life that was the very substance of his body and that was apart\nfrom his own personal life, had yearned toward this light and urged his\nbody toward it in the same way that the cunning chemistry of a plant\nurges it toward the sun.\n\nAlways, in the beginning, before his conscious life dawned, he had\ncrawled toward the mouth of the cave.  And in this his brothers and\nsisters were one with him.  Never, in that period, did any of them crawl\ntoward the dark corners of the back-wall.  The light drew them as if they\nwere plants; the chemistry of the life that composed them demanded the\nlight as a necessity of being; and their little puppet-bodies crawled\nblindly and chemically, like the tendrils of a vine.  Later on, when each\ndeveloped individuality and became personally conscious of impulsions and\ndesires, the attraction of the light increased.  They were always\ncrawling and sprawling toward it, and being driven back from it by their\nmother.\n\nIt was in this way that the grey cub learned other attributes of his\nmother than the soft, soothing tongue.  In his insistent crawling toward\nthe light, he discovered in her a nose that with a sharp nudge\nadministered rebuke, and later, a paw, that crushed him down and rolled\nhim over and over with swift, calculating stroke.  Thus he learned hurt;\nand on top of it he learned to avoid hurt, first, by not incurring the\nrisk of it; and second, when he had incurred the risk, by dodging and by\nretreating.  These were conscious actions, and were the results of his\nfirst generalisations upon the world.  Before that he had recoiled\nautomatically from hurt, as he had crawled automatically toward the\nlight.  After that he recoiled from hurt because he _knew_ that it was\nhurt.\n\nHe was a fierce little cub.  So were his brothers and sisters.  It was to\nbe expected.  He was a carnivorous animal.  He came of a breed of meat-\nkillers and meat-eaters.  His father and mother lived wholly upon meat.\nThe milk he had sucked with his first flickering life, was milk\ntransformed directly from meat, and now, at a month old, when his eyes\nhad been open for but a week, he was beginning himself to eat meat--meat\nhalf-digested by the she-wolf and disgorged for the five growing cubs\nthat already made too great demand upon her breast.\n\nBut he was, further, the fiercest of the litter.  He could make a louder\nrasping growl than any of them.  His tiny rages were much more terrible\nthan theirs.  It was he that first learned the trick of rolling a fellow-\ncub over with a cunning paw-stroke.  And it was he that first gripped\nanother cub by the ear and pulled and tugged and growled through jaws\ntight-clenched.  And certainly it was he that caused the mother the most\ntrouble in keeping her litter from the mouth of the cave.\n\nThe fascination of the light for the grey cub increased from day to day.\nHe was perpetually departing on yard-long adventures toward the cave's\nentrance, and as perpetually being driven back.  Only he did not know it\nfor an entrance.  He did not know anything about entrances--passages\nwhereby one goes from one place to another place.  He did not know any\nother place, much less of a way to get there.  So to him the entrance of\nthe cave was a wall--a wall of light.  As the sun was to the outside\ndweller, this wall was to him the sun of his world.  It attracted him as\na candle attracts a moth.  He was always striving to attain it.  The life\nthat was so swiftly expanding within him, urged him continually toward\nthe wall of light.  The life that was within him knew that it was the one\nway out, the way he was predestined to tread.  But he himself did not\nknow anything about it.  He did not know there was any outside at all.\n\nThere was one strange thing about this wall of light.  His father (he had\nalready come to recognise his father as the one other dweller in the\nworld, a creature like his mother, who slept near the light and was a\nbringer of meat)--his father had a way of walking right into the white\nfar wall and disappearing.  The grey cub could not understand this.\nThough never permitted by his mother to approach that wall, he had\napproached the other walls, and encountered hard obstruction on the end\nof his tender nose.  This hurt.  And after several such adventures, he\nleft the walls alone.  Without thinking about it, he accepted this\ndisappearing into the wall as a peculiarity of his father, as milk and\nhalf-digested meat were peculiarities of his mother.\n\nIn fact, the grey cub was not given to thinking--at least, to the kind of\nthinking customary of men.  His brain worked in dim ways.  Yet his\nconclusions were as sharp and distinct as those achieved by men.  He had\na method of accepting things, without questioning the why and wherefore.\nIn reality, this was the act of classification.  He was never disturbed\nover why a thing happened.  How it happened was sufficient for him.  Thus,\nwhen he had bumped his nose on the back-wall a few times, he accepted\nthat he would not disappear into walls.  In the same way he accepted that\nhis father could disappear into walls.  But he was not in the least\ndisturbed by desire to find out the reason for the difference between his\nfather and himself.  Logic and physics were no part of his mental make-\nup.\n\nLike most creatures of the Wild, he early experienced famine.  There came\na time when not only did the meat-supply cease, but the milk no longer\ncame from his mother's breast.  At first, the cubs whimpered and cried,\nbut for the most part they slept.  It was not long before they were\nreduced to a coma of hunger.  There were no more spats and squabbles, no\nmore tiny rages nor attempts at growling; while the adventures toward the\nfar white wall ceased altogether.  The cubs slept, while the life that\nwas in them flickered and died down.\n\nOne Eye was desperate.  He ranged far and wide, and slept but little in\nthe lair that had now become cheerless and miserable.  The she-wolf, too,\nleft her litter and went out in search of meat.  In the first days after\nthe birth of the cubs, One Eye had journeyed several times back to the\nIndian camp and robbed the rabbit snares; but, with the melting of the\nsnow and the opening of the streams, the Indian camp had moved away, and\nthat source of supply was closed to him.\n\nWhen the grey cub came back to life and again took interest in the far\nwhite wall, he found that the population of his world had been reduced.\nOnly one sister remained to him.  The rest were gone.  As he grew\nstronger, he found himself compelled to play alone, for the sister no\nlonger lifted her head nor moved about.  His little body rounded out with\nthe meat he now ate; but the food had come too late for her.  She slept\ncontinuously, a tiny skeleton flung round with skin in which the flame\nflickered lower and lower and at last went out.\n\nThen there came a time when the grey cub no longer saw his father\nappearing and disappearing in the wall nor lying down asleep in the\nentrance.  This had happened at the end of a second and less severe\nfamine.  The she-wolf knew why One Eye never came back, but there was no\nway by which she could tell what she had seen to the grey cub.  Hunting\nherself for meat, up the left fork of the stream where lived the lynx,\nshe had followed a day-old trail of One Eye.  And she had found him, or\nwhat remained of him, at the end of the trail.  There were many signs of\nthe battle that had been fought, and of the lynx's withdrawal to her lair\nafter having won the victory.  Before she went away, the she-wolf had\nfound this lair, but the signs told her that the lynx was inside, and she\nhad not dared to venture in.\n\nAfter that, the she-wolf in her hunting avoided the left fork.  For she\nknew that in the lynx's lair was a litter of kittens, and she knew the\nlynx for a fierce, bad-tempered creature and a terrible fighter.  It was\nall very well for half a dozen wolves to drive a lynx, spitting and\nbristling, up a tree; but it was quite a different matter for a lone wolf\nto encounter a lynx--especially when the lynx was known to have a litter\nof hungry kittens at her back.\n\nBut the Wild is the Wild, and motherhood is motherhood, at all times\nfiercely protective whether in the Wild or out of it; and the time was to\ncome when the she-wolf, for her grey cub's sake, would venture the left\nfork, and the lair in the rocks, and the lynx's wrath.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV--THE WALL OF THE WORLD\n\n\nBy the time his mother began leaving the cave on hunting expeditions, the\ncub had learned well the law that forbade his approaching the entrance.\nNot only had this law been forcibly and many times impressed on him by\nhis mother's nose and paw, but in him the instinct of fear was\ndeveloping.  Never, in his brief cave-life, had he encountered anything\nof which to be afraid.  Yet fear was in him.  It had come down to him\nfrom a remote ancestry through a thousand thousand lives.  It was a\nheritage he had received directly from One Eye and the she-wolf; but to\nthem, in turn, it had been passed down through all the generations of\nwolves that had gone before.  Fear!--that legacy of the Wild which no\nanimal may escape nor exchange for pottage.\n\nSo the grey cub knew fear, though he knew not the stuff of which fear was\nmade.  Possibly he accepted it as one of the restrictions of life.  For\nhe had already learned that there were such restrictions.  Hunger he had\nknown; and when he could not appease his hunger he had felt restriction.\nThe hard obstruction of the cave-wall, the sharp nudge of his mother's\nnose, the smashing stroke of her paw, the hunger unappeased of several\nfamines, had borne in upon him that all was not freedom in the world,\nthat to life there were limitations and restraints.  These limitations and\nrestraints were laws.  To be obedient to them was to escape hurt and make\nfor happiness.\n\nHe did not reason the question out in this man fashion.  He merely\nclassified the things that hurt and the things that did not hurt.  And\nafter such classification he avoided the things that hurt, the\nrestrictions and restraints, in order to enjoy the satisfactions and the\nremunerations of life.\n\nThus it was that in obedience to the law laid down by his mother, and in\nobedience to the law of that unknown and nameless thing, fear, he kept\naway from the mouth of the cave.  It remained to him a white wall of\nlight.  When his mother was absent, he slept most of the time, while\nduring the intervals that he was awake he kept very quiet, suppressing\nthe whimpering cries that tickled in his throat and strove for noise.\n\nOnce, lying awake, he heard a strange sound in the white wall.  He did\nnot know that it was a wolverine, standing outside, all a-trembling with\nits own daring, and cautiously scenting out the contents of the cave.  The\ncub knew only that the sniff was strange, a something unclassified,\ntherefore unknown and terrible--for the unknown was one of the chief\nelements that went into the making of fear.\n\nThe hair bristled upon the grey cub's back, but it bristled silently.  How\nwas he to know that this thing that sniffed was a thing at which to\nbristle?  It was not born of any knowledge of his, yet it was the visible\nexpression of the fear that was in him, and for which, in his own life,\nthere was no accounting.  But fear was accompanied by another\ninstinct--that of concealment.  The cub was in a frenzy of terror, yet he\nlay without movement or sound, frozen, petrified into immobility, to all\nappearances dead.  His mother, coming home, growled as she smelt the\nwolverine's track, and bounded into the cave and licked and nozzled him\nwith undue vehemence of affection.  And the cub felt that somehow he had\nescaped a great hurt.\n\nBut there were other forces at work in the cub, the greatest of which was\ngrowth.  Instinct and law demanded of him obedience.  But growth demanded\ndisobedience.  His mother and fear impelled him to keep away from the\nwhite wall.  Growth is life, and life is for ever destined to make for\nlight.  So there was no damming up the tide of life that was rising\nwithin him--rising with every mouthful of meat he swallowed, with every\nbreath he drew.  In the end, one day, fear and obedience were swept away\nby the rush of life, and the cub straddled and sprawled toward the\nentrance.\n\nUnlike any other wall with which he had had experience, this wall seemed\nto recede from him as he approached.  No hard surface collided with the\ntender little nose he thrust out tentatively before him.  The substance\nof the wall seemed as permeable and yielding as light.  And as condition,\nin his eyes, had the seeming of form, so he entered into what had been\nwall to him and bathed in the substance that composed it.\n\nIt was bewildering.  He was sprawling through solidity.  And ever the\nlight grew brighter.  Fear urged him to go back, but growth drove him on.\nSuddenly he found himself at the mouth of the cave.  The wall, inside\nwhich he had thought himself, as suddenly leaped back before him to an\nimmeasurable distance.  The light had become painfully bright.  He was\ndazzled by it.  Likewise he was made dizzy by this abrupt and tremendous\nextension of space.  Automatically, his eyes were adjusting themselves to\nthe brightness, focusing themselves to meet the increased distance of\nobjects.  At first, the wall had leaped beyond his vision.  He now saw it\nagain; but it had taken upon itself a remarkable remoteness.  Also, its\nappearance had changed.  It was now a variegated wall, composed of the\ntrees that fringed the stream, the opposing mountain that towered above\nthe trees, and the sky that out-towered the mountain.\n\nA great fear came upon him.  This was more of the terrible unknown.  He\ncrouched down on the lip of the cave and gazed out on the world.  He was\nvery much afraid.  Because it was unknown, it was hostile to him.\nTherefore the hair stood up on end along his back and his lips wrinkled\nweakly in an attempt at a ferocious and intimidating snarl.  Out of his\npuniness and fright he challenged and menaced the whole wide world.\n\nNothing happened.  He continued to gaze, and in his interest he forgot to\nsnarl.  Also, he forgot to be afraid.  For the time, fear had been routed\nby growth, while growth had assumed the guise of curiosity.  He began to\nnotice near objects--an open portion of the stream that flashed in the\nsun, the blasted pine-tree that stood at the base of the slope, and the\nslope itself, that ran right up to him and ceased two feet beneath the\nlip of the cave on which he crouched.\n\nNow the grey cub had lived all his days on a level floor.  He had never\nexperienced the hurt of a fall.  He did not know what a fall was.  So he\nstepped boldly out upon the air.  His hind-legs still rested on the cave-\nlip, so he fell forward head downward.  The earth struck him a harsh blow\non the nose that made him yelp.  Then he began rolling down the slope,\nover and over.  He was in a panic of terror.  The unknown had caught him\nat last.  It had gripped savagely hold of him and was about to wreak upon\nhim some terrific hurt.  Growth was now routed by fear, and he ki-yi'd\nlike any frightened puppy.\n\nThe unknown bore him on he knew not to what frightful hurt, and he yelped\nand ki-yi'd unceasingly.  This was a different proposition from crouching\nin frozen fear while the unknown lurked just alongside.  Now the unknown\nhad caught tight hold of him.  Silence would do no good.  Besides, it was\nnot fear, but terror, that convulsed him.\n\nBut the slope grew more gradual, and its base was grass-covered.  Here\nthe cub lost momentum.  When at last he came to a stop, he gave one last\nagonised yell and then a long, whimpering wail.  Also, and quite as a\nmatter of course, as though in his life he had already made a thousand\ntoilets, he proceeded to lick away the dry clay that soiled him.\n\nAfter that he sat up and gazed about him, as might the first man of the\nearth who landed upon Mars.  The cub had broken through the wall of the\nworld, the unknown had let go its hold of him, and here he was without\nhurt.  But the first man on Mars would have experienced less\nunfamiliarity than did he.  Without any antecedent knowledge, without any\nwarning whatever that such existed, he found himself an explorer in a\ntotally new world.\n\nNow that the terrible unknown had let go of him, he forgot that the\nunknown had any terrors.  He was aware only of curiosity in all the\nthings about him.  He inspected the grass beneath him, the moss-berry\nplant just beyond, and the dead trunk of the blasted pine that stood on\nthe edge of an open space among the trees.  A squirrel, running around\nthe base of the trunk, came full upon him, and gave him a great fright.\nHe cowered down and snarled.  But the squirrel was as badly scared.  It\nran up the tree, and from a point of safety chattered back savagely.\n\nThis helped the cub's courage, and though the woodpecker he next\nencountered gave him a start, he proceeded confidently on his way.  Such\nwas his confidence, that when a moose-bird impudently hopped up to him,\nhe reached out at it with a playful paw.  The result was a sharp peck on\nthe end of his nose that made him cower down and ki-yi.  The noise he\nmade was too much for the moose-bird, who sought safety in flight.\n\nBut the cub was learning.  His misty little mind had already made an\nunconscious classification.  There were live things and things not alive.\nAlso, he must watch out for the live things.  The things not alive\nremained always in one place, but the live things moved about, and there\nwas no telling what they might do.  The thing to expect of them was the\nunexpected, and for this he must be prepared.\n\nHe travelled very clumsily.  He ran into sticks and things.  A twig that\nhe thought a long way off, would the next instant hit him on the nose or\nrake along his ribs.  There were inequalities of surface.  Sometimes he\noverstepped and stubbed his nose.  Quite as often he understepped and\nstubbed his feet.  Then there were the pebbles and stones that turned\nunder him when he trod upon them; and from them he came to know that the\nthings not alive were not all in the same state of stable equilibrium as\nwas his cave--also, that small things not alive were more liable than\nlarge things to fall down or turn over.  But with every mishap he was\nlearning.  The longer he walked, the better he walked.  He was adjusting\nhimself.  He was learning to calculate his own muscular movements, to\nknow his physical limitations, to measure distances between objects, and\nbetween objects and himself.\n\nHis was the luck of the beginner.  Born to be a hunter of meat (though he\ndid not know it), he blundered upon meat just outside his own cave-door\non his first foray into the world.  It was by sheer blundering that he\nchanced upon the shrewdly hidden ptarmigan nest.  He fell into it.  He\nhad essayed to walk along the trunk of a fallen pine.  The rotten bark\ngave way under his feet, and with a despairing yelp he pitched down the\nrounded crescent, smashed through the leafage and stalks of a small bush,\nand in the heart of the bush, on the ground, fetched up in the midst of\nseven ptarmigan chicks.\n\nThey made noises, and at first he was frightened at them.  Then he\nperceived that they were very little, and he became bolder.  They moved.\nHe placed his paw on one, and its movements were accelerated.  This was a\nsource of enjoyment to him.  He smelled it.  He picked it up in his\nmouth.  It struggled and tickled his tongue.  At the same time he was\nmade aware of a sensation of hunger.  His jaws closed together.  There\nwas a crunching of fragile bones, and warm blood ran in his mouth.  The\ntaste of it was good.  This was meat, the same as his mother gave him,\nonly it was alive between his teeth and therefore better.  So he ate the\nptarmigan.  Nor did he stop till he had devoured the whole brood.  Then\nhe licked his chops in quite the same way his mother did, and began to\ncrawl out of the bush.\n\nHe encountered a feathered whirlwind.  He was confused and blinded by the\nrush of it and the beat of angry wings.  He hid his head between his paws\nand yelped.  The blows increased.  The mother ptarmigan was in a fury.\nThen he became angry.  He rose up, snarling, striking out with his paws.\nHe sank his tiny teeth into one of the wings and pulled and tugged\nsturdily.  The ptarmigan struggled against him, showering blows upon him\nwith her free wing.  It was his first battle.  He was elated.  He forgot\nall about the unknown.  He no longer was afraid of anything.  He was\nfighting, tearing at a live thing that was striking at him.  Also, this\nlive thing was meat.  The lust to kill was on him.  He had just destroyed\nlittle live things.  He would now destroy a big live thing.  He was too\nbusy and happy to know that he was happy.  He was thrilling and exulting\nin ways new to him and greater to him than any he had known before.\n\nHe held on to the wing and growled between his tight-clenched teeth.  The\nptarmigan dragged him out of the bush.  When she turned and tried to drag\nhim back into the bush's shelter, he pulled her away from it and on into\nthe open.  And all the time she was making outcry and striking with her\nfree wing, while feathers were flying like a snow-fall.  The pitch to\nwhich he was aroused was tremendous.  All the fighting blood of his breed\nwas up in him and surging through him.  This was living, though he did\nnot know it.  He was realising his own meaning in the world; he was doing\nthat for which he was made--killing meat and battling to kill it.  He was\njustifying his existence, than which life can do no greater; for life\nachieves its summit when it does to the uttermost that which it was\nequipped to do.\n\nAfter a time, the ptarmigan ceased her struggling.  He still held her by\nthe wing, and they lay on the ground and looked at each other.  He tried\nto growl threateningly, ferociously.  She pecked on his nose, which by\nnow, what of previous adventures was sore.  He winced but held on.  She\npecked him again and again.  From wincing he went to whimpering.  He\ntried to back away from her, oblivious to the fact that by his hold on\nher he dragged her after him.  A rain of pecks fell on his ill-used nose.\nThe flood of fight ebbed down in him, and, releasing his prey, he turned\ntail and scampered on across the open in inglorious retreat.\n\nHe lay down to rest on the other side of the open, near the edge of the\nbushes, his tongue lolling out, his chest heaving and panting, his nose\nstill hurting him and causing him to continue his whimper.  But as he lay\nthere, suddenly there came to him a feeling as of something terrible\nimpending.  The unknown with all its terrors rushed upon him, and he\nshrank back instinctively into the shelter of the bush.  As he did so, a\ndraught of air fanned him, and a large, winged body swept ominously and\nsilently past.  A hawk, driving down out of the blue, had barely missed\nhim.\n\nWhile he lay in the bush, recovering from his fright and peering\nfearfully out, the mother-ptarmigan on the other side of the open space\nfluttered out of the ravaged nest.  It was because of her loss that she\npaid no attention to the winged bolt of the sky.  But the cub saw, and it\nwas a warning and a lesson to him--the swift downward swoop of the hawk,\nthe short skim of its body just above the ground, the strike of its\ntalons in the body of the ptarmigan, the ptarmigan's squawk of agony and\nfright, and the hawk's rush upward into the blue, carrying the ptarmigan\naway with it\n\nIt was a long time before the cub left its shelter.  He had learned much.\nLive things were meat.  They were good to eat.  Also, live things when\nthey were large enough, could give hurt.  It was better to eat small live\nthings like ptarmigan chicks, and to let alone large live things like\nptarmigan hens.  Nevertheless he felt a little prick of ambition, a\nsneaking desire to have another battle with that ptarmigan hen--only the\nhawk had carried her away.  Maybe there were other ptarmigan hens.  He\nwould go and see.\n\nHe came down a shelving bank to the stream.  He had never seen water\nbefore.  The footing looked good.  There were no inequalities of surface.\nHe stepped boldly out on it; and went down, crying with fear, into the\nembrace of the unknown.  It was cold, and he gasped, breathing quickly.\nThe water rushed into his lungs instead of the air that had always\naccompanied his act of breathing.  The suffocation he experienced was\nlike the pang of death.  To him it signified death.  He had no conscious\nknowledge of death, but like every animal of the Wild, he possessed the\ninstinct of death.  To him it stood as the greatest of hurts.  It was the\nvery essence of the unknown; it was the sum of the terrors of the\nunknown, the one culminating and unthinkable catastrophe that could\nhappen to him, about which he knew nothing and about which he feared\neverything.\n\nHe came to the surface, and the sweet air rushed into his open mouth.  He\ndid not go down again.  Quite as though it had been a long-established\ncustom of his he struck out with all his legs and began to swim.  The\nnear bank was a yard away; but he had come up with his back to it, and\nthe first thing his eyes rested upon was the opposite bank, toward which\nhe immediately began to swim.  The stream was a small one, but in the\npool it widened out to a score of feet.\n\nMidway in the passage, the current picked up the cub and swept him\ndownstream.  He was caught in the miniature rapid at the bottom of the\npool.  Here was little chance for swimming.  The quiet water had become\nsuddenly angry.  Sometimes he was under, sometimes on top.  At all times\nhe was in violent motion, now being turned over or around, and again,\nbeing smashed against a rock.  And with every rock he struck, he yelped.\nHis progress was a series of yelps, from which might have been adduced\nthe number of rocks he encountered.\n\nBelow the rapid was a second pool, and here, captured by the eddy, he was\ngently borne to the bank, and as gently deposited on a bed of gravel.  He\ncrawled frantically clear of the water and lay down.  He had learned some\nmore about the world.  Water was not alive.  Yet it moved.  Also, it\nlooked as solid as the earth, but was without any solidity at all.  His\nconclusion was that things were not always what they appeared to be.  The\ncub's fear of the unknown was an inherited distrust, and it had now been\nstrengthened by experience.  Thenceforth, in the nature of things, he\nwould possess an abiding distrust of appearances.  He would have to learn\nthe reality of a thing before he could put his faith into it.\n\nOne other adventure was destined for him that day.  He had recollected\nthat there was such a thing in the world as his mother.  And then there\ncame to him a feeling that he wanted her more than all the rest of the\nthings in the world.  Not only was his body tired with the adventures it\nhad undergone, but his little brain was equally tired.  In all the days\nhe had lived it had not worked so hard as on this one day.  Furthermore,\nhe was sleepy.  So he started out to look for the cave and his mother,\nfeeling at the same time an overwhelming rush of loneliness and\nhelplessness.\n\nHe was sprawling along between some bushes, when he heard a sharp\nintimidating cry.  There was a flash of yellow before his eyes.  He saw a\nweasel leaping swiftly away from him.  It was a small live thing, and he\nhad no fear.  Then, before him, at his feet, he saw an extremely small\nlive thing, only several inches long, a young weasel, that, like himself,\nhad disobediently gone out adventuring.  It tried to retreat before him.\nHe turned it over with his paw.  It made a queer, grating noise.  The\nnext moment the flash of yellow reappeared before his eyes.  He heard\nagain the intimidating cry, and at the same instant received a sharp blow\non the side of the neck and felt the sharp teeth of the mother-weasel cut\ninto his flesh.\n\nWhile he yelped and ki-yi'd and scrambled backward, he saw the mother-\nweasel leap upon her young one and disappear with it into the\nneighbouring thicket.  The cut of her teeth in his neck still hurt, but\nhis feelings were hurt more grievously, and he sat down and weakly\nwhimpered.  This mother-weasel was so small and so savage.  He was yet to\nlearn that for size and weight the weasel was the most ferocious,\nvindictive, and terrible of all the killers of the Wild.  But a portion\nof this knowledge was quickly to be his.\n\nHe was still whimpering when the mother-weasel reappeared.  She did not\nrush him, now that her young one was safe.  She approached more\ncautiously, and the cub had full opportunity to observe her lean,\nsnakelike body, and her head, erect, eager, and snake-like itself.  Her\nsharp, menacing cry sent the hair bristling along his back, and he\nsnarled warningly at her.  She came closer and closer.  There was a leap,\nswifter than his unpractised sight, and the lean, yellow body disappeared\nfor a moment out of the field of his vision.  The next moment she was at\nhis throat, her teeth buried in his hair and flesh.\n\nAt first he snarled and tried to fight; but he was very young, and this\nwas only his first day in the world, and his snarl became a whimper, his\nfight a struggle to escape.  The weasel never relaxed her hold.  She hung\non, striving to press down with her teeth to the great vein where his\nlife-blood bubbled.  The weasel was a drinker of blood, and it was ever\nher preference to drink from the throat of life itself.\n\nThe grey cub would have died, and there would have been no story to write\nabout him, had not the she-wolf come bounding through the bushes.  The\nweasel let go the cub and flashed at the she-wolf's throat, missing, but\ngetting a hold on the jaw instead.  The she-wolf flirted her head like\nthe snap of a whip, breaking the weasel's hold and flinging it high in\nthe air.  And, still in the air, the she-wolf's jaws closed on the lean,\nyellow body, and the weasel knew death between the crunching teeth.\n\nThe cub experienced another access of affection on the part of his\nmother.  Her joy at finding him seemed even greater than his joy at being\nfound.  She nozzled him and caressed him and licked the cuts made in him\nby the weasel's teeth.  Then, between them, mother and cub, they ate the\nblood-drinker, and after that went back to the cave and slept.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V--THE LAW OF MEAT\n\n\nThe cub's development was rapid.  He rested for two days, and then\nventured forth from the cave again.  It was on this adventure that he\nfound the young weasel whose mother he had helped eat, and he saw to it\nthat the young weasel went the way of its mother.  But on this trip he\ndid not get lost.  When he grew tired, he found his way back to the cave\nand slept.  And every day thereafter found him out and ranging a wider\narea.\n\nHe began to get accurate measurement of his strength and his weakness,\nand to know when to be bold and when to be cautious.  He found it\nexpedient to be cautious all the time, except for the rare moments, when,\nassured of his own intrepidity, he abandoned himself to petty rages and\nlusts.\n\nHe was always a little demon of fury when he chanced upon a stray\nptarmigan.  Never did he fail to respond savagely to the chatter of the\nsquirrel he had first met on the blasted pine.  While the sight of a\nmoose-bird almost invariably put him into the wildest of rages; for he\nnever forgot the peck on the nose he had received from the first of that\nilk he encountered.\n\nBut there were times when even a moose-bird failed to affect him, and\nthose were times when he felt himself to be in danger from some other\nprowling meat hunter.  He never forgot the hawk, and its moving shadow\nalways sent him crouching into the nearest thicket.  He no longer\nsprawled and straddled, and already he was developing the gait of his\nmother, slinking and furtive, apparently without exertion, yet sliding\nalong with a swiftness that was as deceptive as it was imperceptible.\n\nIn the matter of meat, his luck had been all in the beginning.  The seven\nptarmigan chicks and the baby weasel represented the sum of his killings.\nHis desire to kill strengthened with the days, and he cherished hungry\nambitions for the squirrel that chattered so volubly and always informed\nall wild creatures that the wolf-cub was approaching.  But as birds flew\nin the air, squirrels could climb trees, and the cub could only try to\ncrawl unobserved upon the squirrel when it was on the ground.\n\nThe cub entertained a great respect for his mother.  She could get meat,\nand she never failed to bring him his share.  Further, she was unafraid\nof things.  It did not occur to him that this fearlessness was founded\nupon experience and knowledge.  Its effect on him was that of an\nimpression of power.  His mother represented power; and as he grew older\nhe felt this power in the sharper admonishment of her paw; while the\nreproving nudge of her nose gave place to the slash of her fangs.  For\nthis, likewise, he respected his mother.  She compelled obedience from\nhim, and the older he grew the shorter grew her temper.\n\nFamine came again, and the cub with clearer consciousness knew once more\nthe bite of hunger.  The she-wolf ran herself thin in the quest for meat.\nShe rarely slept any more in the cave, spending most of her time on the\nmeat-trail, and spending it vainly.  This famine was not a long one, but\nit was severe while it lasted.  The cub found no more milk in his\nmother's breast, nor did he get one mouthful of meat for himself.\n\nBefore, he had hunted in play, for the sheer joyousness of it; now he\nhunted in deadly earnestness, and found nothing.  Yet the failure of it\naccelerated his development.  He studied the habits of the squirrel with\ngreater carefulness, and strove with greater craft to steal upon it and\nsurprise it.  He studied the wood-mice and tried to dig them out of their\nburrows; and he learned much about the ways of moose-birds and\nwoodpeckers.  And there came a day when the hawk's shadow did not drive\nhim crouching into the bushes.  He had grown stronger and wiser, and more\nconfident.  Also, he was desperate.  So he sat on his haunches,\nconspicuously in an open space, and challenged the hawk down out of the\nsky.  For he knew that there, floating in the blue above him, was meat,\nthe meat his stomach yearned after so insistently.  But the hawk refused\nto come down and give battle, and the cub crawled away into a thicket and\nwhimpered his disappointment and hunger.\n\nThe famine broke.  The she-wolf brought home meat.  It was strange meat,\ndifferent from any she had ever brought before.  It was a lynx kitten,\npartly grown, like the cub, but not so large.  And it was all for him.\nHis mother had satisfied her hunger elsewhere; though he did not know\nthat it was the rest of the lynx litter that had gone to satisfy her.  Nor\ndid he know the desperateness of her deed.  He knew only that the velvet-\nfurred kitten was meat, and he ate and waxed happier with every mouthful.\n\nA full stomach conduces to inaction, and the cub lay in the cave,\nsleeping against his mother's side.  He was aroused by her snarling.\nNever had he heard her snarl so terribly.  Possibly in her whole life it\nwas the most terrible snarl she ever gave.  There was reason for it, and\nnone knew it better than she.  A lynx's lair is not despoiled with\nimpunity.  In the full glare of the afternoon light, crouching in the\nentrance of the cave, the cub saw the lynx-mother.  The hair rippled up\nalong his back at the sight.  Here was fear, and it did not require his\ninstinct to tell him of it.  And if sight alone were not sufficient, the\ncry of rage the intruder gave, beginning with a snarl and rushing\nabruptly upward into a hoarse screech, was convincing enough in itself.\n\nThe cub felt the prod of the life that was in him, and stood up and\nsnarled valiantly by his mother's side.  But she thrust him ignominiously\naway and behind her.  Because of the low-roofed entrance the lynx could\nnot leap in, and when she made a crawling rush of it the she-wolf sprang\nupon her and pinned her down.  The cub saw little of the battle.  There\nwas a tremendous snarling and spitting and screeching.  The two animals\nthreshed about, the lynx ripping and tearing with her claws and using her\nteeth as well, while the she-wolf used her teeth alone.\n\nOnce, the cub sprang in and sank his teeth into the hind leg of the lynx.\nHe clung on, growling savagely.  Though he did not know it, by the weight\nof his body he clogged the action of the leg and thereby saved his mother\nmuch damage.  A change in the battle crushed him under both their bodies\nand wrenched loose his hold.  The next moment the two mothers separated,\nand, before they rushed together again, the lynx lashed out at the cub\nwith a huge fore-paw that ripped his shoulder open to the bone and sent\nhim hurtling sidewise against the wall.  Then was added to the uproar the\ncub's shrill yelp of pain and fright.  But the fight lasted so long that\nhe had time to cry himself out and to experience a second burst of\ncourage; and the end of the battle found him again clinging to a hind-leg\nand furiously growling between his teeth.\n\nThe lynx was dead.  But the she-wolf was very weak and sick.  At first\nshe caressed the cub and licked his wounded shoulder; but the blood she\nhad lost had taken with it her strength, and for all of a day and a night\nshe lay by her dead foe's side, without movement, scarcely breathing.  For\na week she never left the cave, except for water, and then her movements\nwere slow and painful.  At the end of that time the lynx was devoured,\nwhile the she-wolf's wounds had healed sufficiently to permit her to take\nthe meat-trail again.\n\nThe cub's shoulder was stiff and sore, and for some time he limped from\nthe terrible slash he had received.  But the world now seemed changed.  He\nwent about in it with greater confidence, with a feeling of prowess that\nhad not been his in the days before the battle with the lynx.  He had\nlooked upon life in a more ferocious aspect; he had fought; he had buried\nhis teeth in the flesh of a foe; and he had survived.  And because of all\nthis, he carried himself more boldly, with a touch of defiance that was\nnew in him.  He was no longer afraid of minor things, and much of his\ntimidity had vanished, though the unknown never ceased to press upon him\nwith its mysteries and terrors, intangible and ever-menacing.\n\nHe began to accompany his mother on the meat-trail, and he saw much of\nthe killing of meat and began to play his part in it.  And in his own dim\nway he learned the law of meat.  There were two kinds of life--his own\nkind and the other kind.  His own kind included his mother and himself.\nThe other kind included all live things that moved.  But the other kind\nwas divided.  One portion was what his own kind killed and ate.  This\nportion was composed of the non-killers and the small killers.  The other\nportion killed and ate his own kind, or was killed and eaten by his own\nkind.  And out of this classification arose the law.  The aim of life was\nmeat.  Life itself was meat.  Life lived on life.  There were the eaters\nand the eaten.  The law was: EAT OR BE EATEN.  He did not formulate the\nlaw in clear, set terms and moralise about it.  He did not even think the\nlaw; he merely lived the law without thinking about it at all.\n\nHe saw the law operating around him on every side.  He had eaten the\nptarmigan chicks.  The hawk had eaten the ptarmigan-mother.  The hawk\nwould also have eaten him.  Later, when he had grown more formidable, he\nwanted to eat the hawk.  He had eaten the lynx kitten.  The lynx-mother\nwould have eaten him had she not herself been killed and eaten.  And so\nit went.  The law was being lived about him by all live things, and he\nhimself was part and parcel of the law.  He was a killer.  His only food\nwas meat, live meat, that ran away swiftly before him, or flew into the\nair, or climbed trees, or hid in the ground, or faced him and fought with\nhim, or turned the tables and ran after him.\n\nHad the cub thought in man-fashion, he might have epitomised life as a\nvoracious appetite and the world as a place wherein ranged a multitude of\nappetites, pursuing and being pursued, hunting and being hunted, eating\nand being eaten, all in blindness and confusion, with violence and\ndisorder, a chaos of gluttony and slaughter, ruled over by chance,\nmerciless, planless, endless.\n\nBut the cub did not think in man-fashion.  He did not look at things with\nwide vision.  He was single-purposed, and entertained but one thought or\ndesire at a time.  Besides the law of meat, there were a myriad other and\nlesser laws for him to learn and obey.  The world was filled with\nsurprise.  The stir of the life that was in him, the play of his muscles,\nwas an unending happiness.  To run down meat was to experience thrills\nand elations.  His rages and battles were pleasures.  Terror itself, and\nthe mystery of the unknown, led to his living.\n\nAnd there were easements and satisfactions.  To have a full stomach, to\ndoze lazily in the sunshine--such things were remuneration in full for\nhis ardours and toils, while his ardours and tolls were in themselves\nself-remunerative.  They were expressions of life, and life is always\nhappy when it is expressing itself.  So the cub had no quarrel with his\nhostile environment.  He was very much alive, very happy, and very proud\nof himself.\n\n\n\n\nPART III\n\n\nCHAPTER I--THE MAKERS OF FIRE\n\n\nThe cub came upon it suddenly.  It was his own fault.  He had been\ncareless.  He had left the cave and run down to the stream to drink.  It\nmight have been that he took no notice because he was heavy with sleep.\n(He had been out all night on the meat-trail, and had but just then\nawakened.)  And his carelessness might have been due to the familiarity\nof the trail to the pool.  He had travelled it often, and nothing had\never happened on it.\n\nHe went down past the blasted pine, crossed the open space, and trotted\nin amongst the trees.  Then, at the same instant, he saw and smelt.\nBefore him, sitting silently on their haunches, were five live things,\nthe like of which he had never seen before.  It was his first glimpse of\nmankind.  But at the sight of him the five men did not spring to their\nfeet, nor show their teeth, nor snarl.  They did not move, but sat there,\nsilent and ominous.\n\nNor did the cub move.  Every instinct of his nature would have impelled\nhim to dash wildly away, had there not suddenly and for the first time\narisen in him another and counter instinct.  A great awe descended upon\nhim.  He was beaten down to movelessness by an overwhelming sense of his\nown weakness and littleness.  Here was mastery and power, something far\nand away beyond him.\n\nThe cub had never seen man, yet the instinct concerning man was his.  In\ndim ways he recognised in man the animal that had fought itself to\nprimacy over the other animals of the Wild.  Not alone out of his own\neyes, but out of the eyes of all his ancestors was the cub now looking\nupon man--out of eyes that had circled in the darkness around countless\nwinter camp-fires, that had peered from safe distances and from the\nhearts of thickets at the strange, two-legged animal that was lord over\nliving things.  The spell of the cub's heritage was upon him, the fear\nand the respect born of the centuries of struggle and the accumulated\nexperience of the generations.  The heritage was too compelling for a\nwolf that was only a cub.  Had he been full-grown, he would have run\naway.  As it was, he cowered down in a paralysis of fear, already half\nproffering the submission that his kind had proffered from the first time\na wolf came in to sit by man's fire and be made warm.\n\nOne of the Indians arose and walked over to him and stooped above him.\nThe cub cowered closer to the ground.  It was the unknown, objectified at\nlast, in concrete flesh and blood, bending over him and reaching down to\nseize hold of him.  His hair bristled involuntarily; his lips writhed\nback and his little fangs were bared.  The hand, poised like doom above\nhim, hesitated, and the man spoke laughing, \"_Wabam wabisca ip pit tah_.\"\n(\"Look!  The white fangs!\")\n\nThe other Indians laughed loudly, and urged the man on to pick up the\ncub.  As the hand descended closer and closer, there raged within the cub\na battle of the instincts.  He experienced two great impulsions--to yield\nand to fight.  The resulting action was a compromise.  He did both.  He\nyielded till the hand almost touched him.  Then he fought, his teeth\nflashing in a snap that sank them into the hand.  The next moment he\nreceived a clout alongside the head that knocked him over on his side.\nThen all fight fled out of him.  His puppyhood and the instinct of\nsubmission took charge of him.  He sat up on his haunches and ki-yi'd.\nBut the man whose hand he had bitten was angry.  The cub received a clout\non the other side of his head.  Whereupon he sat up and ki-yi'd louder\nthan ever.\n\nThe four Indians laughed more loudly, while even the man who had been\nbitten began to laugh.  They surrounded the cub and laughed at him, while\nhe wailed out his terror and his hurt.  In the midst of it, he heard\nsomething.  The Indians heard it too.  But the cub knew what it was, and\nwith a last, long wail that had in it more of triumph than grief, he\nceased his noise and waited for the coming of his mother, of his\nferocious and indomitable mother who fought and killed all things and was\nnever afraid.  She was snarling as she ran.  She had heard the cry of her\ncub and was dashing to save him.\n\nShe bounded in amongst them, her anxious and militant motherhood making\nher anything but a pretty sight.  But to the cub the spectacle of her\nprotective rage was pleasing.  He uttered a glad little cry and bounded\nto meet her, while the man-animals went back hastily several steps.  The\nshe-wolf stood over against her cub, facing the men, with bristling hair,\na snarl rumbling deep in her throat.  Her face was distorted and\nmalignant with menace, even the bridge of the nose wrinkling from tip to\neyes so prodigious was her snarl.\n\nThen it was that a cry went up from one of the men.  \"Kiche!\" was what he\nuttered.  It was an exclamation of surprise.  The cub felt his mother\nwilting at the sound.\n\n\"Kiche!\" the man cried again, this time with sharpness and authority.\n\nAnd then the cub saw his mother, the she-wolf, the fearless one,\ncrouching down till her belly touched the ground, whimpering, wagging her\ntail, making peace signs.  The cub could not understand.  He was\nappalled.  The awe of man rushed over him again.  His instinct had been\ntrue.  His mother verified it.  She, too, rendered submission to the man-\nanimals.\n\nThe man who had spoken came over to her.  He put his hand upon her head,\nand she only crouched closer.  She did not snap, nor threaten to snap.\nThe other men came up, and surrounded her, and felt her, and pawed her,\nwhich actions she made no attempt to resent.  They were greatly excited,\nand made many noises with their mouths.  These noises were not indication\nof danger, the cub decided, as he crouched near his mother still\nbristling from time to time but doing his best to submit.\n\n\"It is not strange,\" an Indian was saying.  \"Her father was a wolf.  It\nis true, her mother was a dog; but did not my brother tie her out in the\nwoods all of three nights in the mating season?  Therefore was the father\nof Kiche a wolf.\"\n\n\"It is a year, Grey Beaver, since she ran away,\" spoke a second Indian.\n\n\"It is not strange, Salmon Tongue,\" Grey Beaver answered.  \"It was the\ntime of the famine, and there was no meat for the dogs.\"\n\n\"She has lived with the wolves,\" said a third Indian.\n\n\"So it would seem, Three Eagles,\" Grey Beaver answered, laying his hand\non the cub; \"and this be the sign of it.\"\n\nThe cub snarled a little at the touch of the hand, and the hand flew back\nto administer a clout.  Whereupon the cub covered its fangs, and sank\ndown submissively, while the hand, returning, rubbed behind his ears, and\nup and down his back.\n\n\"This be the sign of it,\" Grey Beaver went on.  \"It is plain that his\nmother is Kiche.  But his father was a wolf.  Wherefore is there in him\nlittle dog and much wolf.  His fangs be white, and White Fang shall be\nhis name.  I have spoken.  He is my dog.  For was not Kiche my brother's\ndog?  And is not my brother dead?\"\n\nThe cub, who had thus received a name in the world, lay and watched.  For\na time the man-animals continued to make their mouth-noises.  Then Grey\nBeaver took a knife from a sheath that hung around his neck, and went\ninto the thicket and cut a stick.  White Fang watched him.  He notched\nthe stick at each end and in the notches fastened strings of raw-hide.\nOne string he tied around the throat of Kiche.  Then he led her to a\nsmall pine, around which he tied the other string.\n\nWhite Fang followed and lay down beside her.  Salmon Tongue's hand\nreached out to him and rolled him over on his back.  Kiche looked on\nanxiously.  White Fang felt fear mounting in him again.  He could not\nquite suppress a snarl, but he made no offer to snap.  The hand, with\nfingers crooked and spread apart, rubbed his stomach in a playful way and\nrolled him from side to side.  It was ridiculous and ungainly, lying\nthere on his back with legs sprawling in the air.  Besides, it was a\nposition of such utter helplessness that White Fang's whole nature\nrevolted against it.  He could do nothing to defend himself.  If this man-\nanimal intended harm, White Fang knew that he could not escape it.  How\ncould he spring away with his four legs in the air above him?  Yet\nsubmission made him master his fear, and he only growled softly.  This\ngrowl he could not suppress; nor did the man-animal resent it by giving\nhim a blow on the head.  And furthermore, such was the strangeness of it,\nWhite Fang experienced an unaccountable sensation of pleasure as the hand\nrubbed back and forth.  When he was rolled on his side he ceased to\ngrowl, when the fingers pressed and prodded at the base of his ears the\npleasurable sensation increased; and when, with a final rub and scratch,\nthe man left him alone and went away, all fear had died out of White\nFang.  He was to know fear many times in his dealing with man; yet it was\na token of the fearless companionship with man that was ultimately to be\nhis.\n\nAfter a time, White Fang heard strange noises approaching.  He was quick\nin his classification, for he knew them at once for man-animal noises.  A\nfew minutes later the remainder of the tribe, strung out as it was on the\nmarch, trailed in.  There were more men and many women and children,\nforty souls of them, and all heavily burdened with camp equipage and\noutfit.  Also there were many dogs; and these, with the exception of the\npart-grown puppies, were likewise burdened with camp outfit.  On their\nbacks, in bags that fastened tightly around underneath, the dogs carried\nfrom twenty to thirty pounds of weight.\n\nWhite Fang had never seen dogs before, but at sight of them he felt that\nthey were his own kind, only somehow different.  But they displayed\nlittle difference from the wolf when they discovered the cub and his\nmother.  There was a rush.  White Fang bristled and snarled and snapped\nin the face of the open-mouthed oncoming wave of dogs, and went down and\nunder them, feeling the sharp slash of teeth in his body, himself biting\nand tearing at the legs and bellies above him.  There was a great uproar.\nHe could hear the snarl of Kiche as she fought for him; and he could hear\nthe cries of the man-animals, the sound of clubs striking upon bodies,\nand the yelps of pain from the dogs so struck.\n\nOnly a few seconds elapsed before he was on his feet again.  He could now\nsee the man-animals driving back the dogs with clubs and stones,\ndefending him, saving him from the savage teeth of his kind that somehow\nwas not his kind.  And though there was no reason in his brain for a\nclear conception of so abstract a thing as justice, nevertheless, in his\nown way, he felt the justice of the man-animals, and he knew them for\nwhat they were--makers of law and executors of law.  Also, he appreciated\nthe power with which they administered the law.  Unlike any animals he\nhad ever encountered, they did not bite nor claw.  They enforced their\nlive strength with the power of dead things.  Dead things did their\nbidding.  Thus, sticks and stones, directed by these strange creatures,\nleaped through the air like living things, inflicting grievous hurts upon\nthe dogs.\n\nTo his mind this was power unusual, power inconceivable and beyond the\nnatural, power that was godlike.  White Fang, in the very nature of him,\ncould never know anything about gods; at the best he could know only\nthings that were beyond knowing--but the wonder and awe that he had of\nthese man-animals in ways resembled what would be the wonder and awe of\nman at sight of some celestial creature, on a mountain top, hurling\nthunderbolts from either hand at an astonished world.\n\nThe last dog had been driven back.  The hubbub died down.  And White Fang\nlicked his hurts and meditated upon this, his first taste of pack-cruelty\nand his introduction to the pack.  He had never dreamed that his own kind\nconsisted of more than One Eye, his mother, and himself.  They had\nconstituted a kind apart, and here, abruptly, he had discovered many more\ncreatures apparently of his own kind.  And there was a subconscious\nresentment that these, his kind, at first sight had pitched upon him and\ntried to destroy him.  In the same way he resented his mother being tied\nwith a stick, even though it was done by the superior man-animals.  It\nsavoured of the trap, of bondage.  Yet of the trap and of bondage he knew\nnothing.  Freedom to roam and run and lie down at will, had been his\nheritage; and here it was being infringed upon.  His mother's movements\nwere restricted to the length of a stick, and by the length of that same\nstick was he restricted, for he had not yet got beyond the need of his\nmother's side.\n\nHe did not like it.  Nor did he like it when the man-animals arose and\nwent on with their march; for a tiny man-animal took the other end of the\nstick and led Kiche captive behind him, and behind Kiche followed White\nFang, greatly perturbed and worried by this new adventure he had entered\nupon.\n\nThey went down the valley of the stream, far beyond White Fang's widest\nranging, until they came to the end of the valley, where the stream ran\ninto the Mackenzie River.  Here, where canoes were cached on poles high\nin the air and where stood fish-racks for the drying of fish, camp was\nmade; and White Fang looked on with wondering eyes.  The superiority of\nthese man-animals increased with every moment.  There was their mastery\nover all these sharp-fanged dogs.  It breathed of power.  But greater\nthan that, to the wolf-cub, was their mastery over things not alive;\ntheir capacity to communicate motion to unmoving things; their capacity\nto change the very face of the world.\n\nIt was this last that especially affected him.  The elevation of frames\nof poles caught his eye; yet this in itself was not so remarkable, being\ndone by the same creatures that flung sticks and stones to great\ndistances.  But when the frames of poles were made into tepees by being\ncovered with cloth and skins, White Fang was astounded.  It was the\ncolossal bulk of them that impressed him.  They arose around him, on\nevery side, like some monstrous quick-growing form of life.  They\noccupied nearly the whole circumference of his field of vision.  He was\nafraid of them.  They loomed ominously above him; and when the breeze\nstirred them into huge movements, he cowered down in fear, keeping his\neyes warily upon them, and prepared to spring away if they attempted to\nprecipitate themselves upon him.\n\nBut in a short while his fear of the tepees passed away.  He saw the\nwomen and children passing in and out of them without harm, and he saw\nthe dogs trying often to get into them, and being driven away with sharp\nwords and flying stones.  After a time, he left Kiche's side and crawled\ncautiously toward the wall of the nearest tepee.  It was the curiosity of\ngrowth that urged him on--the necessity of learning and living and doing\nthat brings experience.  The last few inches to the wall of the tepee\nwere crawled with painful slowness and precaution.  The day's events had\nprepared him for the unknown to manifest itself in most stupendous and\nunthinkable ways.  At last his nose touched the canvas.  He waited.\nNothing happened.  Then he smelled the strange fabric, saturated with the\nman-smell.  He closed on the canvas with his teeth and gave a gentle tug.\nNothing happened, though the adjacent portions of the tepee moved.  He\ntugged harder.  There was a greater movement.  It was delightful.  He\ntugged still harder, and repeatedly, until the whole tepee was in motion.\nThen the sharp cry of a squaw inside sent him scampering back to Kiche.\nBut after that he was afraid no more of the looming bulks of the tepees.\n\nA moment later he was straying away again from his mother.  Her stick was\ntied to a peg in the ground and she could not follow him.  A part-grown\npuppy, somewhat larger and older than he, came toward him slowly, with\nostentatious and belligerent importance.  The puppy's name, as White Fang\nwas afterward to hear him called, was Lip-lip.  He had had experience in\npuppy fights and was already something of a bully.\n\nLip-lip was White Fang's own kind, and, being only a puppy, did not seem\ndangerous; so White Fang prepared to meet him in a friendly spirit.  But\nwhen the stranger's walk became stiff-legged and his lips lifted clear of\nhis teeth, White Fang stiffened too, and answered with lifted lips.  They\nhalf circled about each other, tentatively, snarling and bristling.  This\nlasted several minutes, and White Fang was beginning to enjoy it, as a\nsort of game.  But suddenly, with remarkable swiftness, Lip-lip leaped\nin, delivering a slashing snap, and leaped away again.  The snap had\ntaken effect on the shoulder that had been hurt by the lynx and that was\nstill sore deep down near the bone.  The surprise and hurt of it brought\na yelp out of White Fang; but the next moment, in a rush of anger, he was\nupon Lip-lip and snapping viciously.\n\nBut Lip-lip had lived his life in camp and had fought many puppy fights.\nThree times, four times, and half a dozen times, his sharp little teeth\nscored on the newcomer, until White Fang, yelping shamelessly, fled to\nthe protection of his mother.  It was the first of the many fights he was\nto have with Lip-lip, for they were enemies from the start, born so, with\nnatures destined perpetually to clash.\n\nKiche licked White Fang soothingly with her tongue, and tried to prevail\nupon him to remain with her.  But his curiosity was rampant, and several\nminutes later he was venturing forth on a new quest.  He came upon one of\nthe man-animals, Grey Beaver, who was squatting on his hams and doing\nsomething with sticks and dry moss spread before him on the ground.  White\nFang came near to him and watched.  Grey Beaver made mouth-noises which\nWhite Fang interpreted as not hostile, so he came still nearer.\n\nWomen and children were carrying more sticks and branches to Grey Beaver.\nIt was evidently an affair of moment.  White Fang came in until he\ntouched Grey Beaver's knee, so curious was he, and already forgetful that\nthis was a terrible man-animal.  Suddenly he saw a strange thing like\nmist beginning to arise from the sticks and moss beneath Grey Beaver's\nhands.  Then, amongst the sticks themselves, appeared a live thing,\ntwisting and turning, of a colour like the colour of the sun in the sky.\nWhite Fang knew nothing about fire.  It drew him as the light, in the\nmouth of the cave had drawn him in his early puppyhood.  He crawled the\nseveral steps toward the flame.  He heard Grey Beaver chuckle above him,\nand he knew the sound was not hostile.  Then his nose touched the flame,\nand at the same instant his little tongue went out to it.\n\nFor a moment he was paralysed.  The unknown, lurking in the midst of the\nsticks and moss, was savagely clutching him by the nose.  He scrambled\nbackward, bursting out in an astonished explosion of ki-yi's.  At the\nsound, Kiche leaped snarling to the end of her stick, and there raged\nterribly because she could not come to his aid.  But Grey Beaver laughed\nloudly, and slapped his thighs, and told the happening to all the rest of\nthe camp, till everybody was laughing uproariously.  But White Fang sat\non his haunches and ki-yi'd and ki-yi'd, a forlorn and pitiable little\nfigure in the midst of the man-animals.\n\nIt was the worst hurt he had ever known.  Both nose and tongue had been\nscorched by the live thing, sun-coloured, that had grown up under Grey\nBeaver's hands.  He cried and cried interminably, and every fresh wail\nwas greeted by bursts of laughter on the part of the man-animals.  He\ntried to soothe his nose with his tongue, but the tongue was burnt too,\nand the two hurts coming together produced greater hurt; whereupon he\ncried more hopelessly and helplessly than ever.\n\nAnd then shame came to him.  He knew laughter and the meaning of it.  It\nis not given us to know how some animals know laughter, and know when\nthey are being laughed at; but it was this same way that White Fang knew\nit.  And he felt shame that the man-animals should be laughing at him.  He\nturned and fled away, not from the hurt of the fire, but from the\nlaughter that sank even deeper, and hurt in the spirit of him.  And he\nfled to Kiche, raging at the end of her stick like an animal gone mad--to\nKiche, the one creature in the world who was not laughing at him.\n\nTwilight drew down and night came on, and White Fang lay by his mother's\nside.  His nose and tongue still hurt, but he was perplexed by a greater\ntrouble.  He was homesick.  He felt a vacancy in him, a need for the hush\nand quietude of the stream and the cave in the cliff.  Life had become\ntoo populous.  There were so many of the man-animals, men, women, and\nchildren, all making noises and irritations.  And there were the dogs,\never squabbling and bickering, bursting into uproars and creating\nconfusions.  The restful loneliness of the only life he had known was\ngone.  Here the very air was palpitant with life.  It hummed and buzzed\nunceasingly.  Continually changing its intensity and abruptly variant in\npitch, it impinged on his nerves and senses, made him nervous and\nrestless and worried him with a perpetual imminence of happening.\n\nHe watched the man-animals coming and going and moving about the camp.  In\nfashion distantly resembling the way men look upon the gods they create,\nso looked White Fang upon the man-animals before him.  They were superior\ncreatures, of a verity, gods.  To his dim comprehension they were as much\nwonder-workers as gods are to men.  They were creatures of mastery,\npossessing all manner of unknown and impossible potencies, overlords of\nthe alive and the not alive--making obey that which moved, imparting\nmovement to that which did not move, and making life, sun-coloured and\nbiting life, to grow out of dead moss and wood.  They were fire-makers!\nThey were gods.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II--THE BONDAGE\n\n\nThe days were thronged with experience for White Fang.  During the time\nthat Kiche was tied by the stick, he ran about over all the camp,\ninquiring, investigating, learning.  He quickly came to know much of the\nways of the man-animals, but familiarity did not breed contempt.  The\nmore he came to know them, the more they vindicated their superiority,\nthe more they displayed their mysterious powers, the greater loomed their\ngod-likeness.\n\nTo man has been given the grief, often, of seeing his gods overthrown and\nhis altars crumbling; but to the wolf and the wild dog that have come in\nto crouch at man's feet, this grief has never come.  Unlike man, whose\ngods are of the unseen and the overguessed, vapours and mists of fancy\neluding the garmenture of reality, wandering wraiths of desired goodness\nand power, intangible out-croppings of self into the realm of\nspirit--unlike man, the wolf and the wild dog that have come in to the\nfire find their gods in the living flesh, solid to the touch, occupying\nearth-space and requiring time for the accomplishment of their ends and\ntheir existence.  No effort of faith is necessary to believe in such a\ngod; no effort of will can possibly induce disbelief in such a god.  There\nis no getting away from it.  There it stands, on its two hind-legs, club\nin hand, immensely potential, passionate and wrathful and loving, god and\nmystery and power all wrapped up and around by flesh that bleeds when it\nis torn and that is good to eat like any flesh.\n\nAnd so it was with White Fang.  The man-animals were gods unmistakable\nand unescapable.  As his mother, Kiche, had rendered her allegiance to\nthem at the first cry of her name, so he was beginning to render his\nallegiance.  He gave them the trail as a privilege indubitably theirs.\nWhen they walked, he got out of their way.  When they called, he came.\nWhen they threatened, he cowered down.  When they commanded him to go, he\nwent away hurriedly.  For behind any wish of theirs was power to enforce\nthat wish, power that hurt, power that expressed itself in clouts and\nclubs, in flying stones and stinging lashes of whips.\n\nHe belonged to them as all dogs belonged to them.  His actions were\ntheirs to command.  His body was theirs to maul, to stamp upon, to\ntolerate.  Such was the lesson that was quickly borne in upon him.  It\ncame hard, going as it did, counter to much that was strong and dominant\nin his own nature; and, while he disliked it in the learning of it,\nunknown to himself he was learning to like it.  It was a placing of his\ndestiny in another's hands, a shifting of the responsibilities of\nexistence.  This in itself was compensation, for it is always easier to\nlean upon another than to stand alone.\n\nBut it did not all happen in a day, this giving over of himself, body and\nsoul, to the man-animals.  He could not immediately forego his wild\nheritage and his memories of the Wild.  There were days when he crept to\nthe edge of the forest and stood and listened to something calling him\nfar and away.  And always he returned, restless and uncomfortable, to\nwhimper softly and wistfully at Kiche's side and to lick her face with\neager, questioning tongue.\n\nWhite Fang learned rapidly the ways of the camp.  He knew the injustice\nand greediness of the older dogs when meat or fish was thrown out to be\neaten.  He came to know that men were more just, children more cruel, and\nwomen more kindly and more likely to toss him a bit of meat or bone.  And\nafter two or three painful adventures with the mothers of part-grown\npuppies, he came into the knowledge that it was always good policy to let\nsuch mothers alone, to keep away from them as far as possible, and to\navoid them when he saw them coming.\n\nBut the bane of his life was Lip-lip.  Larger, older, and stronger, Lip-\nlip had selected White Fang for his special object of persecution.  While\nFang fought willingly enough, but he was outclassed.  His enemy was too\nbig.  Lip-lip became a nightmare to him.  Whenever he ventured away from\nhis mother, the bully was sure to appear, trailing at his heels, snarling\nat him, picking upon him, and watchful of an opportunity, when no man-\nanimal was near, to spring upon him and force a fight.  As Lip-lip\ninvariably won, he enjoyed it hugely.  It became his chief delight in\nlife, as it became White Fang's chief torment.\n\nBut the effect upon White Fang was not to cow him.  Though he suffered\nmost of the damage and was always defeated, his spirit remained\nunsubdued.  Yet a bad effect was produced.  He became malignant and\nmorose.  His temper had been savage by birth, but it became more savage\nunder this unending persecution.  The genial, playful, puppyish side of\nhim found little expression.  He never played and gambolled about with\nthe other puppies of the camp.  Lip-lip would not permit it.  The moment\nWhite Fang appeared near them, Lip-lip was upon him, bullying and\nhectoring him, or fighting with him until he had driven him away.\n\nThe effect of all this was to rob White Fang of much of his puppyhood and\nto make him in his comportment older than his age.  Denied the outlet,\nthrough play, of his energies, he recoiled upon himself and developed his\nmental processes.  He became cunning; he had idle time in which to devote\nhimself to thoughts of trickery.  Prevented from obtaining his share of\nmeat and fish when a general feed was given to the camp-dogs, he became a\nclever thief.  He had to forage for himself, and he foraged well, though\nhe was oft-times a plague to the squaws in consequence.  He learned to\nsneak about camp, to be crafty, to know what was going on everywhere, to\nsee and to hear everything and to reason accordingly, and successfully to\ndevise ways and means of avoiding his implacable persecutor.\n\nIt was early in the days of his persecution that he played his first\nreally big crafty game and got therefrom his first taste of revenge.  As\nKiche, when with the wolves, had lured out to destruction dogs from the\ncamps of men, so White Fang, in manner somewhat similar, lured Lip-lip\ninto Kiche's avenging jaws.  Retreating before Lip-lip, White Fang made\nan indirect flight that led in and out and around the various tepees of\nthe camp.  He was a good runner, swifter than any puppy of his size, and\nswifter than Lip-lip.  But he did not run his best in this chase.  He\nbarely held his own, one leap ahead of his pursuer.\n\nLip-lip, excited by the chase and by the persistent nearness of his\nvictim, forgot caution and locality.  When he remembered locality, it was\ntoo late.  Dashing at top speed around a tepee, he ran full tilt into\nKiche lying at the end of her stick.  He gave one yelp of consternation,\nand then her punishing jaws closed upon him.  She was tied, but he could\nnot get away from her easily.  She rolled him off his legs so that he\ncould not run, while she repeatedly ripped and slashed him with her\nfangs.\n\nWhen at last he succeeded in rolling clear of her, he crawled to his\nfeet, badly dishevelled, hurt both in body and in spirit.  His hair was\nstanding out all over him in tufts where her teeth had mauled.  He stood\nwhere he had arisen, opened his mouth, and broke out the long,\nheart-broken puppy wail.  But even this he was not allowed to complete.\nIn the middle of it, White Fang, rushing in, sank his teeth into\nLip-lip's hind leg.  There was no fight left in Lip-lip, and he ran away\nshamelessly, his victim hot on his heels and worrying him all the way\nback to his own tepee.  Here the squaws came to his aid, and White Fang,\ntransformed into a raging demon, was finally driven off only by a\nfusillade of stones.\n\nCame the day when Grey Beaver, deciding that the liability of her running\naway was past, released Kiche.  White Fang was delighted with his\nmother's freedom.  He accompanied her joyfully about the camp; and, so\nlong as he remained close by her side, Lip-lip kept a respectful\ndistance.  White Fang even bristled up to him and walked stiff-legged,\nbut Lip-lip ignored the challenge.  He was no fool himself, and whatever\nvengeance he desired to wreak, he could wait until he caught White Fang\nalone.\n\nLater on that day, Kiche and White Fang strayed into the edge of the\nwoods next to the camp.  He had led his mother there, step by step, and\nnow when she stopped, he tried to inveigle her farther.  The stream, the\nlair, and the quiet woods were calling to him, and he wanted her to come.\nHe ran on a few steps, stopped, and looked back.  She had not moved.  He\nwhined pleadingly, and scurried playfully in and out of the underbrush.\nHe ran back to her, licked her face, and ran on again.  And still she did\nnot move.  He stopped and regarded her, all of an intentness and\neagerness, physically expressed, that slowly faded out of him as she\nturned her head and gazed back at the camp.\n\nThere was something calling to him out there in the open.  His mother\nheard it too.  But she heard also that other and louder call, the call of\nthe fire and of man--the call which has been given alone of all animals\nto the wolf to answer, to the wolf and the wild-dog, who are brothers.\n\nKiche turned and slowly trotted back toward camp.  Stronger than the\nphysical restraint of the stick was the clutch of the camp upon her.\nUnseen and occultly, the gods still gripped with their power and would\nnot let her go.  White Fang sat down in the shadow of a birch and\nwhimpered softly.  There was a strong smell of pine, and subtle wood\nfragrances filled the air, reminding him of his old life of freedom\nbefore the days of his bondage.  But he was still only a part-grown\npuppy, and stronger than the call either of man or of the Wild was the\ncall of his mother.  All the hours of his short life he had depended upon\nher.  The time was yet to come for independence.  So he arose and trotted\nforlornly back to camp, pausing once, and twice, to sit down and whimper\nand to listen to the call that still sounded in the depths of the forest.\n\nIn the Wild the time of a mother with her young is short; but under the\ndominion of man it is sometimes even shorter.  Thus it was with White\nFang.  Grey Beaver was in the debt of Three Eagles.  Three Eagles was\ngoing away on a trip up the Mackenzie to the Great Slave Lake.  A strip\nof scarlet cloth, a bearskin, twenty cartridges, and Kiche, went to pay\nthe debt.  White Fang saw his mother taken aboard Three Eagles' canoe,\nand tried to follow her.  A blow from Three Eagles knocked him backward\nto the land.  The canoe shoved off.  He sprang into the water and swam\nafter it, deaf to the sharp cries of Grey Beaver to return.  Even a man-\nanimal, a god, White Fang ignored, such was the terror he was in of\nlosing his mother.\n\nBut gods are accustomed to being obeyed, and Grey Beaver wrathfully\nlaunched a canoe in pursuit.  When he overtook White Fang, he reached\ndown and by the nape of the neck lifted him clear of the water.  He did\nnot deposit him at once in the bottom of the canoe.  Holding him\nsuspended with one hand, with the other hand he proceeded to give him a\nbeating.  And it _was_ a beating.  His hand was heavy.  Every blow was\nshrewd to hurt; and he delivered a multitude of blows.\n\nImpelled by the blows that rained upon him, now from this side, now from\nthat, White Fang swung back and forth like an erratic and jerky pendulum.\nVarying were the emotions that surged through him.  At first, he had\nknown surprise.  Then came a momentary fear, when he yelped several times\nto the impact of the hand.  But this was quickly followed by anger.  His\nfree nature asserted itself, and he showed his teeth and snarled\nfearlessly in the face of the wrathful god.  This but served to make the\ngod more wrathful.  The blows came faster, heavier, more shrewd to hurt.\n\nGrey Beaver continued to beat, White Fang continued to snarl.  But this\ncould not last for ever.  One or the other must give over, and that one\nwas White Fang.  Fear surged through him again.  For the first time he\nwas being really man-handled.  The occasional blows of sticks and stones\nhe had previously experienced were as caresses compared with this.  He\nbroke down and began to cry and yelp.  For a time each blow brought a\nyelp from him; but fear passed into terror, until finally his yelps were\nvoiced in unbroken succession, unconnected with the rhythm of the\npunishment.\n\nAt last Grey Beaver withheld his hand.  White Fang, hanging limply,\ncontinued to cry.  This seemed to satisfy his master, who flung him down\nroughly in the bottom of the canoe.  In the meantime the canoe had\ndrifted down the stream.  Grey Beaver picked up the paddle.  White Fang\nwas in his way.  He spurned him savagely with his foot.  In that moment\nWhite Fang's free nature flashed forth again, and he sank his teeth into\nthe moccasined foot.\n\nThe beating that had gone before was as nothing compared with the beating\nhe now received.  Grey Beaver's wrath was terrible; likewise was White\nFang's fright.  Not only the hand, but the hard wooden paddle was used\nupon him; and he was bruised and sore in all his small body when he was\nagain flung down in the canoe.  Again, and this time with purpose, did\nGrey Beaver kick him.  White Fang did not repeat his attack on the foot.\nHe had learned another lesson of his bondage.  Never, no matter what the\ncircumstance, must he dare to bite the god who was lord and master over\nhim; the body of the lord and master was sacred, not to be defiled by the\nteeth of such as he.  That was evidently the crime of crimes, the one\noffence there was no condoning nor overlooking.\n\nWhen the canoe touched the shore, White Fang lay whimpering and\nmotionless, waiting the will of Grey Beaver.  It was Grey Beaver's will\nthat he should go ashore, for ashore he was flung, striking heavily on\nhis side and hurting his bruises afresh.  He crawled tremblingly to his\nfeet and stood whimpering.  Lip-lip, who had watched the whole proceeding\nfrom the bank, now rushed upon him, knocking him over and sinking his\nteeth into him.  White Fang was too helpless to defend himself, and it\nwould have gone hard with him had not Grey Beaver's foot shot out,\nlifting Lip-lip into the air with its violence so that he smashed down to\nearth a dozen feet away.  This was the man-animal's justice; and even\nthen, in his own pitiable plight, White Fang experienced a little\ngrateful thrill.  At Grey Beaver's heels he limped obediently through the\nvillage to the tepee.  And so it came that White Fang learned that the\nright to punish was something the gods reserved for themselves and denied\nto the lesser creatures under them.\n\nThat night, when all was still, White Fang remembered his mother and\nsorrowed for her.  He sorrowed too loudly and woke up Grey Beaver, who\nbeat him.  After that he mourned gently when the gods were around.  But\nsometimes, straying off to the edge of the woods by himself, he gave vent\nto his grief, and cried it out with loud whimperings and wailings.\n\nIt was during this period that he might have harkened to the memories of\nthe lair and the stream and run back to the Wild.  But the memory of his\nmother held him.  As the hunting man-animals went out and came back, so\nshe would come back to the village some time.  So he remained in his\nbondage waiting for her.\n\nBut it was not altogether an unhappy bondage.  There was much to interest\nhim.  Something was always happening.  There was no end to the strange\nthings these gods did, and he was always curious to see.  Besides, he was\nlearning how to get along with Grey Beaver.  Obedience, rigid,\nundeviating obedience, was what was exacted of him; and in return he\nescaped beatings and his existence was tolerated.\n\nNay, Grey Beaver himself sometimes tossed him a piece of meat, and\ndefended him against the other dogs in the eating of it.  And such a\npiece of meat was of value.  It was worth more, in some strange way, then\na dozen pieces of meat from the hand of a squaw.  Grey Beaver never\npetted nor caressed.  Perhaps it was the weight of his hand, perhaps his\njustice, perhaps the sheer power of him, and perhaps it was all these\nthings that influenced White Fang; for a certain tie of attachment was\nforming between him and his surly lord.\n\nInsidiously, and by remote ways, as well as by the power of stick and\nstone and clout of hand, were the shackles of White Fang's bondage being\nriveted upon him.  The qualities in his kind that in the beginning made\nit possible for them to come in to the fires of men, were qualities\ncapable of development.  They were developing in him, and the camp-life,\nreplete with misery as it was, was secretly endearing itself to him all\nthe time.  But White Fang was unaware of it.  He knew only grief for the\nloss of Kiche, hope for her return, and a hungry yearning for the free\nlife that had been his.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III--THE OUTCAST\n\n\nLip-lip continued so to darken his days that White Fang became wickeder\nand more ferocious than it was his natural right to be.  Savageness was a\npart of his make-up, but the savageness thus developed exceeded his make-\nup.  He acquired a reputation for wickedness amongst the man-animals\nthemselves.  Wherever there was trouble and uproar in camp, fighting and\nsquabbling or the outcry of a squaw over a bit of stolen meat, they were\nsure to find White Fang mixed up in it and usually at the bottom of it.\nThey did not bother to look after the causes of his conduct.  They saw\nonly the effects, and the effects were bad.  He was a sneak and a thief,\na mischief-maker, a fomenter of trouble; and irate squaws told him to his\nface, the while he eyed them alert and ready to dodge any quick-flung\nmissile, that he was a wolf and worthless and bound to come to an evil\nend.\n\nHe found himself an outcast in the midst of the populous camp.  All the\nyoung dogs followed Lip-lip's lead.  There was a difference between White\nFang and them.  Perhaps they sensed his wild-wood breed, and\ninstinctively felt for him the enmity that the domestic dog feels for the\nwolf.  But be that as it may, they joined with Lip-lip in the\npersecution.  And, once declared against him, they found good reason to\ncontinue declared against him.  One and all, from time to time, they felt\nhis teeth; and to his credit, he gave more than he received.  Many of\nthem he could whip in single fight; but single fight was denied him.  The\nbeginning of such a fight was a signal for all the young dogs in camp to\ncome running and pitch upon him.\n\nOut of this pack-persecution he learned two important things: how to take\ncare of himself in a mass-fight against him--and how, on a single dog, to\ninflict the greatest amount of damage in the briefest space of time.  To\nkeep one's feet in the midst of the hostile mass meant life, and this he\nlearnt well.  He became cat-like in his ability to stay on his feet.  Even\ngrown dogs might hurtle him backward or sideways with the impact of their\nheavy bodies; and backward or sideways he would go, in the air or sliding\non the ground, but always with his legs under him and his feet downward\nto the mother earth.\n\nWhen dogs fight, there are usually preliminaries to the actual\ncombat--snarlings and bristlings and stiff-legged struttings.  But White\nFang learned to omit these preliminaries.  Delay meant the coming against\nhim of all the young dogs.  He must do his work quickly and get away.  So\nhe learnt to give no warning of his intention.  He rushed in and snapped\nand slashed on the instant, without notice, before his foe could prepare\nto meet him.  Thus he learned how to inflict quick and severe damage.\nAlso he learned the value of surprise.  A dog, taken off its guard, its\nshoulder slashed open or its ear ripped in ribbons before it knew what\nwas happening, was a dog half whipped.\n\nFurthermore, it was remarkably easy to overthrow a dog taken by surprise;\nwhile a dog, thus overthrown, invariably exposed for a moment the soft\nunderside of its neck--the vulnerable point at which to strike for its\nlife.  White Fang knew this point.  It was a knowledge bequeathed to him\ndirectly from the hunting generation of wolves.  So it was that White\nFang's method when he took the offensive, was: first to find a young dog\nalone; second, to surprise it and knock it off its feet; and third, to\ndrive in with his teeth at the soft throat.\n\nBeing but partly grown his jaws had not yet become large enough nor\nstrong enough to make his throat-attack deadly; but many a young dog went\naround camp with a lacerated throat in token of White Fang's intention.\nAnd one day, catching one of his enemies alone on the edge of the woods,\nhe managed, by repeatedly overthrowing him and attacking the throat, to\ncut the great vein and let out the life.  There was a great row that\nnight.  He had been observed, the news had been carried to the dead dog's\nmaster, the squaws remembered all the instances of stolen meat, and Grey\nBeaver was beset by many angry voices.  But he resolutely held the door\nof his tepee, inside which he had placed the culprit, and refused to\npermit the vengeance for which his tribespeople clamoured.\n\nWhite Fang became hated by man and dog.  During this period of his\ndevelopment he never knew a moment's security.  The tooth of every dog\nwas against him, the hand of every man.  He was greeted with snarls by\nhis kind, with curses and stones by his gods.  He lived tensely.  He was\nalways keyed up, alert for attack, wary of being attacked, with an eye\nfor sudden and unexpected missiles, prepared to act precipitately and\ncoolly, to leap in with a flash of teeth, or to leap away with a menacing\nsnarl.\n\nAs for snarling he could snarl more terribly than any dog, young or old,\nin camp.  The intent of the snarl is to warn or frighten, and judgment is\nrequired to know when it should be used.  White Fang knew how to make it\nand when to make it.  Into his snarl he incorporated all that was\nvicious, malignant, and horrible.  With nose serrulated by continuous\nspasms, hair bristling in recurrent waves, tongue whipping out like a red\nsnake and whipping back again, ears flattened down, eyes gleaming hatred,\nlips wrinkled back, and fangs exposed and dripping, he could compel a\npause on the part of almost any assailant.  A temporary pause, when taken\noff his guard, gave him the vital moment in which to think and determine\nhis action.  But often a pause so gained lengthened out until it evolved\ninto a complete cessation from the attack.  And before more than one of\nthe grown dogs White Fang's snarl enabled him to beat an honourable\nretreat.\n\nAn outcast himself from the pack of the part-grown dogs, his sanguinary\nmethods and remarkable efficiency made the pack pay for its persecution\nof him.  Not permitted himself to run with the pack, the curious state of\naffairs obtained that no member of the pack could run outside the pack.\nWhite Fang would not permit it.  What of his bushwhacking and waylaying\ntactics, the young dogs were afraid to run by themselves.  With the\nexception of Lip-lip, they were compelled to hunch together for mutual\nprotection against the terrible enemy they had made.  A puppy alone by\nthe river bank meant a puppy dead or a puppy that aroused the camp with\nits shrill pain and terror as it fled back from the wolf-cub that had\nwaylaid it.\n\nBut White Fang's reprisals did not cease, even when the young dogs had\nlearned thoroughly that they must stay together.  He attacked them when\nhe caught them alone, and they attacked him when they were bunched.  The\nsight of him was sufficient to start them rushing after him, at which\ntimes his swiftness usually carried him into safety.  But woe the dog\nthat outran his fellows in such pursuit!  White Fang had learned to turn\nsuddenly upon the pursuer that was ahead of the pack and thoroughly to\nrip him up before the pack could arrive.  This occurred with great\nfrequency, for, once in full cry, the dogs were prone to forget\nthemselves in the excitement of the chase, while White Fang never forgot\nhimself.  Stealing backward glances as he ran, he was always ready to\nwhirl around and down the overzealous pursuer that outran his fellows.\n\nYoung dogs are bound to play, and out of the exigencies of the situation\nthey realised their play in this mimic warfare.  Thus it was that the\nhunt of White Fang became their chief game--a deadly game, withal, and at\nall times a serious game.  He, on the other hand, being the\nfastest-footed, was unafraid to venture anywhere.  During the period that\nhe waited vainly for his mother to come back, he led the pack many a wild\nchase through the adjacent woods.  But the pack invariably lost him.  Its\nnoise and outcry warned him of its presence, while he ran alone, velvet-\nfooted, silently, a moving shadow among the trees after the manner of his\nfather and mother before him.  Further he was more directly connected\nwith the Wild than they; and he knew more of its secrets and stratagems.\nA favourite trick of his was to lose his trail in running water and then\nlie quietly in a near-by thicket while their baffled cries arose around\nhim.\n\nHated by his kind and by mankind, indomitable, perpetually warred upon\nand himself waging perpetual war, his development was rapid and\none-sided.  This was no soil for kindliness and affection to blossom in.\nOf such things he had not the faintest glimmering.  The code he learned\nwas to obey the strong and to oppress the weak.  Grey Beaver was a god,\nand strong.  Therefore White Fang obeyed him.  But the dog younger or\nsmaller than himself was weak, a thing to be destroyed.  His development\nwas in the direction of power.  In order to face the constant danger of\nhurt and even of destruction, his predatory and protective faculties were\nunduly developed.  He became quicker of movement than the other dogs,\nswifter of foot, craftier, deadlier, more lithe, more lean with ironlike\nmuscle and sinew, more enduring, more cruel, more ferocious, and more\nintelligent.  He had to become all these things, else he would not have\nheld his own nor survive the hostile environment in which he found\nhimself.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV--THE TRAIL OF THE GODS\n\n\nIn the fall of the year, when the days were shortening and the bite of\nthe frost was coming into the air, White Fang got his chance for liberty.\nFor several days there had been a great hubbub in the village.  The\nsummer camp was being dismantled, and the tribe, bag and baggage, was\npreparing to go off to the fall hunting.  White Fang watched it all with\neager eyes, and when the tepees began to come down and the canoes were\nloading at the bank, he understood.  Already the canoes were departing,\nand some had disappeared down the river.\n\nQuite deliberately he determined to stay behind.  He waited his\nopportunity to slink out of camp to the woods.  Here, in the running\nstream where ice was beginning to form, he hid his trail.  Then he\ncrawled into the heart of a dense thicket and waited.  The time passed\nby, and he slept intermittently for hours.  Then he was aroused by Grey\nBeaver's voice calling him by name.  There were other voices.  White Fang\ncould hear Grey Beaver's squaw taking part in the search, and Mit-sah,\nwho was Grey Beaver's son.\n\nWhite Fang trembled with fear, and though the impulse came to crawl out\nof his hiding-place, he resisted it.  After a time the voices died away,\nand some time after that he crept out to enjoy the success of his\nundertaking.  Darkness was coming on, and for a while he played about\namong the trees, pleasuring in his freedom.  Then, and quite suddenly, he\nbecame aware of loneliness.  He sat down to consider, listening to the\nsilence of the forest and perturbed by it.  That nothing moved nor\nsounded, seemed ominous.  He felt the lurking of danger, unseen and\nunguessed.  He was suspicious of the looming bulks of the trees and of\nthe dark shadows that might conceal all manner of perilous things.\n\nThen it was cold.  Here was no warm side of a tepee against which to\nsnuggle.  The frost was in his feet, and he kept lifting first one fore-\nfoot and then the other.  He curved his bushy tail around to cover them,\nand at the same time he saw a vision.  There was nothing strange about\nit.  Upon his inward sight was impressed a succession of memory-pictures.\nHe saw the camp again, the tepees, and the blaze of the fires.  He heard\nthe shrill voices of the women, the gruff basses of the men, and the\nsnarling of the dogs.  He was hungry, and he remembered pieces of meat\nand fish that had been thrown him.  Here was no meat, nothing but a\nthreatening and inedible silence.\n\nHis bondage had softened him.  Irresponsibility had weakened him.  He had\nforgotten how to shift for himself.  The night yawned about him.  His\nsenses, accustomed to the hum and bustle of the camp, used to the\ncontinuous impact of sights and sounds, were now left idle.  There was\nnothing to do, nothing to see nor hear.  They strained to catch some\ninterruption of the silence and immobility of nature.  They were appalled\nby inaction and by the feel of something terrible impending.\n\nHe gave a great start of fright.  A colossal and formless something was\nrushing across the field of his vision.  It was a tree-shadow flung by\nthe moon, from whose face the clouds had been brushed away.  Reassured,\nhe whimpered softly; then he suppressed the whimper for fear that it\nmight attract the attention of the lurking dangers.\n\nA tree, contracting in the cool of the night, made a loud noise.  It was\ndirectly above him.  He yelped in his fright.  A panic seized him, and he\nran madly toward the village.  He knew an overpowering desire for the\nprotection and companionship of man.  In his nostrils was the smell of\nthe camp-smoke.  In his ears the camp-sounds and cries were ringing loud.\nHe passed out of the forest and into the moonlit open where were no\nshadows nor darknesses.  But no village greeted his eyes.  He had\nforgotten.  The village had gone away.\n\nHis wild flight ceased abruptly.  There was no place to which to flee.  He\nslunk forlornly through the deserted camp, smelling the rubbish-heaps and\nthe discarded rags and tags of the gods.  He would have been glad for the\nrattle of stones about him, flung by an angry squaw, glad for the hand of\nGrey Beaver descending upon him in wrath; while he would have welcomed\nwith delight Lip-lip and the whole snarling, cowardly pack.\n\nHe came to where Grey Beaver's tepee had stood.  In the centre of the\nspace it had occupied, he sat down.  He pointed his nose at the moon.  His\nthroat was afflicted by rigid spasms, his mouth opened, and in a heart-\nbroken cry bubbled up his loneliness and fear, his grief for Kiche, all\nhis past sorrows and miseries as well as his apprehension of sufferings\nand dangers to come.  It was the long wolf-howl, full-throated and\nmournful, the first howl he had ever uttered.\n\nThe coming of daylight dispelled his fears but increased his loneliness.\nThe naked earth, which so shortly before had been so populous, thrust his\nloneliness more forcibly upon him.  It did not take him long to make up\nhis mind.  He plunged into the forest and followed the river bank down\nthe stream.  All day he ran.  He did not rest.  He seemed made to run on\nforever.  His iron-like body ignored fatigue.  And even after fatigue\ncame, his heritage of endurance braced him to endless endeavour and\nenabled him to drive his complaining body onward.\n\nWhere the river swung in against precipitous bluffs, he climbed the high\nmountains behind.  Rivers and streams that entered the main river he\nforded or swam.  Often he took to the rim-ice that was beginning to form,\nand more than once he crashed through and struggled for life in the icy\ncurrent.  Always he was on the lookout for the trail of the gods where it\nmight leave the river and proceed inland.\n\nWhite Fang was intelligent beyond the average of his kind; yet his mental\nvision was not wide enough to embrace the other bank of the Mackenzie.\nWhat if the trail of the gods led out on that side?  It never entered his\nhead.  Later on, when he had travelled more and grown older and wiser and\ncome to know more of trails and rivers, it might be that he could grasp\nand apprehend such a possibility.  But that mental power was yet in the\nfuture.  Just now he ran blindly, his own bank of the Mackenzie alone\nentering into his calculations.\n\nAll night he ran, blundering in the darkness into mishaps and obstacles\nthat delayed but did not daunt.  By the middle of the second day he had\nbeen running continuously for thirty hours, and the iron of his flesh was\ngiving out.  It was the endurance of his mind that kept him going.  He\nhad not eaten in forty hours, and he was weak with hunger.  The repeated\ndrenchings in the icy water had likewise had their effect on him.  His\nhandsome coat was draggled.  The broad pads of his feet were bruised and\nbleeding.  He had begun to limp, and this limp increased with the hours.\nTo make it worse, the light of the sky was obscured and snow began to\nfall--a raw, moist, melting, clinging snow, slippery under foot, that hid\nfrom him the landscape he traversed, and that covered over the\ninequalities of the ground so that the way of his feet was more difficult\nand painful.\n\nGrey Beaver had intended camping that night on the far bank of the\nMackenzie, for it was in that direction that the hunting lay.  But on the\nnear bank, shortly before dark, a moose coming down to drink, had been\nespied by Kloo-kooch, who was Grey Beaver's squaw.  Now, had not the\nmoose come down to drink, had not Mit-sah been steering out of the course\nbecause of the snow, had not Kloo-kooch sighted the moose, and had not\nGrey Beaver killed it with a lucky shot from his rifle, all subsequent\nthings would have happened differently.  Grey Beaver would not have\ncamped on the near side of the Mackenzie, and White Fang would have\npassed by and gone on, either to die or to find his way to his wild\nbrothers and become one of them--a wolf to the end of his days.\n\nNight had fallen.  The snow was flying more thickly, and White Fang,\nwhimpering softly to himself as he stumbled and limped along, came upon a\nfresh trail in the snow.  So fresh was it that he knew it immediately for\nwhat it was.  Whining with eagerness, he followed back from the river\nbank and in among the trees.  The camp-sounds came to his ears.  He saw\nthe blaze of the fire, Kloo-kooch cooking, and Grey Beaver squatting on\nhis hams and mumbling a chunk of raw tallow.  There was fresh meat in\ncamp!\n\nWhite Fang expected a beating.  He crouched and bristled a little at the\nthought of it.  Then he went forward again.  He feared and disliked the\nbeating he knew to be waiting for him.  But he knew, further, that the\ncomfort of the fire would be his, the protection of the gods, the\ncompanionship of the dogs--the last, a companionship of enmity, but none\nthe less a companionship and satisfying to his gregarious needs.\n\nHe came cringing and crawling into the firelight.  Grey Beaver saw him,\nand stopped munching the tallow.  White Fang crawled slowly, cringing and\ngrovelling in the abjectness of his abasement and submission.  He crawled\nstraight toward Grey Beaver, every inch of his progress becoming slower\nand more painful.  At last he lay at the master's feet, into whose\npossession he now surrendered himself, voluntarily, body and soul.  Of\nhis own choice, he came in to sit by man's fire and to be ruled by him.\nWhite Fang trembled, waiting for the punishment to fall upon him.  There\nwas a movement of the hand above him.  He cringed involuntarily under the\nexpected blow.  It did not fall.  He stole a glance upward.  Grey Beaver\nwas breaking the lump of tallow in half!  Grey Beaver was offering him\none piece of the tallow!  Very gently and somewhat suspiciously, he first\nsmelled the tallow and then proceeded to eat it.  Grey Beaver ordered\nmeat to be brought to him, and guarded him from the other dogs while he\nate.  After that, grateful and content, White Fang lay at Grey Beaver's\nfeet, gazing at the fire that warmed him, blinking and dozing, secure in\nthe knowledge that the morrow would find him, not wandering forlorn\nthrough bleak forest-stretches, but in the camp of the man-animals, with\nthe gods to whom he had given himself and upon whom he was now dependent.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V--THE COVENANT\n\n\nWhen December was well along, Grey Beaver went on a journey up the\nMackenzie.  Mit-sah and Kloo-kooch went with him.  One sled he drove\nhimself, drawn by dogs he had traded for or borrowed.  A second and\nsmaller sled was driven by Mit-sah, and to this was harnessed a team of\npuppies.  It was more of a toy affair than anything else, yet it was the\ndelight of Mit-sah, who felt that he was beginning to do a man's work in\nthe world.  Also, he was learning to drive dogs and to train dogs; while\nthe puppies themselves were being broken in to the harness.  Furthermore,\nthe sled was of some service, for it carried nearly two hundred pounds of\noutfit and food.\n\nWhite Fang had seen the camp-dogs toiling in the harness, so that he did\nnot resent overmuch the first placing of the harness upon himself.  About\nhis neck was put a moss-stuffed collar, which was connected by two\npulling-traces to a strap that passed around his chest and over his back.\nIt was to this that was fastened the long rope by which he pulled at the\nsled.\n\nThere were seven puppies in the team.  The others had been born earlier\nin the year and were nine and ten months old, while White Fang was only\neight months old.  Each dog was fastened to the sled by a single rope.  No\ntwo ropes were of the same length, while the difference in length between\nany two ropes was at least that of a dog's body.  Every rope was brought\nto a ring at the front end of the sled.  The sled itself was without\nrunners, being a birch-bark toboggan, with upturned forward end to keep\nit from ploughing under the snow.  This construction enabled the weight\nof the sled and load to be distributed over the largest snow-surface; for\nthe snow was crystal-powder and very soft.  Observing the same principle\nof widest distribution of weight, the dogs at the ends of their ropes\nradiated fan-fashion from the nose of the sled, so that no dog trod in\nanother's footsteps.\n\nThere was, furthermore, another virtue in the fan-formation.  The ropes\nof varying length prevented the dogs attacking from the rear those that\nran in front of them.  For a dog to attack another, it would have to turn\nupon one at a shorter rope.  In which case it would find itself face to\nface with the dog attacked, and also it would find itself facing the whip\nof the driver.  But the most peculiar virtue of all lay in the fact that\nthe dog that strove to attack one in front of him must pull the sled\nfaster, and that the faster the sled travelled, the faster could the dog\nattacked run away.  Thus, the dog behind could never catch up with the\none in front.  The faster he ran, the faster ran the one he was after,\nand the faster ran all the dogs.  Incidentally, the sled went faster, and\nthus, by cunning indirection, did man increase his mastery over the\nbeasts.\n\nMit-sah resembled his father, much of whose grey wisdom he possessed.  In\nthe past he had observed Lip-lip's persecution of White Fang; but at that\ntime Lip-lip was another man's dog, and Mit-sah had never dared more than\nto shy an occasional stone at him.  But now Lip-lip was his dog, and he\nproceeded to wreak his vengeance on him by putting him at the end of the\nlongest rope.  This made Lip-lip the leader, and was apparently an\nhonour! but in reality it took away from him all honour, and instead of\nbeing bully and master of the pack, he now found himself hated and\npersecuted by the pack.\n\nBecause he ran at the end of the longest rope, the dogs had always the\nview of him running away before them.  All that they saw of him was his\nbushy tail and fleeing hind legs--a view far less ferocious and\nintimidating than his bristling mane and gleaming fangs.  Also, dogs\nbeing so constituted in their mental ways, the sight of him running away\ngave desire to run after him and a feeling that he ran away from them.\n\nThe moment the sled started, the team took after Lip-lip in a chase that\nextended throughout the day.  At first he had been prone to turn upon his\npursuers, jealous of his dignity and wrathful; but at such times Mit-sah\nwould throw the stinging lash of the thirty-foot cariboo-gut whip into\nhis face and compel him to turn tail and run on.  Lip-lip might face the\npack, but he could not face that whip, and all that was left him to do\nwas to keep his long rope taut and his flanks ahead of the teeth of his\nmates.\n\nBut a still greater cunning lurked in the recesses of the Indian mind.  To\ngive point to unending pursuit of the leader, Mit-sah favoured him over\nthe other dogs.  These favours aroused in them jealousy and hatred.  In\ntheir presence Mit-sah would give him meat and would give it to him only.\nThis was maddening to them.  They would rage around just outside the\nthrowing-distance of the whip, while Lip-lip devoured the meat and Mit-\nsah protected him.  And when there was no meat to give, Mit-sah would\nkeep the team at a distance and make believe to give meat to Lip-lip.\n\nWhite Fang took kindly to the work.  He had travelled a greater distance\nthan the other dogs in the yielding of himself to the rule of the gods,\nand he had learned more thoroughly the futility of opposing their will.\nIn addition, the persecution he had suffered from the pack had made the\npack less to him in the scheme of things, and man more.  He had not\nlearned to be dependent on his kind for companionship.  Besides, Kiche\nwas well-nigh forgotten; and the chief outlet of expression that remained\nto him was in the allegiance he tendered the gods he had accepted as\nmasters.  So he worked hard, learned discipline, and was obedient.\nFaithfulness and willingness characterised his toil.  These are essential\ntraits of the wolf and the wild-dog when they have become domesticated,\nand these traits White Fang possessed in unusual measure.\n\nA companionship did exist between White Fang and the other dogs, but it\nwas one of warfare and enmity.  He had never learned to play with them.\nHe knew only how to fight, and fight with them he did, returning to them\na hundred-fold the snaps and slashes they had given him in the days when\nLip-lip was leader of the pack.  But Lip-lip was no longer leader--except\nwhen he fled away before his mates at the end of his rope, the sled\nbounding along behind.  In camp he kept close to Mit-sah or Grey Beaver\nor Kloo-kooch.  He did not dare venture away from the gods, for now the\nfangs of all dogs were against him, and he tasted to the dregs the\npersecution that had been White Fang's.\n\nWith the overthrow of Lip-lip, White Fang could have become leader of the\npack.  But he was too morose and solitary for that.  He merely thrashed\nhis team-mates.  Otherwise he ignored them.  They got out of his way when\nhe came along; nor did the boldest of them ever dare to rob him of his\nmeat.  On the contrary, they devoured their own meat hurriedly, for fear\nthat he would take it away from them.  White Fang knew the law well: _to\noppress the weak and obey the strong_.  He ate his share of meat as\nrapidly as he could.  And then woe the dog that had not yet finished!  A\nsnarl and a flash of fangs, and that dog would wail his indignation to\nthe uncomforting stars while White Fang finished his portion for him.\n\nEvery little while, however, one dog or another would flame up in revolt\nand be promptly subdued.  Thus White Fang was kept in training.  He was\njealous of the isolation in which he kept himself in the midst of the\npack, and he fought often to maintain it.  But such fights were of brief\nduration.  He was too quick for the others.  They were slashed open and\nbleeding before they knew what had happened, were whipped almost before\nthey had begun to fight.\n\nAs rigid as the sled-discipline of the gods, was the discipline\nmaintained by White Fang amongst his fellows.  He never allowed them any\nlatitude.  He compelled them to an unremitting respect for him.  They\nmight do as they pleased amongst themselves.  That was no concern of his.\nBut it _was_ his concern that they leave him alone in his isolation, get\nout of his way when he elected to walk among them, and at all times\nacknowledge his mastery over them.  A hint of stiff-leggedness on their\npart, a lifted lip or a bristle of hair, and he would be upon them,\nmerciless and cruel, swiftly convincing them of the error of their way.\n\nHe was a monstrous tyrant.  His mastery was rigid as steel.  He oppressed\nthe weak with a vengeance.  Not for nothing had he been exposed to the\npitiless struggles for life in the day of his cubhood, when his mother\nand he, alone and unaided, held their own and survived in the ferocious\nenvironment of the Wild.  And not for nothing had he learned to walk\nsoftly when superior strength went by.  He oppressed the weak, but he\nrespected the strong.  And in the course of the long journey with Grey\nBeaver he walked softly indeed amongst the full-grown dogs in the camps\nof the strange man-animals they encountered.\n\nThe months passed by.  Still continued the journey of Grey Beaver.  White\nFang's strength was developed by the long hours on trail and the steady\ntoil at the sled; and it would have seemed that his mental development\nwas well-nigh complete.  He had come to know quite thoroughly the world\nin which he lived.  His outlook was bleak and materialistic.  The world\nas he saw it was a fierce and brutal world, a world without warmth, a\nworld in which caresses and affection and the bright sweetnesses of the\nspirit did not exist.\n\nHe had no affection for Grey Beaver.  True, he was a god, but a most\nsavage god.  White Fang was glad to acknowledge his lordship, but it was\na lordship based upon superior intelligence and brute strength.  There\nwas something in the fibre of White Fang's being that made his lordship a\nthing to be desired, else he would not have come back from the Wild when\nhe did to tender his allegiance.  There were deeps in his nature which\nhad never been sounded.  A kind word, a caressing touch of the hand, on\nthe part of Grey Beaver, might have sounded these deeps; but Grey Beaver\ndid not caress, nor speak kind words.  It was not his way.  His primacy\nwas savage, and savagely he ruled, administering justice with a club,\npunishing transgression with the pain of a blow, and rewarding merit, not\nby kindness, but by withholding a blow.\n\nSo White Fang knew nothing of the heaven a man's hand might contain for\nhim.  Besides, he did not like the hands of the man-animals.  He was\nsuspicious of them.  It was true that they sometimes gave meat, but more\noften they gave hurt.  Hands were things to keep away from.  They hurled\nstones, wielded sticks and clubs and whips, administered slaps and\nclouts, and, when they touched him, were cunning to hurt with pinch and\ntwist and wrench.  In strange villages he had encountered the hands of\nthe children and learned that they were cruel to hurt.  Also, he had once\nnearly had an eye poked out by a toddling papoose.  From these\nexperiences he became suspicious of all children.  He could not tolerate\nthem.  When they came near with their ominous hands, he got up.\n\nIt was in a village at the Great Slave Lake, that, in the course of\nresenting the evil of the hands of the man-animals, he came to modify the\nlaw that he had learned from Grey Beaver: namely, that the unpardonable\ncrime was to bite one of the gods.  In this village, after the custom of\nall dogs in all villages, White Fang went foraging, for food.  A boy was\nchopping frozen moose-meat with an axe, and the chips were flying in the\nsnow.  White Fang, sliding by in quest of meat, stopped and began to eat\nthe chips.  He observed the boy lay down the axe and take up a stout\nclub.  White Fang sprang clear, just in time to escape the descending\nblow.  The boy pursued him, and he, a stranger in the village, fled\nbetween two tepees to find himself cornered against a high earth bank.\n\nThere was no escape for White Fang.  The only way out was between the two\ntepees, and this the boy guarded.  Holding his club prepared to strike,\nhe drew in on his cornered quarry.  White Fang was furious.  He faced the\nboy, bristling and snarling, his sense of justice outraged.  He knew the\nlaw of forage.  All the wastage of meat, such as the frozen chips,\nbelonged to the dog that found it.  He had done no wrong, broken no law,\nyet here was this boy preparing to give him a beating.  White Fang\nscarcely knew what happened.  He did it in a surge of rage.  And he did\nit so quickly that the boy did not know either.  All the boy knew was\nthat he had in some unaccountable way been overturned into the snow, and\nthat his club-hand had been ripped wide open by White Fang's teeth.\n\nBut White Fang knew that he had broken the law of the gods.  He had\ndriven his teeth into the sacred flesh of one of them, and could expect\nnothing but a most terrible punishment.  He fled away to Grey Beaver,\nbehind whose protecting legs he crouched when the bitten boy and the\nboy's family came, demanding vengeance.  But they went away with\nvengeance unsatisfied.  Grey Beaver defended White Fang.  So did Mit-sah\nand Kloo-kooch.  White Fang, listening to the wordy war and watching the\nangry gestures, knew that his act was justified.  And so it came that he\nlearned there were gods and gods.  There were his gods, and there were\nother gods, and between them there was a difference.  Justice or\ninjustice, it was all the same, he must take all things from the hands of\nhis own gods.  But he was not compelled to take injustice from the other\ngods.  It was his privilege to resent it with his teeth.  And this also\nwas a law of the gods.\n\nBefore the day was out, White Fang was to learn more about this law.  Mit-\nsah, alone, gathering firewood in the forest, encountered the boy that\nhad been bitten.  With him were other boys.  Hot words passed.  Then all\nthe boys attacked Mit-sah.  It was going hard with him.  Blows were\nraining upon him from all sides.  White Fang looked on at first.  This\nwas an affair of the gods, and no concern of his.  Then he realised that\nthis was Mit-sah, one of his own particular gods, who was being\nmaltreated.  It was no reasoned impulse that made White Fang do what he\nthen did.  A mad rush of anger sent him leaping in amongst the\ncombatants.  Five minutes later the landscape was covered with fleeing\nboys, many of whom dripped blood upon the snow in token that White Fang's\nteeth had not been idle.  When Mit-sah told the story in camp, Grey\nBeaver ordered meat to be given to White Fang.  He ordered much meat to\nbe given, and White Fang, gorged and sleepy by the fire, knew that the\nlaw had received its verification.\n\nIt was in line with these experiences that White Fang came to learn the\nlaw of property and the duty of the defence of property.  From the\nprotection of his god's body to the protection of his god's possessions\nwas a step, and this step he made.  What was his god's was to be defended\nagainst all the world--even to the extent of biting other gods.  Not only\nwas such an act sacrilegious in its nature, but it was fraught with\nperil.  The gods were all-powerful, and a dog was no match against them;\nyet White Fang learned to face them, fiercely belligerent and unafraid.\nDuty rose above fear, and thieving gods learned to leave Grey Beaver's\nproperty alone.\n\nOne thing, in this connection, White Fang quickly learnt, and that was\nthat a thieving god was usually a cowardly god and prone to run away at\nthe sounding of the alarm.  Also, he learned that but brief time elapsed\nbetween his sounding of the alarm and Grey Beaver coming to his aid.  He\ncame to know that it was not fear of him that drove the thief away, but\nfear of Grey Beaver.  White Fang did not give the alarm by barking.  He\nnever barked.  His method was to drive straight at the intruder, and to\nsink his teeth in if he could.  Because he was morose and solitary,\nhaving nothing to do with the other dogs, he was unusually fitted to\nguard his master's property; and in this he was encouraged and trained by\nGrey Beaver.  One result of this was to make White Fang more ferocious\nand indomitable, and more solitary.\n\nThe months went by, binding stronger and stronger the covenant between\ndog and man.  This was the ancient covenant that the first wolf that came\nin from the Wild entered into with man.  And, like all succeeding wolves\nand wild dogs that had done likewise, White Fang worked the covenant out\nfor himself.  The terms were simple.  For the possession of a flesh-and-\nblood god, he exchanged his own liberty.  Food and fire, protection and\ncompanionship, were some of the things he received from the god.  In\nreturn, he guarded the god's property, defended his body, worked for him,\nand obeyed him.\n\nThe possession of a god implies service.  White Fang's was a service of\nduty and awe, but not of love.  He did not know what love was.  He had no\nexperience of love.  Kiche was a remote memory.  Besides, not only had he\nabandoned the Wild and his kind when he gave himself up to man, but the\nterms of the covenant were such that if ever he met Kiche again he would\nnot desert his god to go with her.  His allegiance to man seemed somehow\na law of his being greater than the love of liberty, of kind and kin.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI--THE FAMINE\n\n\nThe spring of the year was at hand when Grey Beaver finished his long\njourney.  It was April, and White Fang was a year old when he pulled into\nthe home villages and was loosed from the harness by Mit-sah.  Though a\nlong way from his full growth, White Fang, next to Lip-lip, was the\nlargest yearling in the village.  Both from his father, the wolf, and\nfrom Kiche, he had inherited stature and strength, and already he was\nmeasuring up alongside the full-grown dogs.  But he had not yet grown\ncompact.  His body was slender and rangy, and his strength more stringy\nthan massive. His coat was the true wolf-grey, and to all appearances he\nwas true wolf himself.  The quarter-strain of dog he had inherited from\nKiche had left no mark on him physically, though it had played its part\nin his mental make-up.\n\nHe wandered through the village, recognising with staid satisfaction the\nvarious gods he had known before the long journey.  Then there were the\ndogs, puppies growing up like himself, and grown dogs that did not look\nso large and formidable as the memory pictures he retained of them.  Also,\nhe stood less in fear of them than formerly, stalking among them with a\ncertain careless ease that was as new to him as it was enjoyable.\n\nThere was Baseek, a grizzled old fellow that in his younger days had but\nto uncover his fangs to send White Fang cringing and crouching to the\nright about.  From him White Fang had learned much of his own\ninsignificance; and from him he was now to learn much of the change and\ndevelopment that had taken place in himself.  While Baseek had been\ngrowing weaker with age, White Fang had been growing stronger with youth.\n\nIt was at the cutting-up of a moose, fresh-killed, that White Fang\nlearned of the changed relations in which he stood to the dog-world.  He\nhad got for himself a hoof and part of the shin-bone, to which quite a\nbit of meat was attached.  Withdrawn from the immediate scramble of the\nother dogs--in fact out of sight behind a thicket--he was devouring his\nprize, when Baseek rushed in upon him.  Before he knew what he was doing,\nhe had slashed the intruder twice and sprung clear.  Baseek was surprised\nby the other's temerity and swiftness of attack.  He stood, gazing\nstupidly across at White Fang, the raw, red shin-bone between them.\n\nBaseek was old, and already he had come to know the increasing valour of\nthe dogs it had been his wont to bully.  Bitter experiences these, which,\nperforce, he swallowed, calling upon all his wisdom to cope with them.  In\nthe old days he would have sprung upon White Fang in a fury of righteous\nwrath.  But now his waning powers would not permit such a course.  He\nbristled fiercely and looked ominously across the shin-bone at White\nFang.  And White Fang, resurrecting quite a deal of the old awe, seemed\nto wilt and to shrink in upon himself and grow small, as he cast about in\nhis mind for a way to beat a retreat not too inglorious.\n\nAnd right here Baseek erred.  Had he contented himself with looking\nfierce and ominous, all would have been well.  White Fang, on the verge\nof retreat, would have retreated, leaving the meat to him.  But Baseek\ndid not wait.  He considered the victory already his and stepped forward\nto the meat.  As he bent his head carelessly to smell it, White Fang\nbristled slightly.  Even then it was not too late for Baseek to retrieve\nthe situation.  Had he merely stood over the meat, head up and glowering,\nWhite Fang would ultimately have slunk away.  But the fresh meat was\nstrong in Baseek's nostrils, and greed urged him to take a bite of it.\n\nThis was too much for White Fang.  Fresh upon his months of mastery over\nhis own team-mates, it was beyond his self-control to stand idly by while\nanother devoured the meat that belonged to him.  He struck, after his\ncustom, without warning.  With the first slash, Baseek's right ear was\nripped into ribbons.  He was astounded at the suddenness of it.  But more\nthings, and most grievous ones, were happening with equal suddenness.  He\nwas knocked off his feet.  His throat was bitten.  While he was\nstruggling to his feet the young dog sank teeth twice into his shoulder.\nThe swiftness of it was bewildering.  He made a futile rush at White\nFang, clipping the empty air with an outraged snap.  The next moment his\nnose was laid open, and he was staggering backward away from the meat.\n\nThe situation was now reversed.  White Fang stood over the shin-bone,\nbristling and menacing, while Baseek stood a little way off, preparing to\nretreat.  He dared not risk a fight with this young lightning-flash, and\nagain he knew, and more bitterly, the enfeeblement of oncoming age.  His\nattempt to maintain his dignity was heroic.  Calmly turning his back upon\nyoung dog and shin-bone, as though both were beneath his notice and\nunworthy of his consideration, he stalked grandly away.  Nor, until well\nout of sight, did he stop to lick his bleeding wounds.\n\nThe effect on White Fang was to give him a greater faith in himself, and\na greater pride.  He walked less softly among the grown dogs; his\nattitude toward them was less compromising.  Not that he went out of his\nway looking for trouble.  Far from it.  But upon his way he demanded\nconsideration.  He stood upon his right to go his way unmolested and to\ngive trail to no dog.  He had to be taken into account, that was all.  He\nwas no longer to be disregarded and ignored, as was the lot of puppies,\nand as continued to be the lot of the puppies that were his team-mates.\nThey got out of the way, gave trail to the grown dogs, and gave up meat\nto them under compulsion.  But White Fang, uncompanionable, solitary,\nmorose, scarcely looking to right or left, redoubtable, forbidding of\naspect, remote and alien, was accepted as an equal by his puzzled elders.\nThey quickly learned to leave him alone, neither venturing hostile acts\nnor making overtures of friendliness.  If they left him alone, he left\nthem alone--a state of affairs that they found, after a few encounters,\nto be pre-eminently desirable.\n\nIn midsummer White Fang had an experience.  Trotting along in his silent\nway to investigate a new tepee which had been erected on the edge of the\nvillage while he was away with the hunters after moose, he came full upon\nKiche.  He paused and looked at her.  He remembered her vaguely, but he\n_remembered_ her, and that was more than could be said for her.  She\nlifted her lip at him in the old snarl of menace, and his memory became\nclear.  His forgotten cubhood, all that was associated with that familiar\nsnarl, rushed back to him.  Before he had known the gods, she had been to\nhim the centre-pin of the universe.  The old familiar feelings of that\ntime came back upon him, surged up within him.  He bounded towards her\njoyously, and she met him with shrewd fangs that laid his cheek open to\nthe bone.  He did not understand.  He backed away, bewildered and\npuzzled.\n\nBut it was not Kiche's fault.  A wolf-mother was not made to remember her\ncubs of a year or so before.  So she did not remember White Fang.  He was\na strange animal, an intruder; and her present litter of puppies gave her\nthe right to resent such intrusion.\n\nOne of the puppies sprawled up to White Fang.  They were half-brothers,\nonly they did not know it.  White Fang sniffed the puppy curiously,\nwhereupon Kiche rushed upon him, gashing his face a second time.  He\nbacked farther away.  All the old memories and associations died down\nagain and passed into the grave from which they had been resurrected.  He\nlooked at Kiche licking her puppy and stopping now and then to snarl at\nhim.  She was without value to him.  He had learned to get along without\nher.  Her meaning was forgotten.  There was no place for her in his\nscheme of things, as there was no place for him in hers.\n\nHe was still standing, stupid and bewildered, the memories forgotten,\nwondering what it was all about, when Kiche attacked him a third time,\nintent on driving him away altogether from the vicinity.  And White Fang\nallowed himself to be driven away.  This was a female of his kind, and it\nwas a law of his kind that the males must not fight the females.  He did\nnot know anything about this law, for it was no generalisation of the\nmind, not a something acquired by experience of the world.  He knew it as\na secret prompting, as an urge of instinct--of the same instinct that\nmade him howl at the moon and stars of nights, and that made him fear\ndeath and the unknown.\n\nThe months went by.  White Fang grew stronger, heavier, and more compact,\nwhile his character was developing along the lines laid down by his\nheredity and his environment.  His heredity was a life-stuff that may be\nlikened to clay.  It possessed many possibilities, was capable of being\nmoulded into many different forms.  Environment served to model the clay,\nto give it a particular form.  Thus, had White Fang never come in to the\nfires of man, the Wild would have moulded him into a true wolf.  But the\ngods had given him a different environment, and he was moulded into a dog\nthat was rather wolfish, but that was a dog and not a wolf.\n\nAnd so, according to the clay of his nature and the pressure of his\nsurroundings, his character was being moulded into a certain particular\nshape.  There was no escaping it.  He was becoming more morose, more\nuncompanionable, more solitary, more ferocious; while the dogs were\nlearning more and more that it was better to be at peace with him than at\nwar, and Grey Beaver was coming to prize him more greatly with the\npassage of each day.\n\nWhite Fang, seeming to sum up strength in all his qualities, nevertheless\nsuffered from one besetting weakness.  He could not stand being laughed\nat.  The laughter of men was a hateful thing.  They might laugh among\nthemselves about anything they pleased except himself, and he did not\nmind.  But the moment laughter was turned upon him he would fly into a\nmost terrible rage.  Grave, dignified, sombre, a laugh made him frantic\nto ridiculousness.  It so outraged him and upset him that for hours he\nwould behave like a demon.  And woe to the dog that at such times ran\nfoul of him.  He knew the law too well to take it out of Grey Beaver;\nbehind Grey Beaver were a club and godhead.  But behind the dogs there\nwas nothing but space, and into this space they flew when White Fang came\non the scene, made mad by laughter.\n\nIn the third year of his life there came a great famine to the Mackenzie\nIndians.  In the summer the fish failed.  In the winter the cariboo\nforsook their accustomed track.  Moose were scarce, the rabbits almost\ndisappeared, hunting and preying animals perished.  Denied their usual\nfood-supply, weakened by hunger, they fell upon and devoured one another.\nOnly the strong survived.  White Fang's gods were always hunting animals.\nThe old and the weak of them died of hunger.  There was wailing in the\nvillage, where the women and children went without in order that what\nlittle they had might go into the bellies of the lean and hollow-eyed\nhunters who trod the forest in the vain pursuit of meat.\n\nTo such extremity were the gods driven that they ate the soft-tanned\nleather of their mocassins and mittens, while the dogs ate the harnesses\noff their backs and the very whip-lashes.  Also, the dogs ate one\nanother, and also the gods ate the dogs.  The weakest and the more\nworthless were eaten first.  The dogs that still lived, looked on and\nunderstood.  A few of the boldest and wisest forsook the fires of the\ngods, which had now become a shambles, and fled into the forest, where,\nin the end, they starved to death or were eaten by wolves.\n\nIn this time of misery, White Fang, too, stole away into the woods.  He\nwas better fitted for the life than the other dogs, for he had the\ntraining of his cubhood to guide him.  Especially adept did he become in\nstalking small living things.  He would lie concealed for hours,\nfollowing every movement of a cautious tree-squirrel, waiting, with a\npatience as huge as the hunger he suffered from, until the squirrel\nventured out upon the ground.  Even then, White Fang was not premature.\nHe waited until he was sure of striking before the squirrel could gain a\ntree-refuge.  Then, and not until then, would he flash from his hiding-\nplace, a grey projectile, incredibly swift, never failing its mark--the\nfleeing squirrel that fled not fast enough.\n\nSuccessful as he was with squirrels, there was one difficulty that\nprevented him from living and growing fat on them.  There were not enough\nsquirrels.  So he was driven to hunt still smaller things.  So acute did\nhis hunger become at times that he was not above rooting out wood-mice\nfrom their burrows in the ground.  Nor did he scorn to do battle with a\nweasel as hungry as himself and many times more ferocious.\n\nIn the worst pinches of the famine he stole back to the fires of the\ngods.  But he did not go into the fires.  He lurked in the forest,\navoiding discovery and robbing the snares at the rare intervals when game\nwas caught.  He even robbed Grey Beaver's snare of a rabbit at a time\nwhen Grey Beaver staggered and tottered through the forest, sitting down\noften to rest, what of weakness and of shortness of breath.\n\nOne day White Fang encountered a young wolf, gaunt and scrawny, loose-\njointed with famine.  Had he not been hungry himself, White Fang might\nhave gone with him and eventually found his way into the pack amongst his\nwild brethren.  As it was, he ran the young wolf down and killed and ate\nhim.\n\nFortune seemed to favour him.  Always, when hardest pressed for food, he\nfound something to kill.  Again, when he was weak, it was his luck that\nnone of the larger preying animals chanced upon him.  Thus, he was strong\nfrom the two days' eating a lynx had afforded him when the hungry wolf-\npack ran full tilt upon him.  It was a long, cruel chase, but he was\nbetter nourished than they, and in the end outran them.  And not only did\nhe outrun them, but, circling widely back on his track, he gathered in\none of his exhausted pursuers.\n\nAfter that he left that part of the country and journeyed over to the\nvalley wherein he had been born.  Here, in the old lair, he encountered\nKiche.  Up to her old tricks, she, too, had fled the inhospitable fires\nof the gods and gone back to her old refuge to give birth to her young.\nOf this litter but one remained alive when White Fang came upon the\nscene, and this one was not destined to live long.  Young life had little\nchance in such a famine.\n\nKiche's greeting of her grown son was anything but affectionate.  But\nWhite Fang did not mind.  He had outgrown his mother.  So he turned tail\nphilosophically and trotted on up the stream.  At the forks he took the\nturning to the left, where he found the lair of the lynx with whom his\nmother and he had fought long before.  Here, in the abandoned lair, he\nsettled down and rested for a day.\n\nDuring the early summer, in the last days of the famine, he met Lip-lip,\nwho had likewise taken to the woods, where he had eked out a miserable\nexistence.\n\nWhite Fang came upon him unexpectedly.  Trotting in opposite directions\nalong the base of a high bluff, they rounded a corner of rock and found\nthemselves face to face.  They paused with instant alarm, and looked at\neach other suspiciously.\n\nWhite Fang was in splendid condition.  His hunting had been good, and for\na week he had eaten his fill.  He was even gorged from his latest kill.\nBut in the moment he looked at Lip-lip his hair rose on end all along his\nback.  It was an involuntary bristling on his part, the physical state\nthat in the past had always accompanied the mental state produced in him\nby Lip-lip's bullying and persecution.  As in the past he had bristled\nand snarled at sight of Lip-lip, so now, and automatically, he bristled\nand snarled.  He did not waste any time.  The thing was done thoroughly\nand with despatch.  Lip-lip essayed to back away, but White Fang struck\nhim hard, shoulder to shoulder.  Lip-lip was overthrown and rolled upon\nhis back.  White Fang's teeth drove into the scrawny throat.  There was a\ndeath-struggle, during which White Fang walked around, stiff-legged and\nobservant.  Then he resumed his course and trotted on along the base of\nthe bluff.\n\nOne day, not long after, he came to the edge of the forest, where a\nnarrow stretch of open land sloped down to the Mackenzie.  He had been\nover this ground before, when it was bare, but now a village occupied it.\nStill hidden amongst the trees, he paused to study the situation.  Sights\nand sounds and scents were familiar to him.  It was the old village\nchanged to a new place.  But sights and sounds and smells were different\nfrom those he had last had when he fled away from it.  There was no\nwhimpering nor wailing.  Contented sounds saluted his ear, and when he\nheard the angry voice of a woman he knew it to be the anger that proceeds\nfrom a full stomach.  And there was a smell in the air of fish.  There\nwas food.  The famine was gone.  He came out boldly from the forest and\ntrotted into camp straight to Grey Beaver's tepee.  Grey Beaver was not\nthere; but Kloo-kooch welcomed him with glad cries and the whole of a\nfresh-caught fish, and he lay down to wait Grey Beaver's coming.\n\n\n\n\nPART IV\n\n\nCHAPTER I--THE ENEMY OF HIS KIND\n\n\nHad there been in White Fang's nature any possibility, no matter how\nremote, of his ever coming to fraternise with his kind, such possibility\nwas irretrievably destroyed when he was made leader of the sled-team.  For\nnow the dogs hated him--hated him for the extra meat bestowed upon him by\nMit-sah; hated him for all the real and fancied favours he received;\nhated him for that he fled always at the head of the team, his waving\nbrush of a tail and his perpetually retreating hind-quarters for ever\nmaddening their eyes.\n\nAnd White Fang just as bitterly hated them back.  Being sled-leader was\nanything but gratifying to him.  To be compelled to run away before the\nyelling pack, every dog of which, for three years, he had thrashed and\nmastered, was almost more than he could endure.  But endure it he must,\nor perish, and the life that was in him had no desire to perish out.  The\nmoment Mit-sah gave his order for the start, that moment the whole team,\nwith eager, savage cries, sprang forward at White Fang.\n\nThere was no defence for him.  If he turned upon them, Mit-sah would\nthrow the stinging lash of the whip into his face.  Only remained to him\nto run away.  He could not encounter that howling horde with his tail and\nhind-quarters.  These were scarcely fit weapons with which to meet the\nmany merciless fangs.  So run away he did, violating his own nature and\npride with every leap he made, and leaping all day long.\n\nOne cannot violate the promptings of one's nature without having that\nnature recoil upon itself.  Such a recoil is like that of a hair, made to\ngrow out from the body, turning unnaturally upon the direction of its\ngrowth and growing into the body--a rankling, festering thing of hurt.\nAnd so with White Fang.  Every urge of his being impelled him to spring\nupon the pack that cried at his heels, but it was the will of the gods\nthat this should not be; and behind the will, to enforce it, was the whip\nof cariboo-gut with its biting thirty-foot lash.  So White Fang could\nonly eat his heart in bitterness and develop a hatred and malice\ncommensurate with the ferocity and indomitability of his nature.\n\nIf ever a creature was the enemy of its kind, White Fang was that\ncreature.  He asked no quarter, gave none.  He was continually marred and\nscarred by the teeth of the pack, and as continually he left his own\nmarks upon the pack.  Unlike most leaders, who, when camp was made and\nthe dogs were unhitched, huddled near to the gods for protection, White\nFang disdained such protection.  He walked boldly about the camp,\ninflicting punishment in the night for what he had suffered in the day.\nIn the time before he was made leader of the team, the pack had learned\nto get out of his way.  But now it was different.  Excited by the day-\nlong pursuit of him, swayed subconsciously by the insistent iteration on\ntheir brains of the sight of him fleeing away, mastered by the feeling of\nmastery enjoyed all day, the dogs could not bring themselves to give way\nto him.  When he appeared amongst them, there was always a squabble.  His\nprogress was marked by snarl and snap and growl.  The very atmosphere he\nbreathed was surcharged with hatred and malice, and this but served to\nincrease the hatred and malice within him.\n\nWhen Mit-sah cried out his command for the team to stop, White Fang\nobeyed.  At first this caused trouble for the other dogs.  All of them\nwould spring upon the hated leader only to find the tables turned.  Behind\nhim would be Mit-sah, the great whip singing in his hand.  So the dogs\ncame to understand that when the team stopped by order, White Fang was to\nbe let alone.  But when White Fang stopped without orders, then it was\nallowed them to spring upon him and destroy him if they could.  After\nseveral experiences, White Fang never stopped without orders.  He learned\nquickly.  It was in the nature of things, that he must learn quickly if\nhe were to survive the unusually severe conditions under which life was\nvouchsafed him.\n\nBut the dogs could never learn the lesson to leave him alone in camp.\nEach day, pursuing him and crying defiance at him, the lesson of the\nprevious night was erased, and that night would have to be learned over\nagain, to be as immediately forgotten.  Besides, there was a greater\nconsistence in their dislike of him.  They sensed between themselves and\nhim a difference of kind--cause sufficient in itself for hostility.  Like\nhim, they were domesticated wolves.  But they had been domesticated for\ngenerations.  Much of the Wild had been lost, so that to them the Wild\nwas the unknown, the terrible, the ever-menacing and ever warring.  But\nto him, in appearance and action and impulse, still clung the Wild.  He\nsymbolised it, was its personification: so that when they showed their\nteeth to him they were defending themselves against the powers of\ndestruction that lurked in the shadows of the forest and in the dark\nbeyond the camp-fire.\n\nBut there was one lesson the dogs did learn, and that was to keep\ntogether.  White Fang was too terrible for any of them to face single-\nhanded.  They met him with the mass-formation, otherwise he would have\nkilled them, one by one, in a night.  As it was, he never had a chance to\nkill them.  He might roll a dog off its feet, but the pack would be upon\nhim before he could follow up and deliver the deadly throat-stroke.  At\nthe first hint of conflict, the whole team drew together and faced him.\nThe dogs had quarrels among themselves, but these were forgotten when\ntrouble was brewing with White Fang.\n\nOn the other hand, try as they would, they could not kill White Fang.  He\nwas too quick for them, too formidable, too wise.  He avoided tight\nplaces and always backed out of it when they bade fair to surround him.\nWhile, as for getting him off his feet, there was no dog among them\ncapable of doing the trick.  His feet clung to the earth with the same\ntenacity that he clung to life.  For that matter, life and footing were\nsynonymous in this unending warfare with the pack, and none knew it\nbetter than White Fang.\n\nSo he became the enemy of his kind, domesticated wolves that they were,\nsoftened by the fires of man, weakened in the sheltering shadow of man's\nstrength.  White Fang was bitter and implacable.  The clay of him was so\nmoulded.  He declared a vendetta against all dogs.  And so terribly did\nhe live this vendetta that Grey Beaver, fierce savage himself, could not\nbut marvel at White Fang's ferocity.  Never, he swore, had there been the\nlike of this animal; and the Indians in strange villages swore likewise\nwhen they considered the tale of his killings amongst their dogs.\n\nWhen White Fang was nearly five years old, Grey Beaver took him on\nanother great journey, and long remembered was the havoc he worked\namongst the dogs of the many villages along the Mackenzie, across the\nRockies, and down the Porcupine to the Yukon.  He revelled in the\nvengeance he wreaked upon his kind.  They were ordinary, unsuspecting\ndogs.  They were not prepared for his swiftness and directness, for his\nattack without warning.  They did not know him for what he was, a\nlightning-flash of slaughter.  They bristled up to him, stiff-legged and\nchallenging, while he, wasting no time on elaborate preliminaries,\nsnapping into action like a steel spring, was at their throats and\ndestroying them before they knew what was happening and while they were\nyet in the throes of surprise.\n\nHe became an adept at fighting.  He economised.  He never wasted his\nstrength, never tussled.  He was in too quickly for that, and, if he\nmissed, was out again too quickly.  The dislike of the wolf for close\nquarters was his to an unusual degree.  He could not endure a prolonged\ncontact with another body.  It smacked of danger.  It made him frantic.\nHe must be away, free, on his own legs, touching no living thing.  It was\nthe Wild still clinging to him, asserting itself through him.  This\nfeeling had been accentuated by the Ishmaelite life he had led from his\npuppyhood.  Danger lurked in contacts.  It was the trap, ever the trap,\nthe fear of it lurking deep in the life of him, woven into the fibre of\nhim.\n\nIn consequence, the strange dogs he encountered had no chance against\nhim.  He eluded their fangs.  He got them, or got away, himself untouched\nin either event.  In the natural course of things there were exceptions\nto this.  There were times when several dogs, pitching on to him,\npunished him before he could get away; and there were times when a single\ndog scored deeply on him.  But these were accidents.  In the main, so\nefficient a fighter had he become, he went his way unscathed.\n\nAnother advantage he possessed was that of correctly judging time and\ndistance.  Not that he did this consciously, however.  He did not\ncalculate such things.  It was all automatic.  His eyes saw correctly,\nand the nerves carried the vision correctly to his brain.  The parts of\nhim were better adjusted than those of the average dog.  They worked\ntogether more smoothly and steadily.  His was a better, far better,\nnervous, mental, and muscular co-ordination.  When his eyes conveyed to\nhis brain the moving image of an action, his brain without conscious\neffort, knew the space that limited that action and the time required for\nits completion.  Thus, he could avoid the leap of another dog, or the\ndrive of its fangs, and at the same moment could seize the infinitesimal\nfraction of time in which to deliver his own attack.  Body and brain, his\nwas a more perfected mechanism.  Not that he was to be praised for it.\nNature had been more generous to him than to the average animal, that was\nall.\n\nIt was in the summer that White Fang arrived at Fort Yukon.  Grey Beaver\nhad crossed the great watershed between Mackenzie and the Yukon in the\nlate winter, and spent the spring in hunting among the western outlying\nspurs of the Rockies.  Then, after the break-up of the ice on the\nPorcupine, he had built a canoe and paddled down that stream to where it\neffected its junction with the Yukon just under the Arctic circle.  Here\nstood the old Hudson's Bay Company fort; and here were many Indians, much\nfood, and unprecedented excitement.  It was the summer of 1898, and\nthousands of gold-hunters were going up the Yukon to Dawson and the\nKlondike.  Still hundreds of miles from their goal, nevertheless many of\nthem had been on the way for a year, and the least any of them had\ntravelled to get that far was five thousand miles, while some had come\nfrom the other side of the world.\n\nHere Grey Beaver stopped.  A whisper of the gold-rush had reached his\nears, and he had come with several bales of furs, and another of gut-sewn\nmittens and moccasins.  He would not have ventured so long a trip had he\nnot expected generous profits.  But what he had expected was nothing to\nwhat he realised.  His wildest dreams had not exceeded a hundred per\ncent. profit; he made a thousand per cent.  And like a true Indian, he\nsettled down to trade carefully and slowly, even if it took all summer\nand the rest of the winter to dispose of his goods.\n\nIt was at Fort Yukon that White Fang saw his first white men.  As\ncompared with the Indians he had known, they were to him another race of\nbeings, a race of superior gods.  They impressed him as possessing\nsuperior power, and it is on power that godhead rests.  White Fang did\nnot reason it out, did not in his mind make the sharp generalisation that\nthe white gods were more powerful.  It was a feeling, nothing more, and\nyet none the less potent.  As, in his puppyhood, the looming bulks of the\ntepees, man-reared, had affected him as manifestations of power, so was\nhe affected now by the houses and the huge fort all of massive logs.  Here\nwas power.  Those white gods were strong.  They possessed greater mastery\nover matter than the gods he had known, most powerful among which was\nGrey Beaver.  And yet Grey Beaver was as a child-god among these white-\nskinned ones.\n\nTo be sure, White Fang only felt these things.  He was not conscious of\nthem.  Yet it is upon feeling, more often than thinking, that animals\nact; and every act White Fang now performed was based upon the feeling\nthat the white men were the superior gods.  In the first place he was\nvery suspicious of them.  There was no telling what unknown terrors were\ntheirs, what unknown hurts they could administer.  He was curious to\nobserve them, fearful of being noticed by them.  For the first few hours\nhe was content with slinking around and watching them from a safe\ndistance.  Then he saw that no harm befell the dogs that were near to\nthem, and he came in closer.\n\nIn turn he was an object of great curiosity to them.  His wolfish\nappearance caught their eyes at once, and they pointed him out to one\nanother.  This act of pointing put White Fang on his guard, and when they\ntried to approach him he showed his teeth and backed away.  Not one\nsucceeded in laying a hand on him, and it was well that they did not.\n\nWhite Fang soon learned that very few of these gods--not more than a\ndozen--lived at this place.  Every two or three days a steamer (another\nand colossal manifestation of power) came into the bank and stopped for\nseveral hours.  The white men came from off these steamers and went away\non them again.  There seemed untold numbers of these white men.  In the\nfirst day or so, he saw more of them than he had seen Indians in all his\nlife; and as the days went by they continued to come up the river, stop,\nand then go on up the river out of sight.\n\nBut if the white gods were all-powerful, their dogs did not amount to\nmuch.  This White Fang quickly discovered by mixing with those that came\nashore with their masters.  They were irregular shapes and sizes.  Some\nwere short-legged--too short; others were long-legged--too long.  They\nhad hair instead of fur, and a few had very little hair at that.  And\nnone of them knew how to fight.\n\nAs an enemy of his kind, it was in White Fang's province to fight with\nthem.  This he did, and he quickly achieved for them a mighty contempt.\nThey were soft and helpless, made much noise, and floundered around\nclumsily trying to accomplish by main strength what he accomplished by\ndexterity and cunning.  They rushed bellowing at him.  He sprang to the\nside.  They did not know what had become of him; and in that moment he\nstruck them on the shoulder, rolling them off their feet and delivering\nhis stroke at the throat.\n\nSometimes this stroke was successful, and a stricken dog rolled in the\ndirt, to be pounced upon and torn to pieces by the pack of Indian dogs\nthat waited.  White Fang was wise.  He had long since learned that the\ngods were made angry when their dogs were killed.  The white men were no\nexception to this.  So he was content, when he had overthrown and slashed\nwide the throat of one of their dogs, to drop back and let the pack go in\nand do the cruel finishing work.  It was then that the white men rushed\nin, visiting their wrath heavily on the pack, while White Fang went free.\nHe would stand off at a little distance and look on, while stones, clubs,\naxes, and all sorts of weapons fell upon his fellows.  White Fang was\nvery wise.\n\nBut his fellows grew wise in their own way; and in this White Fang grew\nwise with them.  They learned that it was when a steamer first tied to\nthe bank that they had their fun.  After the first two or three strange\ndogs had been downed and destroyed, the white men hustled their own\nanimals back on board and wreaked savage vengeance on the offenders.  One\nwhite man, having seen his dog, a setter, torn to pieces before his eyes,\ndrew a revolver.  He fired rapidly, six times, and six of the pack lay\ndead or dying--another manifestation of power that sank deep into White\nFang's consciousness.\n\nWhite Fang enjoyed it all.  He did not love his kind, and he was shrewd\nenough to escape hurt himself.  At first, the killing of the white men's\ndogs had been a diversion.  After a time it became his occupation.  There\nwas no work for him to do.  Grey Beaver was busy trading and getting\nwealthy.  So White Fang hung around the landing with the disreputable\ngang of Indian dogs, waiting for steamers.  With the arrival of a steamer\nthe fun began.  After a few minutes, by the time the white men had got\nover their surprise, the gang scattered.  The fun was over until the next\nsteamer should arrive.\n\nBut it can scarcely be said that White Fang was a member of the gang.  He\ndid not mingle with it, but remained aloof, always himself, and was even\nfeared by it.  It is true, he worked with it.  He picked the quarrel with\nthe strange dog while the gang waited.  And when he had overthrown the\nstrange dog the gang went in to finish it.  But it is equally true that\nhe then withdrew, leaving the gang to receive the punishment of the\noutraged gods.\n\nIt did not require much exertion to pick these quarrels.  All he had to\ndo, when the strange dogs came ashore, was to show himself.  When they\nsaw him they rushed for him.  It was their instinct.  He was the Wild--the\nunknown, the terrible, the ever-menacing, the thing that prowled in the\ndarkness around the fires of the primeval world when they, cowering close\nto the fires, were reshaping their instincts, learning to fear the Wild\nout of which they had come, and which they had deserted and betrayed.\nGeneration by generation, down all the generations, had this fear of the\nWild been stamped into their natures.  For centuries the Wild had stood\nfor terror and destruction.  And during all this time free licence had\nbeen theirs, from their masters, to kill the things of the Wild.  In\ndoing this they had protected both themselves and the gods whose\ncompanionship they shared.\n\nAnd so, fresh from the soft southern world, these dogs, trotting down the\ngang-plank and out upon the Yukon shore had but to see White Fang to\nexperience the irresistible impulse to rush upon him and destroy him.\nThey might be town-reared dogs, but the instinctive fear of the Wild was\ntheirs just the same.  Not alone with their own eyes did they see the\nwolfish creature in the clear light of day, standing before them.  They\nsaw him with the eyes of their ancestors, and by their inherited memory\nthey knew White Fang for the wolf, and they remembered the ancient feud.\n\nAll of which served to make White Fang's days enjoyable.  If the sight of\nhim drove these strange dogs upon him, so much the better for him, so\nmuch the worse for them.  They looked upon him as legitimate prey, and as\nlegitimate prey he looked upon them.\n\nNot for nothing had he first seen the light of day in a lonely lair and\nfought his first fights with the ptarmigan, the weasel, and the lynx.  And\nnot for nothing had his puppyhood been made bitter by the persecution of\nLip-lip and the whole puppy pack.  It might have been otherwise, and he\nwould then have been otherwise.  Had Lip-lip not existed, he would have\npassed his puppyhood with the other puppies and grown up more doglike and\nwith more liking for dogs.  Had Grey Beaver possessed the plummet of\naffection and love, he might have sounded the deeps of White Fang's\nnature and brought up to the surface all manner of kindly qualities.  But\nthese things had not been so.  The clay of White Fang had been moulded\nuntil he became what he was, morose and lonely, unloving and ferocious,\nthe enemy of all his kind.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II--THE MAD GOD\n\n\nA small number of white men lived in Fort Yukon.  These men had been long\nin the country.  They called themselves Sour-doughs, and took great pride\nin so classifying themselves.  For other men, new in the land, they felt\nnothing but disdain.  The men who came ashore from the steamers were\nnewcomers.  They were known as _chechaquos_, and they always wilted at\nthe application of the name.  They made their bread with baking-powder.\nThis was the invidious distinction between them and the Sour-doughs, who,\nforsooth, made their bread from sour-dough because they had no baking-\npowder.\n\nAll of which is neither here nor there.  The men in the fort disdained\nthe newcomers and enjoyed seeing them come to grief.  Especially did they\nenjoy the havoc worked amongst the newcomers' dogs by White Fang and his\ndisreputable gang.  When a steamer arrived, the men of the fort made it a\npoint always to come down to the bank and see the fun.  They looked\nforward to it with as much anticipation as did the Indian dogs, while\nthey were not slow to appreciate the savage and crafty part played by\nWhite Fang.\n\nBut there was one man amongst them who particularly enjoyed the sport.  He\nwould come running at the first sound of a steamboat's whistle; and when\nthe last fight was over and White Fang and the pack had scattered, he\nwould return slowly to the fort, his face heavy with regret.  Sometimes,\nwhen a soft southland dog went down, shrieking its death-cry under the\nfangs of the pack, this man would be unable to contain himself, and would\nleap into the air and cry out with delight.  And always he had a sharp\nand covetous eye for White Fang.\n\nThis man was called \"Beauty\" by the other men of the fort.  No one knew\nhis first name, and in general he was known in the country as Beauty\nSmith.  But he was anything save a beauty.  To antithesis was due his\nnaming.  He was pre-eminently unbeautiful.  Nature had been niggardly\nwith him.  He was a small man to begin with; and upon his meagre frame\nwas deposited an even more strikingly meagre head.  Its apex might be\nlikened to a point.  In fact, in his boyhood, before he had been named\nBeauty by his fellows, he had been called \"Pinhead.\"\n\nBackward, from the apex, his head slanted down to his neck and forward it\nslanted uncompromisingly to meet a low and remarkably wide forehead.\nBeginning here, as though regretting her parsimony, Nature had spread his\nfeatures with a lavish hand.  His eyes were large, and between them was\nthe distance of two eyes.  His face, in relation to the rest of him, was\nprodigious.  In order to discover the necessary area, Nature had given\nhim an enormous prognathous jaw.  It was wide and heavy, and protruded\noutward and down until it seemed to rest on his chest.  Possibly this\nappearance was due to the weariness of the slender neck, unable properly\nto support so great a burden.\n\nThis jaw gave the impression of ferocious determination.  But something\nlacked.  Perhaps it was from excess.  Perhaps the jaw was too large.  At\nany rate, it was a lie.  Beauty Smith was known far and wide as the\nweakest of weak-kneed and snivelling cowards.  To complete his\ndescription, his teeth were large and yellow, while the two eye-teeth,\nlarger than their fellows, showed under his lean lips like fangs.  His\neyes were yellow and muddy, as though Nature had run short on pigments\nand squeezed together the dregs of all her tubes.  It was the same with\nhis hair, sparse and irregular of growth, muddy-yellow and dirty-yellow,\nrising on his head and sprouting out of his face in unexpected tufts and\nbunches, in appearance like clumped and wind-blown grain.\n\nIn short, Beauty Smith was a monstrosity, and the blame of it lay\nelsewhere.  He was not responsible.  The clay of him had been so moulded\nin the making.  He did the cooking for the other men in the fort, the\ndish-washing and the drudgery.  They did not despise him.  Rather did\nthey tolerate him in a broad human way, as one tolerates any creature\nevilly treated in the making.  Also, they feared him.  His cowardly rages\nmade them dread a shot in the back or poison in their coffee.  But\nsomebody had to do the cooking, and whatever else his shortcomings,\nBeauty Smith could cook.\n\nThis was the man that looked at White Fang, delighted in his ferocious\nprowess, and desired to possess him.  He made overtures to White Fang\nfrom the first.  White Fang began by ignoring him.  Later on, when the\novertures became more insistent, White Fang bristled and bared his teeth\nand backed away.  He did not like the man.  The feel of him was bad.  He\nsensed the evil in him, and feared the extended hand and the attempts at\nsoft-spoken speech.  Because of all this, he hated the man.\n\nWith the simpler creatures, good and bad are things simply understood.\nThe good stands for all things that bring easement and satisfaction and\nsurcease from pain.  Therefore, the good is liked.  The bad stands for\nall things that are fraught with discomfort, menace, and hurt, and is\nhated accordingly.  White Fang's feel of Beauty Smith was bad.  From the\nman's distorted body and twisted mind, in occult ways, like mists rising\nfrom malarial marshes, came emanations of the unhealth within.  Not by\nreasoning, not by the five senses alone, but by other and remoter and\nuncharted senses, came the feeling to White Fang that the man was ominous\nwith evil, pregnant with hurtfulness, and therefore a thing bad, and\nwisely to be hated.\n\nWhite Fang was in Grey Beaver's camp when Beauty Smith first visited it.\nAt the faint sound of his distant feet, before he came in sight, White\nFang knew who was coming and began to bristle.  He had been lying down in\nan abandon of comfort, but he arose quickly, and, as the man arrived,\nslid away in true wolf-fashion to the edge of the camp.  He did not know\nwhat they said, but he could see the man and Grey Beaver talking\ntogether.  Once, the man pointed at him, and White Fang snarled back as\nthough the hand were just descending upon him instead of being, as it\nwas, fifty feet away.  The man laughed at this; and White Fang slunk away\nto the sheltering woods, his head turned to observe as he glided softly\nover the ground.\n\nGrey Beaver refused to sell the dog.  He had grown rich with his trading\nand stood in need of nothing.  Besides, White Fang was a valuable animal,\nthe strongest sled-dog he had ever owned, and the best leader.\nFurthermore, there was no dog like him on the Mackenzie nor the Yukon.  He\ncould fight.  He killed other dogs as easily as men killed mosquitoes.\n(Beauty Smith's eyes lighted up at this, and he licked his thin lips with\nan eager tongue).  No, White Fang was not for sale at any price.\n\nBut Beauty Smith knew the ways of Indians.  He visited Grey Beaver's camp\noften, and hidden under his coat was always a black bottle or so.  One of\nthe potencies of whisky is the breeding of thirst.  Grey Beaver got the\nthirst.  His fevered membranes and burnt stomach began to clamour for\nmore and more of the scorching fluid; while his brain, thrust all awry by\nthe unwonted stimulant, permitted him to go any length to obtain it.  The\nmoney he had received for his furs and mittens and moccasins began to go.\nIt went faster and faster, and the shorter his money-sack grew, the\nshorter grew his temper.\n\nIn the end his money and goods and temper were all gone.  Nothing\nremained to him but his thirst, a prodigious possession in itself that\ngrew more prodigious with every sober breath he drew.  Then it was that\nBeauty Smith had talk with him again about the sale of White Fang; but\nthis time the price offered was in bottles, not dollars, and Grey\nBeaver's ears were more eager to hear.\n\n\"You ketch um dog you take um all right,\" was his last word.\n\nThe bottles were delivered, but after two days.  \"You ketch um dog,\" were\nBeauty Smith's words to Grey Beaver.\n\nWhite Fang slunk into camp one evening and dropped down with a sigh of\ncontent.  The dreaded white god was not there.  For days his\nmanifestations of desire to lay hands on him had been growing more\ninsistent, and during that time White Fang had been compelled to avoid\nthe camp.  He did not know what evil was threatened by those insistent\nhands.  He knew only that they did threaten evil of some sort, and that\nit was best for him to keep out of their reach.\n\nBut scarcely had he lain down when Grey Beaver staggered over to him and\ntied a leather thong around his neck.  He sat down beside White Fang,\nholding the end of the thong in his hand.  In the other hand he held a\nbottle, which, from time to time, was inverted above his head to the\naccompaniment of gurgling noises.\n\nAn hour of this passed, when the vibrations of feet in contact with the\nground foreran the one who approached.  White Fang heard it first, and he\nwas bristling with recognition while Grey Beaver still nodded stupidly.\nWhite Fang tried to draw the thong softly out of his master's hand; but\nthe relaxed fingers closed tightly and Grey Beaver roused himself.\n\nBeauty Smith strode into camp and stood over White Fang.  He snarled\nsoftly up at the thing of fear, watching keenly the deportment of the\nhands.  One hand extended outward and began to descend upon his head.  His\nsoft snarl grew tense and harsh.  The hand continued slowly to descend,\nwhile he crouched beneath it, eyeing it malignantly, his snarl growing\nshorter and shorter as, with quickening breath, it approached its\nculmination.  Suddenly he snapped, striking with his fangs like a snake.\nThe hand was jerked back, and the teeth came together emptily with a\nsharp click.  Beauty Smith was frightened and angry.  Grey Beaver clouted\nWhite Fang alongside the head, so that he cowered down close to the earth\nin respectful obedience.\n\nWhite Fang's suspicious eyes followed every movement.  He saw Beauty\nSmith go away and return with a stout club.  Then the end of the thong\nwas given over to him by Grey Beaver.  Beauty Smith started to walk away.\nThe thong grew taut.  White Fang resisted it.  Grey Beaver clouted him\nright and left to make him get up and follow.  He obeyed, but with a\nrush, hurling himself upon the stranger who was dragging him away.  Beauty\nSmith did not jump away.  He had been waiting for this.  He swung the\nclub smartly, stopping the rush midway and smashing White Fang down upon\nthe ground.  Grey Beaver laughed and nodded approval.  Beauty Smith\ntightened the thong again, and White Fang crawled limply and dizzily to\nhis feet.\n\nHe did not rush a second time.  One smash from the club was sufficient to\nconvince him that the white god knew how to handle it, and he was too\nwise to fight the inevitable.  So he followed morosely at Beauty Smith's\nheels, his tail between his legs, yet snarling softly under his breath.\nBut Beauty Smith kept a wary eye on him, and the club was held always\nready to strike.\n\nAt the fort Beauty Smith left him securely tied and went in to bed.  White\nFang waited an hour.  Then he applied his teeth to the thong, and in the\nspace of ten seconds was free.  He had wasted no time with his teeth.\nThere had been no useless gnawing.  The thong was cut across, diagonally,\nalmost as clean as though done by a knife.  White Fang looked up at the\nfort, at the same time bristling and growling.  Then he turned and\ntrotted back to Grey Beaver's camp.  He owed no allegiance to this\nstrange and terrible god.  He had given himself to Grey Beaver, and to\nGrey Beaver he considered he still belonged.\n\nBut what had occurred before was repeated--with a difference.  Grey\nBeaver again made him fast with a thong, and in the morning turned him\nover to Beauty Smith.  And here was where the difference came in.  Beauty\nSmith gave him a beating.  Tied securely, White Fang could only rage\nfutilely and endure the punishment.  Club and whip were both used upon\nhim, and he experienced the worst beating he had ever received in his\nlife.  Even the big beating given him in his puppyhood by Grey Beaver was\nmild compared with this.\n\nBeauty Smith enjoyed the task.  He delighted in it.  He gloated over his\nvictim, and his eyes flamed dully, as he swung the whip or club and\nlistened to White Fang's cries of pain and to his helpless bellows and\nsnarls.  For Beauty Smith was cruel in the way that cowards are cruel.\nCringing and snivelling himself before the blows or angry speech of a\nman, he revenged himself, in turn, upon creatures weaker than he.  All\nlife likes power, and Beauty Smith was no exception.  Denied the\nexpression of power amongst his own kind, he fell back upon the lesser\ncreatures and there vindicated the life that was in him.  But Beauty\nSmith had not created himself, and no blame was to be attached to him.  He\nhad come into the world with a twisted body and a brute intelligence.\nThis had constituted the clay of him, and it had not been kindly moulded\nby the world.\n\nWhite Fang knew why he was being beaten.  When Grey Beaver tied the thong\naround his neck, and passed the end of the thong into Beauty Smith's\nkeeping, White Fang knew that it was his god's will for him to go with\nBeauty Smith.  And when Beauty Smith left him tied outside the fort, he\nknew that it was Beauty Smith's will that he should remain there.\nTherefore, he had disobeyed the will of both the gods, and earned the\nconsequent punishment.  He had seen dogs change owners in the past, and\nhe had seen the runaways beaten as he was being beaten.  He was wise, and\nyet in the nature of him there were forces greater than wisdom.  One of\nthese was fidelity.  He did not love Grey Beaver, yet, even in the face\nof his will and his anger, he was faithful to him.  He could not help it.\nThis faithfulness was a quality of the clay that composed him.  It was\nthe quality that was peculiarly the possession of his kind; the quality\nthat set apart his species from all other species; the quality that has\nenabled the wolf and the wild dog to come in from the open and be the\ncompanions of man.\n\nAfter the beating, White Fang was dragged back to the fort.  But this\ntime Beauty Smith left him tied with a stick.  One does not give up a god\neasily, and so with White Fang.  Grey Beaver was his own particular god,\nand, in spite of Grey Beaver's will, White Fang still clung to him and\nwould not give him up.  Grey Beaver had betrayed and forsaken him, but\nthat had no effect upon him.  Not for nothing had he surrendered himself\nbody and soul to Grey Beaver.  There had been no reservation on White\nFang's part, and the bond was not to be broken easily.\n\nSo, in the night, when the men in the fort were asleep, White Fang\napplied his teeth to the stick that held him.  The wood was seasoned and\ndry, and it was tied so closely to his neck that he could scarcely get\nhis teeth to it.  It was only by the severest muscular exertion and neck-\narching that he succeeded in getting the wood between his teeth, and\nbarely between his teeth at that; and it was only by the exercise of an\nimmense patience, extending through many hours, that he succeeded in\ngnawing through the stick.  This was something that dogs were not\nsupposed to do.  It was unprecedented.  But White Fang did it, trotting\naway from the fort in the early morning, with the end of the stick\nhanging to his neck.\n\nHe was wise.  But had he been merely wise he would not have gone back to\nGrey Beaver who had already twice betrayed him.  But there was his\nfaithfulness, and he went back to be betrayed yet a third time.  Again he\nyielded to the tying of a thong around his neck by Grey Beaver, and again\nBeauty Smith came to claim him.  And this time he was beaten even more\nseverely than before.\n\nGrey Beaver looked on stolidly while the white man wielded the whip.  He\ngave no protection.  It was no longer his dog.  When the beating was over\nWhite Fang was sick.  A soft southland dog would have died under it, but\nnot he.  His school of life had been sterner, and he was himself of\nsterner stuff.  He had too great vitality.  His clutch on life was too\nstrong.  But he was very sick.  At first he was unable to drag himself\nalong, and Beauty Smith had to wait half-an-hour for him.  And then,\nblind and reeling, he followed at Beauty Smith's heels back to the fort.\n\nBut now he was tied with a chain that defied his teeth, and he strove in\nvain, by lunging, to draw the staple from the timber into which it was\ndriven.  After a few days, sober and bankrupt, Grey Beaver departed up\nthe Porcupine on his long journey to the Mackenzie.  White Fang remained\non the Yukon, the property of a man more than half mad and all brute.  But\nwhat is a dog to know in its consciousness of madness?  To White Fang,\nBeauty Smith was a veritable, if terrible, god.  He was a mad god at\nbest, but White Fang knew nothing of madness; he knew only that he must\nsubmit to the will of this new master, obey his every whim and fancy.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III--THE REIGN OF HATE\n\n\nUnder the tutelage of the mad god, White Fang became a fiend.  He was\nkept chained in a pen at the rear of the fort, and here Beauty Smith\nteased and irritated and drove him wild with petty torments.  The man\nearly discovered White Fang's susceptibility to laughter, and made it a\npoint after painfully tricking him, to laugh at him.  This laughter was\nuproarious and scornful, and at the same time the god pointed his finger\nderisively at White Fang.  At such times reason fled from White Fang, and\nin his transports of rage he was even more mad than Beauty Smith.\n\nFormerly, White Fang had been merely the enemy of his kind, withal a\nferocious enemy.  He now became the enemy of all things, and more\nferocious than ever.  To such an extent was he tormented, that he hated\nblindly and without the faintest spark of reason.  He hated the chain\nthat bound him, the men who peered in at him through the slats of the\npen, the dogs that accompanied the men and that snarled malignantly at\nhim in his helplessness.  He hated the very wood of the pen that confined\nhim.  And, first, last, and most of all, he hated Beauty Smith.\n\nBut Beauty Smith had a purpose in all that he did to White Fang.  One day\na number of men gathered about the pen.  Beauty Smith entered, club in\nhand, and took the chain off from White Fang's neck.  When his master had\ngone out, White Fang turned loose and tore around the pen, trying to get\nat the men outside.  He was magnificently terrible.  Fully five feet in\nlength, and standing two and one-half feet at the shoulder, he far\noutweighed a wolf of corresponding size.  From his mother he had\ninherited the heavier proportions of the dog, so that he weighed, without\nany fat and without an ounce of superfluous flesh, over ninety pounds.  It\nwas all muscle, bone, and sinew-fighting flesh in the finest condition.\n\nThe door of the pen was being opened again.  White Fang paused.  Something\nunusual was happening.  He waited.  The door was opened wider.  Then a\nhuge dog was thrust inside, and the door was slammed shut behind him.\nWhite Fang had never seen such a dog (it was a mastiff); but the size and\nfierce aspect of the intruder did not deter him.  Here was some thing,\nnot wood nor iron, upon which to wreak his hate.  He leaped in with a\nflash of fangs that ripped down the side of the mastiff's neck.  The\nmastiff shook his head, growled hoarsely, and plunged at White Fang.  But\nWhite Fang was here, there, and everywhere, always evading and eluding,\nand always leaping in and slashing with his fangs and leaping out again\nin time to escape punishment.\n\nThe men outside shouted and applauded, while Beauty Smith, in an ecstasy\nof delight, gloated over the ripping and mangling performed by White\nFang.  There was no hope for the mastiff from the first.  He was too\nponderous and slow.  In the end, while Beauty Smith beat White Fang back\nwith a club, the mastiff was dragged out by its owner.  Then there was a\npayment of bets, and money clinked in Beauty Smith's hand.\n\nWhite Fang came to look forward eagerly to the gathering of the men\naround his pen.  It meant a fight; and this was the only way that was now\nvouchsafed him of expressing the life that was in him.  Tormented,\nincited to hate, he was kept a prisoner so that there was no way of\nsatisfying that hate except at the times his master saw fit to put\nanother dog against him.  Beauty Smith had estimated his powers well, for\nhe was invariably the victor.  One day, three dogs were turned in upon\nhim in succession.  Another day a full-grown wolf, fresh-caught from the\nWild, was shoved in through the door of the pen.  And on still another\nday two dogs were set against him at the same time.  This was his\nseverest fight, and though in the end he killed them both he was himself\nhalf killed in doing it.\n\nIn the fall of the year, when the first snows were falling and mush-ice\nwas running in the river, Beauty Smith took passage for himself and White\nFang on a steamboat bound up the Yukon to Dawson.  White Fang had now\nachieved a reputation in the land.  As \"the Fighting Wolf\" he was known\nfar and wide, and the cage in which he was kept on the steam-boat's deck\nwas usually surrounded by curious men.  He raged and snarled at them, or\nlay quietly and studied them with cold hatred.  Why should he not hate\nthem?  He never asked himself the question.  He knew only hate and lost\nhimself in the passion of it.  Life had become a hell to him.  He had not\nbeen made for the close confinement wild beasts endure at the hands of\nmen.  And yet it was in precisely this way that he was treated.  Men\nstared at him, poked sticks between the bars to make him snarl, and then\nlaughed at him.\n\nThey were his environment, these men, and they were moulding the clay of\nhim into a more ferocious thing than had been intended by Nature.\nNevertheless, Nature had given him plasticity.  Where many another animal\nwould have died or had its spirit broken, he adjusted himself and lived,\nand at no expense of the spirit.  Possibly Beauty Smith, arch-fiend and\ntormentor, was capable of breaking White Fang's spirit, but as yet there\nwere no signs of his succeeding.\n\nIf Beauty Smith had in him a devil, White Fang had another; and the two\nof them raged against each other unceasingly.  In the days before, White\nFang had had the wisdom to cower down and submit to a man with a club in\nhis hand; but this wisdom now left him.  The mere sight of Beauty Smith\nwas sufficient to send him into transports of fury.  And when they came\nto close quarters, and he had been beaten back by the club, he went on\ngrowling and snarling, and showing his fangs.  The last growl could never\nbe extracted from him.  No matter how terribly he was beaten, he had\nalways another growl; and when Beauty Smith gave up and withdrew, the\ndefiant growl followed after him, or White Fang sprang at the bars of the\ncage bellowing his hatred.\n\nWhen the steamboat arrived at Dawson, White Fang went ashore.  But he\nstill lived a public life, in a cage, surrounded by curious men.  He was\nexhibited as \"the Fighting Wolf,\" and men paid fifty cents in gold dust\nto see him.  He was given no rest.  Did he lie down to sleep, he was\nstirred up by a sharp stick--so that the audience might get its money's\nworth.  In order to make the exhibition interesting, he was kept in a\nrage most of the time.  But worse than all this, was the atmosphere in\nwhich he lived.  He was regarded as the most fearful of wild beasts, and\nthis was borne in to him through the bars of the cage.  Every word, every\ncautious action, on the part of the men, impressed upon him his own\nterrible ferocity.  It was so much added fuel to the flame of his\nfierceness.  There could be but one result, and that was that his\nferocity fed upon itself and increased.  It was another instance of the\nplasticity of his clay, of his capacity for being moulded by the pressure\nof environment.\n\nIn addition to being exhibited he was a professional fighting animal.  At\nirregular intervals, whenever a fight could be arranged, he was taken out\nof his cage and led off into the woods a few miles from town.  Usually\nthis occurred at night, so as to avoid interference from the mounted\npolice of the Territory.  After a few hours of waiting, when daylight had\ncome, the audience and the dog with which he was to fight arrived.  In\nthis manner it came about that he fought all sizes and breeds of dogs.  It\nwas a savage land, the men were savage, and the fights were usually to\nthe death.\n\nSince White Fang continued to fight, it is obvious that it was the other\ndogs that died.  He never knew defeat.  His early training, when he\nfought with Lip-lip and the whole puppy-pack, stood him in good stead.\nThere was the tenacity with which he clung to the earth.  No dog could\nmake him lose his footing.  This was the favourite trick of the wolf\nbreeds--to rush in upon him, either directly or with an unexpected\nswerve, in the hope of striking his shoulder and overthrowing him.\nMackenzie hounds, Eskimo and Labrador dogs, huskies and Malemutes--all\ntried it on him, and all failed.  He was never known to lose his footing.\nMen told this to one another, and looked each time to see it happen; but\nWhite Fang always disappointed them.\n\nThen there was his lightning quickness.  It gave him a tremendous\nadvantage over his antagonists.  No matter what their fighting\nexperience, they had never encountered a dog that moved so swiftly as he.\nAlso to be reckoned with, was the immediateness of his attack.  The\naverage dog was accustomed to the preliminaries of snarling and bristling\nand growling, and the average dog was knocked off his feet and finished\nbefore he had begun to fight or recovered from his surprise.  So often\ndid this happen, that it became the custom to hold White Fang until the\nother dog went through its preliminaries, was good and ready, and even\nmade the first attack.\n\nBut greatest of all the advantages in White Fang's favour, was his\nexperience.  He knew more about fighting than did any of the dogs that\nfaced him.  He had fought more fights, knew how to meet more tricks and\nmethods, and had more tricks himself, while his own method was scarcely\nto be improved upon.\n\nAs the time went by, he had fewer and fewer fights.  Men despaired of\nmatching him with an equal, and Beauty Smith was compelled to pit wolves\nagainst him.  These were trapped by the Indians for the purpose, and a\nfight between White Fang and a wolf was always sure to draw a crowd.\nOnce, a full-grown female lynx was secured, and this time White Fang\nfought for his life.  Her quickness matched his; her ferocity equalled\nhis; while he fought with his fangs alone, and she fought with her sharp-\nclawed feet as well.\n\nBut after the lynx, all fighting ceased for White Fang.  There were no\nmore animals with which to fight--at least, there was none considered\nworthy of fighting with him.  So he remained on exhibition until spring,\nwhen one Tim Keenan, a faro-dealer, arrived in the land.  With him came\nthe first bull-dog that had ever entered the Klondike.  That this dog and\nWhite Fang should come together was inevitable, and for a week the\nanticipated fight was the mainspring of conversation in certain quarters\nof the town.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV--THE CLINGING DEATH\n\n\nBeauty Smith slipped the chain from his neck and stepped back.\n\nFor once White Fang did not make an immediate attack.  He stood still,\nears pricked forward, alert and curious, surveying the strange animal\nthat faced him.  He had never seen such a dog before.  Tim Keenan shoved\nthe bull-dog forward with a muttered \"Go to it.\"  The animal waddled\ntoward the centre of the circle, short and squat and ungainly.  He came\nto a stop and blinked across at White Fang.\n\nThere were cries from the crowd of, \"Go to him, Cherokee!  Sick 'm,\nCherokee!  Eat 'm up!\"\n\nBut Cherokee did not seem anxious to fight.  He turned his head and\nblinked at the men who shouted, at the same time wagging his stump of a\ntail good-naturedly.  He was not afraid, but merely lazy.  Besides, it\ndid not seem to him that it was intended he should fight with the dog he\nsaw before him.  He was not used to fighting with that kind of dog, and\nhe was waiting for them to bring on the real dog.\n\nTim Keenan stepped in and bent over Cherokee, fondling him on both sides\nof the shoulders with hands that rubbed against the grain of the hair and\nthat made slight, pushing-forward movements.  These were so many\nsuggestions.  Also, their effect was irritating, for Cherokee began to\ngrowl, very softly, deep down in his throat.  There was a correspondence\nin rhythm between the growls and the movements of the man's hands.  The\ngrowl rose in the throat with the culmination of each forward-pushing\nmovement, and ebbed down to start up afresh with the beginning of the\nnext movement.  The end of each movement was the accent of the rhythm,\nthe movement ending abruptly and the growling rising with a jerk.\n\nThis was not without its effect on White Fang.  The hair began to rise on\nhis neck and across the shoulders.  Tim Keenan gave a final shove forward\nand stepped back again.  As the impetus that carried Cherokee forward\ndied down, he continued to go forward of his own volition, in a swift,\nbow-legged run.  Then White Fang struck.  A cry of startled admiration\nwent up.  He had covered the distance and gone in more like a cat than a\ndog; and with the same cat-like swiftness he had slashed with his fangs\nand leaped clear.\n\nThe bull-dog was bleeding back of one ear from a rip in his thick neck.\nHe gave no sign, did not even snarl, but turned and followed after White\nFang.  The display on both sides, the quickness of the one and the\nsteadiness of the other, had excited the partisan spirit of the crowd,\nand the men were making new bets and increasing original bets.  Again,\nand yet again, White Fang sprang in, slashed, and got away untouched, and\nstill his strange foe followed after him, without too great haste, not\nslowly, but deliberately and determinedly, in a businesslike sort of way.\nThere was purpose in his method--something for him to do that he was\nintent upon doing and from which nothing could distract him.\n\nHis whole demeanour, every action, was stamped with this purpose.  It\npuzzled White Fang.  Never had he seen such a dog.  It had no hair\nprotection.  It was soft, and bled easily.  There was no thick mat of fur\nto baffle White Fang's teeth as they were often baffled by dogs of his\nown breed.  Each time that his teeth struck they sank easily into the\nyielding flesh, while the animal did not seem able to defend itself.\nAnother disconcerting thing was that it made no outcry, such as he had\nbeen accustomed to with the other dogs he had fought.  Beyond a growl or\na grunt, the dog took its punishment silently.  And never did it flag in\nits pursuit of him.\n\nNot that Cherokee was slow.  He could turn and whirl swiftly enough, but\nWhite Fang was never there.  Cherokee was puzzled, too.  He had never\nfought before with a dog with which he could not close.  The desire to\nclose had always been mutual.  But here was a dog that kept at a\ndistance, dancing and dodging here and there and all about.  And when it\ndid get its teeth into him, it did not hold on but let go instantly and\ndarted away again.\n\nBut White Fang could not get at the soft underside of the throat.  The\nbull-dog stood too short, while its massive jaws were an added\nprotection.  White Fang darted in and out unscathed, while Cherokee's\nwounds increased.  Both sides of his neck and head were ripped and\nslashed.  He bled freely, but showed no signs of being disconcerted.  He\ncontinued his plodding pursuit, though once, for the moment baffled, he\ncame to a full stop and blinked at the men who looked on, at the same\ntime wagging his stump of a tail as an expression of his willingness to\nfight.\n\nIn that moment White Fang was in upon him and out, in passing ripping his\ntrimmed remnant of an ear.  With a slight manifestation of anger,\nCherokee took up the pursuit again, running on the inside of the circle\nWhite Fang was making, and striving to fasten his deadly grip on White\nFang's throat.  The bull-dog missed by a hair's-breadth, and cries of\npraise went up as White Fang doubled suddenly out of danger in the\nopposite direction.\n\nThe time went by.  White Fang still danced on, dodging and doubling,\nleaping in and out, and ever inflicting damage.  And still the bull-dog,\nwith grim certitude, toiled after him.  Sooner or later he would\naccomplish his purpose, get the grip that would win the battle.  In the\nmeantime, he accepted all the punishment the other could deal him.  His\ntufts of ears had become tassels, his neck and shoulders were slashed in\na score of places, and his very lips were cut and bleeding--all from\nthese lightning snaps that were beyond his foreseeing and guarding.\n\nTime and again White Fang had attempted to knock Cherokee off his feet;\nbut the difference in their height was too great.  Cherokee was too\nsquat, too close to the ground.  White Fang tried the trick once too\noften.  The chance came in one of his quick doublings and\ncounter-circlings.  He caught Cherokee with head turned away as he\nwhirled more slowly.  His shoulder was exposed.  White Fang drove in upon\nit: but his own shoulder was high above, while he struck with such force\nthat his momentum carried him on across over the other's body.  For the\nfirst time in his fighting history, men saw White Fang lose his footing.\nHis body turned a half-somersault in the air, and he would have landed on\nhis back had he not twisted, catlike, still in the air, in the effort to\nbring his feet to the earth.  As it was, he struck heavily on his side.\nThe next instant he was on his feet, but in that instant Cherokee's teeth\nclosed on his throat.\n\nIt was not a good grip, being too low down toward the chest; but Cherokee\nheld on.  White Fang sprang to his feet and tore wildly around, trying to\nshake off the bull-dog's body.  It made him frantic, this clinging,\ndragging weight.  It bound his movements, restricted his freedom.  It was\nlike the trap, and all his instinct resented it and revolted against it.\nIt was a mad revolt.  For several minutes he was to all intents insane.\nThe basic life that was in him took charge of him.  The will to exist of\nhis body surged over him.  He was dominated by this mere flesh-love of\nlife.  All intelligence was gone.  It was as though he had no brain.  His\nreason was unseated by the blind yearning of the flesh to exist and move,\nat all hazards to move, to continue to move, for movement was the\nexpression of its existence.\n\nRound and round he went, whirling and turning and reversing, trying to\nshake off the fifty-pound weight that dragged at his throat.  The bull-\ndog did little but keep his grip.  Sometimes, and rarely, he managed to\nget his feet to the earth and for a moment to brace himself against White\nFang.  But the next moment his footing would be lost and he would be\ndragging around in the whirl of one of White Fang's mad gyrations.\nCherokee identified himself with his instinct.  He knew that he was doing\nthe right thing by holding on, and there came to him certain blissful\nthrills of satisfaction.  At such moments he even closed his eyes and\nallowed his body to be hurled hither and thither, willy-nilly, careless\nof any hurt that might thereby come to it.  That did not count.  The grip\nwas the thing, and the grip he kept.\n\nWhite Fang ceased only when he had tired himself out.  He could do\nnothing, and he could not understand.  Never, in all his fighting, had\nthis thing happened.  The dogs he had fought with did not fight that way.\nWith them it was snap and slash and get away, snap and slash and get\naway.  He lay partly on his side, panting for breath.  Cherokee still\nholding his grip, urged against him, trying to get him over entirely on\nhis side.  White Fang resisted, and he could feel the jaws shifting their\ngrip, slightly relaxing and coming together again in a chewing movement.\nEach shift brought the grip closer to his throat.  The bull-dog's method\nwas to hold what he had, and when opportunity favoured to work in for\nmore.  Opportunity favoured when White Fang remained quiet.  When White\nFang struggled, Cherokee was content merely to hold on.\n\nThe bulging back of Cherokee's neck was the only portion of his body that\nWhite Fang's teeth could reach.  He got hold toward the base where the\nneck comes out from the shoulders; but he did not know the chewing method\nof fighting, nor were his jaws adapted to it.  He spasmodically ripped\nand tore with his fangs for a space.  Then a change in their position\ndiverted him.  The bull-dog had managed to roll him over on his back, and\nstill hanging on to his throat, was on top of him.  Like a cat, White\nFang bowed his hind-quarters in, and, with the feet digging into his\nenemy's abdomen above him, he began to claw with long tearing-strokes.\nCherokee might well have been disembowelled had he not quickly pivoted on\nhis grip and got his body off of White Fang's and at right angles to it.\n\nThere was no escaping that grip.  It was like Fate itself, and as\ninexorable.  Slowly it shifted up along the jugular.  All that saved\nWhite Fang from death was the loose skin of his neck and the thick fur\nthat covered it.  This served to form a large roll in Cherokee's mouth,\nthe fur of which well-nigh defied his teeth.  But bit by bit, whenever\nthe chance offered, he was getting more of the loose skin and fur in his\nmouth.  The result was that he was slowly throttling White Fang.  The\nlatter's breath was drawn with greater and greater difficulty as the\nmoments went by.\n\nIt began to look as though the battle were over.  The backers of Cherokee\nwaxed jubilant and offered ridiculous odds.  White Fang's backers were\ncorrespondingly depressed, and refused bets of ten to one and twenty to\none, though one man was rash enough to close a wager of fifty to one.\nThis man was Beauty Smith.  He took a step into the ring and pointed his\nfinger at White Fang.  Then he began to laugh derisively and scornfully.\nThis produced the desired effect.  White Fang went wild with rage.  He\ncalled up his reserves of strength, and gained his feet.  As he struggled\naround the ring, the fifty pounds of his foe ever dragging on his throat,\nhis anger passed on into panic.  The basic life of him dominated him\nagain, and his intelligence fled before the will of his flesh to live.\nRound and round and back again, stumbling and falling and rising, even\nuprearing at times on his hind-legs and lifting his foe clear of the\nearth, he struggled vainly to shake off the clinging death.\n\nAt last he fell, toppling backward, exhausted; and the bull-dog promptly\nshifted his grip, getting in closer, mangling more and more of the fur-\nfolded flesh, throttling White Fang more severely than ever.  Shouts of\napplause went up for the victor, and there were many cries of \"Cherokee!\"\n\"Cherokee!\"  To this Cherokee responded by vigorous wagging of the stump\nof his tail.  But the clamour of approval did not distract him.  There\nwas no sympathetic relation between his tail and his massive jaws.  The\none might wag, but the others held their terrible grip on White Fang's\nthroat.\n\nIt was at this time that a diversion came to the spectators.  There was a\njingle of bells.  Dog-mushers' cries were heard.  Everybody, save Beauty\nSmith, looked apprehensively, the fear of the police strong upon them.\nBut they saw, up the trail, and not down, two men running with sled and\ndogs.  They were evidently coming down the creek from some prospecting\ntrip.  At sight of the crowd they stopped their dogs and came over and\njoined it, curious to see the cause of the excitement.  The dog-musher\nwore a moustache, but the other, a taller and younger man, was smooth-\nshaven, his skin rosy from the pounding of his blood and the running in\nthe frosty air.\n\nWhite Fang had practically ceased struggling.  Now and again he resisted\nspasmodically and to no purpose.  He could get little air, and that\nlittle grew less and less under the merciless grip that ever tightened.\nIn spite of his armour of fur, the great vein of his throat would have\nlong since been torn open, had not the first grip of the bull-dog been so\nlow down as to be practically on the chest.  It had taken Cherokee a long\ntime to shift that grip upward, and this had also tended further to clog\nhis jaws with fur and skin-fold.\n\nIn the meantime, the abysmal brute in Beauty Smith had been rising into\nhis brain and mastering the small bit of sanity that he possessed at\nbest.  When he saw White Fang's eyes beginning to glaze, he knew beyond\ndoubt that the fight was lost.  Then he broke loose.  He sprang upon\nWhite Fang and began savagely to kick him.  There were hisses from the\ncrowd and cries of protest, but that was all.  While this went on, and\nBeauty Smith continued to kick White Fang, there was a commotion in the\ncrowd.  The tall young newcomer was forcing his way through, shouldering\nmen right and left without ceremony or gentleness.  When he broke through\ninto the ring, Beauty Smith was just in the act of delivering another\nkick.  All his weight was on one foot, and he was in a state of unstable\nequilibrium.  At that moment the newcomer's fist landed a smashing blow\nfull in his face.  Beauty Smith's remaining leg left the ground, and his\nwhole body seemed to lift into the air as he turned over backward and\nstruck the snow.  The newcomer turned upon the crowd.\n\n\"You cowards!\" he cried.  \"You beasts!\"\n\nHe was in a rage himself--a sane rage.  His grey eyes seemed metallic and\nsteel-like as they flashed upon the crowd.  Beauty Smith regained his\nfeet and came toward him, sniffling and cowardly.  The new-comer did not\nunderstand.  He did not know how abject a coward the other was, and\nthought he was coming back intent on fighting.  So, with a \"You beast!\"\nhe smashed Beauty Smith over backward with a second blow in the face.\nBeauty Smith decided that the snow was the safest place for him, and lay\nwhere he had fallen, making no effort to get up.\n\n\"Come on, Matt, lend a hand,\" the newcomer called the dog-musher, who had\nfollowed him into the ring.\n\nBoth men bent over the dogs.  Matt took hold of White Fang, ready to pull\nwhen Cherokee's jaws should be loosened.  This the younger man\nendeavoured to accomplish by clutching the bulldog's jaws in his hands\nand trying to spread them.  It was a vain undertaking.  As he pulled and\ntugged and wrenched, he kept exclaiming with every expulsion of breath,\n\"Beasts!\"\n\nThe crowd began to grow unruly, and some of the men were protesting\nagainst the spoiling of the sport; but they were silenced when the\nnewcomer lifted his head from his work for a moment and glared at them.\n\n\"You damn beasts!\" he finally exploded, and went back to his task.\n\n\"It's no use, Mr. Scott, you can't break 'm apart that way,\" Matt said at\nlast.\n\nThe pair paused and surveyed the locked dogs.\n\n\"Ain't bleedin' much,\" Matt announced.  \"Ain't got all the way in yet.\"\n\n\"But he's liable to any moment,\" Scott answered.  \"There, did you see\nthat!  He shifted his grip in a bit.\"\n\nThe younger man's excitement and apprehension for White Fang was growing.\nHe struck Cherokee about the head savagely again and again.  But that did\nnot loosen the jaws.  Cherokee wagged the stump of his tail in\nadvertisement that he understood the meaning of the blows, but that he\nknew he was himself in the right and only doing his duty by keeping his\ngrip.\n\n\"Won't some of you help?\" Scott cried desperately at the crowd.\n\nBut no help was offered.  Instead, the crowd began sarcastically to cheer\nhim on and showered him with facetious advice.\n\n\"You'll have to get a pry,\" Matt counselled.\n\nThe other reached into the holster at his hip, drew his revolver, and\ntried to thrust its muzzle between the bull-dog's jaws.  He shoved, and\nshoved hard, till the grating of the steel against the locked teeth could\nbe distinctly heard.  Both men were on their knees, bending over the\ndogs.  Tim Keenan strode into the ring.  He paused beside Scott and\ntouched him on the shoulder, saying ominously:\n\n\"Don't break them teeth, stranger.\"\n\n\"Then I'll break his neck,\" Scott retorted, continuing his shoving and\nwedging with the revolver muzzle.\n\n\"I said don't break them teeth,\" the faro-dealer repeated more ominously\nthan before.\n\nBut if it was a bluff he intended, it did not work.  Scott never desisted\nfrom his efforts, though he looked up coolly and asked:\n\n\"Your dog?\"\n\nThe faro-dealer grunted.\n\n\"Then get in here and break this grip.\"\n\n\"Well, stranger,\" the other drawled irritatingly, \"I don't mind telling\nyou that's something I ain't worked out for myself.  I don't know how to\nturn the trick.\"\n\n\"Then get out of the way,\" was the reply, \"and don't bother me.  I'm\nbusy.\"\n\nTim Keenan continued standing over him, but Scott took no further notice\nof his presence.  He had managed to get the muzzle in between the jaws on\none side, and was trying to get it out between the jaws on the other\nside.  This accomplished, he pried gently and carefully, loosening the\njaws a bit at a time, while Matt, a bit at a time, extricated White\nFang's mangled neck.\n\n\"Stand by to receive your dog,\" was Scott's peremptory order to\nCherokee's owner.\n\nThe faro-dealer stooped down obediently and got a firm hold on Cherokee.\n\n\"Now!\" Scott warned, giving the final pry.\n\nThe dogs were drawn apart, the bull-dog struggling vigorously.\n\n\"Take him away,\" Scott commanded, and Tim Keenan dragged Cherokee back\ninto the crowd.\n\nWhite Fang made several ineffectual efforts to get up.  Once he gained\nhis feet, but his legs were too weak to sustain him, and he slowly wilted\nand sank back into the snow.  His eyes were half closed, and the surface\nof them was glassy.  His jaws were apart, and through them the tongue\nprotruded, draggled and limp.  To all appearances he looked like a dog\nthat had been strangled to death.  Matt examined him.\n\n\"Just about all in,\" he announced; \"but he's breathin' all right.\"\n\nBeauty Smith had regained his feet and come over to look at White Fang.\n\n\"Matt, how much is a good sled-dog worth?\" Scott asked.\n\nThe dog-musher, still on his knees and stooped over White Fang,\ncalculated for a moment.\n\n\"Three hundred dollars,\" he answered.\n\n\"And how much for one that's all chewed up like this one?\" Scott asked,\nnudging White Fang with his foot.\n\n\"Half of that,\" was the dog-musher's judgment.  Scott turned upon Beauty\nSmith.\n\n\"Did you hear, Mr. Beast?  I'm going to take your dog from you, and I'm\ngoing to give you a hundred and fifty for him.\"\n\nHe opened his pocket-book and counted out the bills.\n\nBeauty Smith put his hands behind his back, refusing to touch the\nproffered money.\n\n\"I ain't a-sellin',\" he said.\n\n\"Oh, yes you are,\" the other assured him.  \"Because I'm buying.  Here's\nyour money.  The dog's mine.\"\n\nBeauty Smith, his hands still behind him, began to back away.\n\nScott sprang toward him, drawing his fist back to strike.  Beauty Smith\ncowered down in anticipation of the blow.\n\n\"I've got my rights,\" he whimpered.\n\n\"You've forfeited your rights to own that dog,\" was the rejoinder.  \"Are\nyou going to take the money? or do I have to hit you again?\"\n\n\"All right,\" Beauty Smith spoke up with the alacrity of fear.  \"But I\ntake the money under protest,\" he added.  \"The dog's a mint.  I ain't a-\ngoin' to be robbed.  A man's got his rights.\"\n\n\"Correct,\" Scott answered, passing the money over to him.  \"A man's got\nhis rights.  But you're not a man.  You're a beast.\"\n\n\"Wait till I get back to Dawson,\" Beauty Smith threatened.  \"I'll have\nthe law on you.\"\n\n\"If you open your mouth when you get back to Dawson, I'll have you run\nout of town.  Understand?\"\n\nBeauty Smith replied with a grunt.\n\n\"Understand?\" the other thundered with abrupt fierceness.\n\n\"Yes,\" Beauty Smith grunted, shrinking away.\n\n\"Yes what?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" Beauty Smith snarled.\n\n\"Look out!  He'll bite!\" some one shouted, and a guffaw of laughter went\nup.\n\nScott turned his back on him, and returned to help the dog-musher, who\nwas working over White Fang.\n\nSome of the men were already departing; others stood in groups, looking\non and talking.  Tim Keenan joined one of the groups.\n\n\"Who's that mug?\" he asked.\n\n\"Weedon Scott,\" some one answered.\n\n\"And who in hell is Weedon Scott?\" the faro-dealer demanded.\n\n\"Oh, one of them crackerjack minin' experts.  He's in with all the big\nbugs.  If you want to keep out of trouble, you'll steer clear of him,\nthat's my talk.  He's all hunky with the officials.  The Gold\nCommissioner's a special pal of his.\"\n\n\"I thought he must be somebody,\" was the faro-dealer's comment.  \"That's\nwhy I kept my hands offen him at the start.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V--THE INDOMITABLE\n\n\n\"It's hopeless,\" Weedon Scott confessed.\n\nHe sat on the step of his cabin and stared at the dog-musher, who\nresponded with a shrug that was equally hopeless.\n\nTogether they looked at White Fang at the end of his stretched chain,\nbristling, snarling, ferocious, straining to get at the sled-dogs.  Having\nreceived sundry lessons from Matt, said lessons being imparted by means\nof a club, the sled-dogs had learned to leave White Fang alone; and even\nthen they were lying down at a distance, apparently oblivious of his\nexistence.\n\n\"It's a wolf and there's no taming it,\" Weedon Scott announced.\n\n\"Oh, I don't know about that,\" Matt objected.  \"Might be a lot of dog in\n'm, for all you can tell.  But there's one thing I know sure, an' that\nthere's no gettin' away from.\"\n\nThe dog-musher paused and nodded his head confidentially at Moosehide\nMountain.\n\n\"Well, don't be a miser with what you know,\" Scott said sharply, after\nwaiting a suitable length of time.  \"Spit it out.  What is it?\"\n\nThe dog-musher indicated White Fang with a backward thrust of his thumb.\n\n\"Wolf or dog, it's all the same--he's ben tamed 'ready.\"\n\n\"No!\"\n\n\"I tell you yes, an' broke to harness.  Look close there.  D'ye see them\nmarks across the chest?\"\n\n\"You're right, Matt.  He was a sled-dog before Beauty Smith got hold of\nhim.\"\n\n\"And there's not much reason against his bein' a sled-dog again.\"\n\n\"What d'ye think?\" Scott queried eagerly.  Then the hope died down as he\nadded, shaking his head, \"We've had him two weeks now, and if anything\nhe's wilder than ever at the present moment.\"\n\n\"Give 'm a chance,\" Matt counselled.  \"Turn 'm loose for a spell.\"\n\nThe other looked at him incredulously.\n\n\"Yes,\" Matt went on, \"I know you've tried to, but you didn't take a\nclub.\"\n\n\"You try it then.\"\n\nThe dog-musher secured a club and went over to the chained animal.  White\nFang watched the club after the manner of a caged lion watching the whip\nof its trainer.\n\n\"See 'm keep his eye on that club,\" Matt said.  \"That's a good sign.  He's\nno fool.  Don't dast tackle me so long as I got that club handy.  He's\nnot clean crazy, sure.\"\n\nAs the man's hand approached his neck, White Fang bristled and snarled\nand crouched down.  But while he eyed the approaching hand, he at the\nsame time contrived to keep track of the club in the other hand,\nsuspended threateningly above him.  Matt unsnapped the chain from the\ncollar and stepped back.\n\nWhite Fang could scarcely realise that he was free.  Many months had gone\nby since he passed into the possession of Beauty Smith, and in all that\nperiod he had never known a moment of freedom except at the times he had\nbeen loosed to fight with other dogs.  Immediately after such fights he\nhad always been imprisoned again.\n\nHe did not know what to make of it.  Perhaps some new devilry of the gods\nwas about to be perpetrated on him.  He walked slowly and cautiously,\nprepared to be assailed at any moment.  He did not know what to do, it\nwas all so unprecedented.  He took the precaution to sheer off from the\ntwo watching gods, and walked carefully to the corner of the cabin.\nNothing happened.  He was plainly perplexed, and he came back again,\npausing a dozen feet away and regarding the two men intently.\n\n\"Won't he run away?\" his new owner asked.\n\nMatt shrugged his shoulders.  \"Got to take a gamble.  Only way to find\nout is to find out.\"\n\n\"Poor devil,\" Scott murmured pityingly.  \"What he needs is some show of\nhuman kindness,\" he added, turning and going into the cabin.\n\nHe came out with a piece of meat, which he tossed to White Fang.  He\nsprang away from it, and from a distance studied it suspiciously.\n\n\"Hi-yu, Major!\" Matt shouted warningly, but too late.\n\nMajor had made a spring for the meat.  At the instant his jaws closed on\nit, White Fang struck him.  He was overthrown.  Matt rushed in, but\nquicker than he was White Fang.  Major staggered to his feet, but the\nblood spouting from his throat reddened the snow in a widening path.\n\n\"It's too bad, but it served him right,\" Scott said hastily.\n\nBut Matt's foot had already started on its way to kick White Fang.  There\nwas a leap, a flash of teeth, a sharp exclamation.  White Fang, snarling\nfiercely, scrambled backward for several yards, while Matt stooped and\ninvestigated his leg.\n\n\"He got me all right,\" he announced, pointing to the torn trousers and\nundercloths, and the growing stain of red.\n\n\"I told you it was hopeless, Matt,\" Scott said in a discouraged voice.\n\"I've thought about it off and on, while not wanting to think of it.  But\nwe've come to it now.  It's the only thing to do.\"\n\nAs he talked, with reluctant movements he drew his revolver, threw open\nthe cylinder, and assured himself of its contents.\n\n\"Look here, Mr. Scott,\" Matt objected; \"that dog's ben through hell.  You\ncan't expect 'm to come out a white an' shinin' angel.  Give 'm time.\"\n\n\"Look at Major,\" the other rejoined.\n\nThe dog-musher surveyed the stricken dog.  He had sunk down on the snow\nin the circle of his blood and was plainly in the last gasp.\n\n\"Served 'm right.  You said so yourself, Mr. Scott.  He tried to take\nWhite Fang's meat, an' he's dead-O.  That was to be expected.  I wouldn't\ngive two whoops in hell for a dog that wouldn't fight for his own meat.\"\n\n\"But look at yourself, Matt.  It's all right about the dogs, but we must\ndraw the line somewhere.\"\n\n\"Served me right,\" Matt argued stubbornly.  \"What'd I want to kick 'm\nfor?  You said yourself that he'd done right.  Then I had no right to\nkick 'm.\"\n\n\"It would be a mercy to kill him,\" Scott insisted.  \"He's untamable.\"\n\n\"Now look here, Mr. Scott, give the poor devil a fightin' chance.  He\nain't had no chance yet.  He's just come through hell, an' this is the\nfirst time he's ben loose.  Give 'm a fair chance, an' if he don't\ndeliver the goods, I'll kill 'm myself.  There!\"\n\n\"God knows I don't want to kill him or have him killed,\" Scott answered,\nputting away the revolver.  \"We'll let him run loose and see what\nkindness can do for him.  And here's a try at it.\"\n\nHe walked over to White Fang and began talking to him gently and\nsoothingly.\n\n\"Better have a club handy,\" Matt warned.\n\nScott shook his head and went on trying to win White Fang's confidence.\n\nWhite Fang was suspicious.  Something was impending.  He had killed this\ngod's dog, bitten his companion god, and what else was to be expected\nthan some terrible punishment?  But in the face of it he was indomitable.\nHe bristled and showed his teeth, his eyes vigilant, his whole body wary\nand prepared for anything.  The god had no club, so he suffered him to\napproach quite near.  The god's hand had come out and was descending upon\nhis head.  White Fang shrank together and grew tense as he crouched under\nit.  Here was danger, some treachery or something.  He knew the hands of\nthe gods, their proved mastery, their cunning to hurt.  Besides, there\nwas his old antipathy to being touched.  He snarled more menacingly,\ncrouched still lower, and still the hand descended.  He did not want to\nbite the hand, and he endured the peril of it until his instinct surged\nup in him, mastering him with its insatiable yearning for life.\n\nWeedon Scott had believed that he was quick enough to avoid any snap or\nslash.  But he had yet to learn the remarkable quickness of White Fang,\nwho struck with the certainty and swiftness of a coiled snake.\n\nScott cried out sharply with surprise, catching his torn hand and holding\nit tightly in his other hand.  Matt uttered a great oath and sprang to\nhis side.  White Fang crouched down, and backed away, bristling, showing\nhis fangs, his eyes malignant with menace.  Now he could expect a beating\nas fearful as any he had received from Beauty Smith.\n\n\"Here!  What are you doing?\" Scott cried suddenly.\n\nMatt had dashed into the cabin and come out with a rifle.\n\n\"Nothin',\" he said slowly, with a careless calmness that was assumed,\n\"only goin' to keep that promise I made.  I reckon it's up to me to kill\n'm as I said I'd do.\"\n\n\"No you don't!\"\n\n\"Yes I do.  Watch me.\"\n\nAs Matt had pleaded for White Fang when he had been bitten, it was now\nWeedon Scott's turn to plead.\n\n\"You said to give him a chance.  Well, give it to him.  We've only just\nstarted, and we can't quit at the beginning.  It served me right, this\ntime.  And--look at him!\"\n\nWhite Fang, near the corner of the cabin and forty feet away, was\nsnarling with blood-curdling viciousness, not at Scott, but at the dog-\nmusher.\n\n\"Well, I'll be everlastingly gosh-swoggled!\" was the dog-musher's\nexpression of astonishment.\n\n\"Look at the intelligence of him,\" Scott went on hastily.  \"He knows the\nmeaning of firearms as well as you do.  He's got intelligence and we've\ngot to give that intelligence a chance.  Put up the gun.\"\n\n\"All right, I'm willin',\" Matt agreed, leaning the rifle against the\nwoodpile.\n\n\"But will you look at that!\" he exclaimed the next moment.\n\nWhite Fang had quieted down and ceased snarling.  \"This is worth\ninvestigatin'.  Watch.\"\n\nMatt, reached for the rifle, and at the same moment White Fang snarled.\nHe stepped away from the rifle, and White Fang's lifted lips descended,\ncovering his teeth.\n\n\"Now, just for fun.\"\n\nMatt took the rifle and began slowly to raise it to his shoulder.  White\nFang's snarling began with the movement, and increased as the movement\napproached its culmination.  But the moment before the rifle came to a\nlevel on him, he leaped sidewise behind the corner of the cabin.  Matt\nstood staring along the sights at the empty space of snow which had been\noccupied by White Fang.\n\nThe dog-musher put the rifle down solemnly, then turned and looked at his\nemployer.\n\n\"I agree with you, Mr. Scott.  That dog's too intelligent to kill.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI--THE LOVE-MASTER\n\n\nAs White Fang watched Weedon Scott approach, he bristled and snarled to\nadvertise that he would not submit to punishment.  Twenty-four hours had\npassed since he had slashed open the hand that was now bandaged and held\nup by a sling to keep the blood out of it.  In the past White Fang had\nexperienced delayed punishments, and he apprehended that such a one was\nabout to befall him.  How could it be otherwise?  He had committed what\nwas to him sacrilege, sunk his fangs into the holy flesh of a god, and of\na white-skinned superior god at that.  In the nature of things, and of\nintercourse with gods, something terrible awaited him.\n\nThe god sat down several feet away.  White Fang could see nothing\ndangerous in that.  When the gods administered punishment they stood on\ntheir legs.  Besides, this god had no club, no whip, no firearm.  And\nfurthermore, he himself was free.  No chain nor stick bound him.  He\ncould escape into safety while the god was scrambling to his feet.  In\nthe meantime he would wait and see.\n\nThe god remained quiet, made no movement; and White Fang's snarl slowly\ndwindled to a growl that ebbed down in his throat and ceased.  Then the\ngod spoke, and at the first sound of his voice, the hair rose on White\nFang's neck and the growl rushed up in his throat.  But the god made no\nhostile movement, and went on calmly talking.  For a time White Fang\ngrowled in unison with him, a correspondence of rhythm being established\nbetween growl and voice.  But the god talked on interminably.  He talked\nto White Fang as White Fang had never been talked to before.  He talked\nsoftly and soothingly, with a gentleness that somehow, somewhere, touched\nWhite Fang.  In spite of himself and all the pricking warnings of his\ninstinct, White Fang began to have confidence in this god.  He had a\nfeeling of security that was belied by all his experience with men.\n\nAfter a long time, the god got up and went into the cabin.  White Fang\nscanned him apprehensively when he came out.  He had neither whip nor\nclub nor weapon.  Nor was his uninjured hand behind his back hiding\nsomething.  He sat down as before, in the same spot, several feet away.\nHe held out a small piece of meat.  White Fang pricked his ears and\ninvestigated it suspiciously, managing to look at the same time both at\nthe meat and the god, alert for any overt act, his body tense and ready\nto spring away at the first sign of hostility.\n\nStill the punishment delayed.  The god merely held near to his nose a\npiece of meat.  And about the meat there seemed nothing wrong.  Still\nWhite Fang suspected; and though the meat was proffered to him with short\ninviting thrusts of the hand, he refused to touch it.  The gods were all-\nwise, and there was no telling what masterful treachery lurked behind\nthat apparently harmless piece of meat.  In past experience, especially\nin dealing with squaws, meat and punishment had often been disastrously\nrelated.\n\nIn the end, the god tossed the meat on the snow at White Fang's feet.  He\nsmelled the meat carefully; but he did not look at it.  While he smelled\nit he kept his eyes on the god.  Nothing happened.  He took the meat into\nhis mouth and swallowed it.  Still nothing happened.  The god was\nactually offering him another piece of meat.  Again he refused to take it\nfrom the hand, and again it was tossed to him.  This was repeated a\nnumber of times.  But there came a time when the god refused to toss it.\nHe kept it in his hand and steadfastly proffered it.\n\nThe meat was good meat, and White Fang was hungry.  Bit by bit,\ninfinitely cautious, he approached the hand.  At last the time came that\nhe decided to eat the meat from the hand.  He never took his eyes from\nthe god, thrusting his head forward with ears flattened back and hair\ninvoluntarily rising and cresting on his neck.  Also a low growl rumbled\nin his throat as warning that he was not to be trifled with.  He ate the\nmeat, and nothing happened.  Piece by piece, he ate all the meat, and\nnothing happened.  Still the punishment delayed.\n\nHe licked his chops and waited.  The god went on talking.  In his voice\nwas kindness--something of which White Fang had no experience whatever.\nAnd within him it aroused feelings which he had likewise never\nexperienced before.  He was aware of a certain strange satisfaction, as\nthough some need were being gratified, as though some void in his being\nwere being filled.  Then again came the prod of his instinct and the\nwarning of past experience.  The gods were ever crafty, and they had\nunguessed ways of attaining their ends.\n\nAh, he had thought so!  There it came now, the god's hand, cunning to\nhurt, thrusting out at him, descending upon his head.  But the god went\non talking.  His voice was soft and soothing.  In spite of the menacing\nhand, the voice inspired confidence.  And in spite of the assuring voice,\nthe hand inspired distrust.  White Fang was torn by conflicting feelings,\nimpulses.  It seemed he would fly to pieces, so terrible was the control\nhe was exerting, holding together by an unwonted indecision the counter-\nforces that struggled within him for mastery.\n\nHe compromised.  He snarled and bristled and flattened his ears.  But he\nneither snapped nor sprang away.  The hand descended.  Nearer and nearer\nit came.  It touched the ends of his upstanding hair.  He shrank down\nunder it.  It followed down after him, pressing more closely against him.\nShrinking, almost shivering, he still managed to hold himself together.\nIt was a torment, this hand that touched him and violated his instinct.\nHe could not forget in a day all the evil that had been wrought him at\nthe hands of men.  But it was the will of the god, and he strove to\nsubmit.\n\nThe hand lifted and descended again in a patting, caressing movement.\nThis continued, but every time the hand lifted, the hair lifted under it.\nAnd every time the hand descended, the ears flattened down and a\ncavernous growl surged in his throat.  White Fang growled and growled\nwith insistent warning.  By this means he announced that he was prepared\nto retaliate for any hurt he might receive.  There was no telling when\nthe god's ulterior motive might be disclosed.  At any moment that soft,\nconfidence-inspiring voice might break forth in a roar of wrath, that\ngentle and caressing hand transform itself into a vice-like grip to hold\nhim helpless and administer punishment.\n\nBut the god talked on softly, and ever the hand rose and fell with non-\nhostile pats.  White Fang experienced dual feelings.  It was distasteful\nto his instinct.  It restrained him, opposed the will of him toward\npersonal liberty.  And yet it was not physically painful.  On the\ncontrary, it was even pleasant, in a physical way.  The patting movement\nslowly and carefully changed to a rubbing of the ears about their bases,\nand the physical pleasure even increased a little.  Yet he continued to\nfear, and he stood on guard, expectant of unguessed evil, alternately\nsuffering and enjoying as one feeling or the other came uppermost and\nswayed him.\n\n\"Well, I'll be gosh-swoggled!\"\n\nSo spoke Matt, coming out of the cabin, his sleeves rolled up, a pan of\ndirty dish-water in his hands, arrested in the act of emptying the pan by\nthe sight of Weedon Scott patting White Fang.\n\nAt the instant his voice broke the silence, White Fang leaped back,\nsnarling savagely at him.\n\nMatt regarded his employer with grieved disapproval.\n\n\"If you don't mind my expressin' my feelin's, Mr. Scott, I'll make free\nto say you're seventeen kinds of a damn fool an' all of 'em different,\nan' then some.\"\n\nWeedon Scott smiled with a superior air, gained his feet, and walked over\nto White Fang.  He talked soothingly to him, but not for long, then\nslowly put out his hand, rested it on White Fang's head, and resumed the\ninterrupted patting.  White Fang endured it, keeping his eyes fixed\nsuspiciously, not upon the man that patted him, but upon the man that\nstood in the doorway.\n\n\"You may be a number one, tip-top minin' expert, all right all right,\"\nthe dog-musher delivered himself oracularly, \"but you missed the chance\nof your life when you was a boy an' didn't run off an' join a circus.\"\n\nWhite Fang snarled at the sound of his voice, but this time did not leap\naway from under the hand that was caressing his head and the back of his\nneck with long, soothing strokes.\n\nIt was the beginning of the end for White Fang--the ending of the old\nlife and the reign of hate.  A new and incomprehensibly fairer life was\ndawning.  It required much thinking and endless patience on the part of\nWeedon Scott to accomplish this.  And on the part of White Fang it\nrequired nothing less than a revolution.  He had to ignore the urges and\npromptings of instinct and reason, defy experience, give the lie to life\nitself.\n\nLife, as he had known it, not only had had no place in it for much that\nhe now did; but all the currents had gone counter to those to which he\nnow abandoned himself.  In short, when all things were considered, he had\nto achieve an orientation far vaster than the one he had achieved at the\ntime he came voluntarily in from the Wild and accepted Grey Beaver as his\nlord.  At that time he was a mere puppy, soft from the making, without\nform, ready for the thumb of circumstance to begin its work upon him.  But\nnow it was different.  The thumb of circumstance had done its work only\ntoo well.  By it he had been formed and hardened into the Fighting Wolf,\nfierce and implacable, unloving and unlovable.  To accomplish the change\nwas like a reflux of being, and this when the plasticity of youth was no\nlonger his; when the fibre of him had become tough and knotty; when the\nwarp and the woof of him had made of him an adamantine texture, harsh and\nunyielding; when the face of his spirit had become iron and all his\ninstincts and axioms had crystallised into set rules, cautions, dislikes,\nand desires.\n\nYet again, in this new orientation, it was the thumb of circumstance that\npressed and prodded him, softening that which had become hard and\nremoulding it into fairer form.  Weedon Scott was in truth this thumb.  He\nhad gone to the roots of White Fang's nature, and with kindness touched\nto life potencies that had languished and well-nigh perished.  One such\npotency was _love_.  It took the place of _like_, which latter had been\nthe highest feeling that thrilled him in his intercourse with the gods.\n\nBut this love did not come in a day.  It began with _like_ and out of it\nslowly developed.  White Fang did not run away, though he was allowed to\nremain loose, because he liked this new god.  This was certainly better\nthan the life he had lived in the cage of Beauty Smith, and it was\nnecessary that he should have some god.  The lordship of man was a need\nof his nature.  The seal of his dependence on man had been set upon him\nin that early day when he turned his back on the Wild and crawled to Grey\nBeaver's feet to receive the expected beating.  This seal had been\nstamped upon him again, and ineradicably, on his second return from the\nWild, when the long famine was over and there was fish once more in the\nvillage of Grey Beaver.\n\nAnd so, because he needed a god and because he preferred Weedon Scott to\nBeauty Smith, White Fang remained.  In acknowledgment of fealty, he\nproceeded to take upon himself the guardianship of his master's property.\nHe prowled about the cabin while the sled-dogs slept, and the first night-\nvisitor to the cabin fought him off with a club until Weedon Scott came\nto the rescue.  But White Fang soon learned to differentiate between\nthieves and honest men, to appraise the true value of step and carriage.\nThe man who travelled, loud-stepping, the direct line to the cabin door,\nhe let alone--though he watched him vigilantly until the door opened and\nhe received the endorsement of the master.  But the man who went softly,\nby circuitous ways, peering with caution, seeking after secrecy--that was\nthe man who received no suspension of judgment from White Fang, and who\nwent away abruptly, hurriedly, and without dignity.\n\nWeedon Scott had set himself the task of redeeming White Fang--or rather,\nof redeeming mankind from the wrong it had done White Fang.  It was a\nmatter of principle and conscience.  He felt that the ill done White Fang\nwas a debt incurred by man and that it must be paid.  So he went out of\nhis way to be especially kind to the Fighting Wolf.  Each day he made it\na point to caress and pet White Fang, and to do it at length.\n\nAt first suspicious and hostile, White Fang grew to like this petting.\nBut there was one thing that he never outgrew--his growling.  Growl he\nwould, from the moment the petting began till it ended.  But it was a\ngrowl with a new note in it.  A stranger could not hear this note, and to\nsuch a stranger the growling of White Fang was an exhibition of\nprimordial savagery, nerve-racking and blood-curdling.  But White Fang's\nthroat had become harsh-fibred from the making of ferocious sounds\nthrough the many years since his first little rasp of anger in the lair\nof his cubhood, and he could not soften the sounds of that throat now to\nexpress the gentleness he felt.  Nevertheless, Weedon Scott's ear and\nsympathy were fine enough to catch the new note all but drowned in the\nfierceness--the note that was the faintest hint of a croon of content and\nthat none but he could hear.\n\nAs the days went by, the evolution of _like_ into _love_ was accelerated.\nWhite Fang himself began to grow aware of it, though in his consciousness\nhe knew not what love was.  It manifested itself to him as a void in his\nbeing--a hungry, aching, yearning void that clamoured to be filled.  It\nwas a pain and an unrest; and it received easement only by the touch of\nthe new god's presence.  At such times love was joy to him, a wild, keen-\nthrilling satisfaction.  But when away from his god, the pain and the\nunrest returned; the void in him sprang up and pressed against him with\nits emptiness, and the hunger gnawed and gnawed unceasingly.\n\nWhite Fang was in the process of finding himself.  In spite of the\nmaturity of his years and of the savage rigidity of the mould that had\nformed him, his nature was undergoing an expansion.  There was a\nburgeoning within him of strange feelings and unwonted impulses.  His old\ncode of conduct was changing.  In the past he had liked comfort and\nsurcease from pain, disliked discomfort and pain, and he had adjusted his\nactions accordingly.  But now it was different.  Because of this new\nfeeling within him, he ofttimes elected discomfort and pain for the sake\nof his god.  Thus, in the early morning, instead of roaming and foraging,\nor lying in a sheltered nook, he would wait for hours on the cheerless\ncabin-stoop for a sight of the god's face.  At night, when the god\nreturned home, White Fang would leave the warm sleeping-place he had\nburrowed in the snow in order to receive the friendly snap of fingers and\nthe word of greeting.  Meat, even meat itself, he would forego to be with\nhis god, to receive a caress from him or to accompany him down into the\ntown.\n\n_Like_ had been replaced by _love_.  And love was the plummet dropped\ndown into the deeps of him where like had never gone.  And responsive out\nof his deeps had come the new thing--love.  That which was given unto him\ndid he return.  This was a god indeed, a love-god, a warm and radiant\ngod, in whose light White Fang's nature expanded as a flower expands\nunder the sun.\n\nBut White Fang was not demonstrative.  He was too old, too firmly\nmoulded, to become adept at expressing himself in new ways.  He was too\nself-possessed, too strongly poised in his own isolation.  Too long had\nhe cultivated reticence, aloofness, and moroseness.  He had never barked\nin his life, and he could not now learn to bark a welcome when his god\napproached.  He was never in the way, never extravagant nor foolish in\nthe expression of his love.  He never ran to meet his god.  He waited at\na distance; but he always waited, was always there.  His love partook of\nthe nature of worship, dumb, inarticulate, a silent adoration.  Only by\nthe steady regard of his eyes did he express his love, and by the\nunceasing following with his eyes of his god's every movement.  Also, at\ntimes, when his god looked at him and spoke to him, he betrayed an\nawkward self-consciousness, caused by the struggle of his love to express\nitself and his physical inability to express it.\n\nHe learned to adjust himself in many ways to his new mode of life.  It\nwas borne in upon him that he must let his master's dogs alone.  Yet his\ndominant nature asserted itself, and he had first to thrash them into an\nacknowledgment of his superiority and leadership.  This accomplished, he\nhad little trouble with them.  They gave trail to him when he came and\nwent or walked among them, and when he asserted his will they obeyed.\n\nIn the same way, he came to tolerate Matt--as a possession of his master.\nHis master rarely fed him.  Matt did that, it was his business; yet White\nFang divined that it was his master's food he ate and that it was his\nmaster who thus fed him vicariously.  Matt it was who tried to put him\ninto the harness and make him haul sled with the other dogs.  But Matt\nfailed.  It was not until Weedon Scott put the harness on White Fang and\nworked him, that he understood.  He took it as his master's will that\nMatt should drive him and work him just as he drove and worked his\nmaster's other dogs.\n\nDifferent from the Mackenzie toboggans were the Klondike sleds with\nrunners under them.  And different was the method of driving the dogs.\nThere was no fan-formation of the team.  The dogs worked in single file,\none behind another, hauling on double traces.  And here, in the Klondike,\nthe leader was indeed the leader.  The wisest as well as strongest dog\nwas the leader, and the team obeyed him and feared him.  That White Fang\nshould quickly gain this post was inevitable.  He could not be satisfied\nwith less, as Matt learned after much inconvenience and trouble.  White\nFang picked out the post for himself, and Matt backed his judgment with\nstrong language after the experiment had been tried.  But, though he\nworked in the sled in the day, White Fang did not forego the guarding of\nhis master's property in the night.  Thus he was on duty all the time,\never vigilant and faithful, the most valuable of all the dogs.\n\n\"Makin' free to spit out what's in me,\" Matt said one day, \"I beg to\nstate that you was a wise guy all right when you paid the price you did\nfor that dog.  You clean swindled Beauty Smith on top of pushin' his face\nin with your fist.\"\n\nA recrudescence of anger glinted in Weedon Scott's grey eyes, and he\nmuttered savagely, \"The beast!\"\n\nIn the late spring a great trouble came to White Fang.  Without warning,\nthe love-master disappeared.  There had been warning, but White Fang was\nunversed in such things and did not understand the packing of a grip.  He\nremembered afterwards that his packing had preceded the master's\ndisappearance; but at the time he suspected nothing.  That night he\nwaited for the master to return.  At midnight the chill wind that blew\ndrove him to shelter at the rear of the cabin.  There he drowsed, only\nhalf asleep, his ears keyed for the first sound of the familiar step.\nBut, at two in the morning, his anxiety drove him out to the cold front\nstoop, where he crouched, and waited.\n\nBut no master came.  In the morning the door opened and Matt stepped\noutside.  White Fang gazed at him wistfully.  There was no common speech\nby which he might learn what he wanted to know.  The days came and went,\nbut never the master.  White Fang, who had never known sickness in his\nlife, became sick.  He became very sick, so sick that Matt was finally\ncompelled to bring him inside the cabin.  Also, in writing to his\nemployer, Matt devoted a postscript to White Fang.\n\nWeedon Scott reading the letter down in Circle City, came upon the\nfollowing:\n\n\"That dam wolf won't work.  Won't eat.  Aint got no spunk left.  All the\ndogs is licking him.  Wants to know what has become of you, and I don't\nknow how to tell him.  Mebbe he is going to die.\"\n\nIt was as Matt had said.  White Fang had ceased eating, lost heart, and\nallowed every dog of the team to thrash him.  In the cabin he lay on the\nfloor near the stove, without interest in food, in Matt, nor in life.\nMatt might talk gently to him or swear at him, it was all the same; he\nnever did more than turn his dull eyes upon the man, then drop his head\nback to its customary position on his fore-paws.\n\nAnd then, one night, Matt, reading to himself with moving lips and\nmumbled sounds, was startled by a low whine from White Fang.  He had got\nupon his feet, his ears cocked towards the door, and he was listening\nintently.  A moment later, Matt heard a footstep.  The door opened, and\nWeedon Scott stepped in.  The two men shook hands.  Then Scott looked\naround the room.\n\n\"Where's the wolf?\" he asked.\n\nThen he discovered him, standing where he had been lying, near to the\nstove.  He had not rushed forward after the manner of other dogs.  He\nstood, watching and waiting.\n\n\"Holy smoke!\" Matt exclaimed.  \"Look at 'm wag his tail!\"\n\nWeedon Scott strode half across the room toward him, at the same time\ncalling him.  White Fang came to him, not with a great bound, yet\nquickly.  He was awakened from self-consciousness, but as he drew near,\nhis eyes took on a strange expression.  Something, an incommunicable\nvastness of feeling, rose up into his eyes as a light and shone forth.\n\n\"He never looked at me that way all the time you was gone!\" Matt\ncommented.\n\nWeedon Scott did not hear.  He was squatting down on his heels, face to\nface with White Fang and petting him--rubbing at the roots of the ears,\nmaking long caressing strokes down the neck to the shoulders, tapping the\nspine gently with the balls of his fingers.  And White Fang was growling\nresponsively, the crooning note of the growl more pronounced than ever.\n\nBut that was not all.  What of his joy, the great love in him, ever\nsurging and struggling to express itself, succeeded in finding a new\nmode of expression.  He suddenly thrust his head forward and nudged his\nway in between the master's arm and body.  And here, confined, hidden\nfrom view all except his ears, no longer growling, he continued to nudge\nand snuggle.\n\nThe two men looked at each other.  Scott's eyes were shining.\n\n\"Gosh!\" said Matt in an awe-stricken voice.\n\nA moment later, when he had recovered himself, he said, \"I always\ninsisted that wolf was a dog.  Look at 'm!\"\n\nWith the return of the love-master, White Fang's recovery was rapid.  Two\nnights and a day he spent in the cabin.  Then he sallied forth.  The sled-\ndogs had forgotten his prowess.  They remembered only the latest, which\nwas his weakness and sickness.  At the sight of him as he came out of the\ncabin, they sprang upon him.\n\n\"Talk about your rough-houses,\" Matt murmured gleefully, standing in the\ndoorway and looking on.\n\n\"Give 'm hell, you wolf!  Give 'm hell!--an' then some!\"\n\nWhite Fang did not need the encouragement.  The return of the love-master\nwas enough.  Life was flowing through him again, splendid and\nindomitable.  He fought from sheer joy, finding in it an expression of\nmuch that he felt and that otherwise was without speech.  There could be\nbut one ending.  The team dispersed in ignominious defeat, and it was not\nuntil after dark that the dogs came sneaking back, one by one, by\nmeekness and humility signifying their fealty to White Fang.\n\nHaving learned to snuggle, White Fang was guilty of it often.  It was the\nfinal word.  He could not go beyond it.  The one thing of which he had\nalways been particularly jealous was his head.  He had always disliked to\nhave it touched.  It was the Wild in him, the fear of hurt and of the\ntrap, that had given rise to the panicky impulses to avoid contacts.  It\nwas the mandate of his instinct that that head must be free.  And now,\nwith the love-master, his snuggling was the deliberate act of putting\nhimself into a position of hopeless helplessness.  It was an expression\nof perfect confidence, of absolute self-surrender, as though he said: \"I\nput myself into thy hands.  Work thou thy will with me.\"\n\nOne night, not long after the return, Scott and Matt sat at a game of\ncribbage preliminary to going to bed.  \"Fifteen-two, fifteen-four an' a\npair makes six,\" Matt was pegging up, when there was an outcry and sound\nof snarling without.  They looked at each other as they started to rise\nto their feet.\n\n\"The wolf's nailed somebody,\" Matt said.\n\nA wild scream of fear and anguish hastened them.\n\n\"Bring a light!\" Scott shouted, as he sprang outside.\n\nMatt followed with the lamp, and by its light they saw a man lying on his\nback in the snow.  His arms were folded, one above the other, across his\nface and throat.  Thus he was trying to shield himself from White Fang's\nteeth.  And there was need for it.  White Fang was in a rage, wickedly\nmaking his attack on the most vulnerable spot.  From shoulder to wrist of\nthe crossed arms, the coat-sleeve, blue flannel shirt and undershirt were\nripped in rags, while the arms themselves were terribly slashed and\nstreaming blood.\n\nAll this the two men saw in the first instant.  The next instant Weedon\nScott had White Fang by the throat and was dragging him clear.  White\nFang struggled and snarled, but made no attempt to bite, while he quickly\nquieted down at a sharp word from the master.\n\nMatt helped the man to his feet.  As he arose he lowered his crossed\narms, exposing the bestial face of Beauty Smith.  The dog-musher let go\nof him precipitately, with action similar to that of a man who has picked\nup live fire.  Beauty Smith blinked in the lamplight and looked about\nhim.  He caught sight of White Fang and terror rushed into his face.\n\nAt the same moment Matt noticed two objects lying in the snow.  He held\nthe lamp close to them, indicating them with his toe for his employer's\nbenefit--a steel dog-chain and a stout club.\n\nWeedon Scott saw and nodded.  Not a word was spoken.  The dog-musher laid\nhis hand on Beauty Smith's shoulder and faced him to the right about.  No\nword needed to be spoken.  Beauty Smith started.\n\nIn the meantime the love-master was patting White Fang and talking to\nhim.\n\n\"Tried to steal you, eh?  And you wouldn't have it!  Well, well, he made\na mistake, didn't he?\"\n\n\"Must 'a' thought he had hold of seventeen devils,\" the dog-musher\nsniggered.\n\nWhite Fang, still wrought up and bristling, growled and growled, the hair\nslowly lying down, the crooning note remote and dim, but growing in his\nthroat.\n\n\n\n\nPART V\n\n\nCHAPTER I--THE LONG TRAIL\n\n\nIt was in the air.  White Fang sensed the coming calamity, even before\nthere was tangible evidence of it.  In vague ways it was borne in upon\nhim that a change was impending.  He knew not how nor why, yet he got his\nfeel of the oncoming event from the gods themselves.  In ways subtler\nthan they knew, they betrayed their intentions to the wolf-dog that\nhaunted the cabin-stoop, and that, though he never came inside the cabin,\nknew what went on inside their brains.\n\n\"Listen to that, will you!\" the dog-musher exclaimed at supper one night.\n\nWeedon Scott listened.  Through the door came a low, anxious whine, like\na sobbing under the breath that had just grown audible.  Then came the\nlong sniff, as White Fang reassured himself that his god was still inside\nand had not yet taken himself off in mysterious and solitary flight.\n\n\"I do believe that wolf's on to you,\" the dog-musher said.\n\nWeedon Scott looked across at his companion with eyes that almost\npleaded, though this was given the lie by his words.\n\n\"What the devil can I do with a wolf in California?\" he demanded.\n\n\"That's what I say,\" Matt answered.  \"What the devil can you do with a\nwolf in California?\"\n\nBut this did not satisfy Weedon Scott.  The other seemed to be judging\nhim in a non-committal sort of way.\n\n\"White man's dogs would have no show against him,\" Scott went on.  \"He'd\nkill them on sight.  If he didn't bankrupt me with damage suits, the\nauthorities would take him away from me and electrocute him.\"\n\n\"He's a downright murderer, I know,\" was the dog-musher's comment.\n\nWeedon Scott looked at him suspiciously.\n\n\"It would never do,\" he said decisively.\n\n\"It would never do!\" Matt concurred.  \"Why you'd have to hire a man\n'specially to take care of 'm.\"\n\nThe other's suspicion was allayed.  He nodded cheerfully.  In the silence\nthat followed, the low, half-sobbing whine was heard at the door and then\nthe long, questing sniff.\n\n\"There's no denyin' he thinks a hell of a lot of you,\" Matt said.\n\nThe other glared at him in sudden wrath.  \"Damn it all, man!  I know my\nown mind and what's best!\"\n\n\"I'm agreein' with you, only . . . \"\n\n\"Only what?\" Scott snapped out.\n\n\"Only . . . \" the dog-musher began softly, then changed his mind and\nbetrayed a rising anger of his own.  \"Well, you needn't get so all-fired\nhet up about it.  Judgin' by your actions one'd think you didn't know\nyour own mind.\"\n\nWeedon Scott debated with himself for a while, and then said more gently:\n\"You are right, Matt.  I don't know my own mind, and that's what's the\ntrouble.\"\n\n\"Why, it would be rank ridiculousness for me to take that dog along,\" he\nbroke out after another pause.\n\n\"I'm agreein' with you,\" was Matt's answer, and again his employer was\nnot quite satisfied with him.\n\n\"But how in the name of the great Sardanapolis he knows you're goin' is\nwhat gets me,\" the dog-musher continued innocently.\n\n\"It's beyond me, Matt,\" Scott answered, with a mournful shake of the\nhead.\n\nThen came the day when, through the open cabin door, White Fang saw the\nfatal grip on the floor and the love-master packing things into it.  Also,\nthere were comings and goings, and the erstwhile placid atmosphere of the\ncabin was vexed with strange perturbations and unrest.  Here was\nindubitable evidence.  White Fang had already scented it.  He now\nreasoned it.  His god was preparing for another flight.  And since he had\nnot taken him with him before, so, now, he could look to be left behind.\n\nThat night he lifted the long wolf-howl.  As he had howled, in his puppy\ndays, when he fled back from the Wild to the village to find it vanished\nand naught but a rubbish-heap to mark the site of Grey Beaver's tepee, so\nnow he pointed his muzzle to the cold stars and told to them his woe.\n\nInside the cabin the two men had just gone to bed.\n\n\"He's gone off his food again,\" Matt remarked from his bunk.\n\nThere was a grunt from Weedon Scott's bunk, and a stir of blankets.\n\n\"From the way he cut up the other time you went away, I wouldn't wonder\nthis time but what he died.\"\n\nThe blankets in the other bunk stirred irritably.\n\n\"Oh, shut up!\" Scott cried out through the darkness.  \"You nag worse than\na woman.\"\n\n\"I'm agreein' with you,\" the dog-musher answered, and Weedon Scott was\nnot quite sure whether or not the other had snickered.\n\nThe next day White Fang's anxiety and restlessness were even more\npronounced.  He dogged his master's heels whenever he left the cabin, and\nhaunted the front stoop when he remained inside.  Through the open door\nhe could catch glimpses of the luggage on the floor.  The grip had been\njoined by two large canvas bags and a box.  Matt was rolling the master's\nblankets and fur robe inside a small tarpaulin.  White Fang whined as he\nwatched the operation.\n\nLater on two Indians arrived.  He watched them closely as they shouldered\nthe luggage and were led off down the hill by Matt, who carried the\nbedding and the grip.  But White Fang did not follow them.  The master\nwas still in the cabin.  After a time, Matt returned.  The master came to\nthe door and called White Fang inside.\n\n\"You poor devil,\" he said gently, rubbing White Fang's ears and tapping\nhis spine.  \"I'm hitting the long trail, old man, where you cannot\nfollow.  Now give me a growl--the last, good, good-bye growl.\"\n\nBut White Fang refused to growl.  Instead, and after a wistful, searching\nlook, he snuggled in, burrowing his head out of sight between the\nmaster's arm and body.\n\n\"There she blows!\" Matt cried.  From the Yukon arose the hoarse bellowing\nof a river steamboat.  \"You've got to cut it short.  Be sure and lock the\nfront door.  I'll go out the back.  Get a move on!\"\n\nThe two doors slammed at the same moment, and Weedon Scott waited for\nMatt to come around to the front.  From inside the door came a low\nwhining and sobbing.  Then there were long, deep-drawn sniffs.\n\n\"You must take good care of him, Matt,\" Scott said, as they started down\nthe hill.  \"Write and let me know how he gets along.\"\n\n\"Sure,\" the dog-musher answered.  \"But listen to that, will you!\"\n\nBoth men stopped.  White Fang was howling as dogs howl when their masters\nlie dead.  He was voicing an utter woe, his cry bursting upward in great\nheart-breaking rushes, dying down into quavering misery, and bursting\nupward again with a rush upon rush of grief.\n\nThe _Aurora_ was the first steamboat of the year for the Outside, and her\ndecks were jammed with prosperous adventurers and broken gold seekers,\nall equally as mad to get to the Outside as they had been originally to\nget to the Inside.  Near the gang-plank, Scott was shaking hands with\nMatt, who was preparing to go ashore.  But Matt's hand went limp in the\nother's grasp as his gaze shot past and remained fixed on something\nbehind him.  Scott turned to see.  Sitting on the deck several feet away\nand watching wistfully was White Fang.\n\nThe dog-musher swore softly, in awe-stricken accents.  Scott could only\nlook in wonder.\n\n\"Did you lock the front door?\" Matt demanded.  The other nodded, and\nasked, \"How about the back?\"\n\n\"You just bet I did,\" was the fervent reply.\n\nWhite Fang flattened his ears ingratiatingly, but remained where he was,\nmaking no attempt to approach.\n\n\"I'll have to take 'm ashore with me.\"\n\nMatt made a couple of steps toward White Fang, but the latter slid away\nfrom him.  The dog-musher made a rush of it, and White Fang dodged\nbetween the legs of a group of men.  Ducking, turning, doubling, he slid\nabout the deck, eluding the other's efforts to capture him.\n\nBut when the love-master spoke, White Fang came to him with prompt\nobedience.\n\n\"Won't come to the hand that's fed 'm all these months,\" the dog-musher\nmuttered resentfully.  \"And you--you ain't never fed 'm after them first\ndays of gettin' acquainted.  I'm blamed if I can see how he works it out\nthat you're the boss.\"\n\nScott, who had been patting White Fang, suddenly bent closer and pointed\nout fresh-made cuts on his muzzle, and a gash between the eyes.\n\nMatt bent over and passed his hand along White Fang's belly.\n\n\"We plumb forgot the window.  He's all cut an' gouged underneath.  Must\n'a' butted clean through it, b'gosh!\"\n\nBut Weedon Scott was not listening.  He was thinking rapidly.  The\n_Aurora's_ whistle hooted a final announcement of departure.  Men were\nscurrying down the gang-plank to the shore.  Matt loosened the bandana\nfrom his own neck and started to put it around White Fang's.  Scott\ngrasped the dog-musher's hand.\n\n\"Good-bye, Matt, old man.  About the wolf--you needn't write.  You see,\nI've . . . !\"\n\n\"What!\" the dog-musher exploded.  \"You don't mean to say . . .?\"\n\n\"The very thing I mean.  Here's your bandana.  I'll write to you about\nhim.\"\n\nMatt paused halfway down the gang-plank.\n\n\"He'll never stand the climate!\" he shouted back.  \"Unless you clip 'm in\nwarm weather!\"\n\nThe gang-plank was hauled in, and the _Aurora_ swung out from the bank.\nWeedon Scott waved a last good-bye.  Then he turned and bent over White\nFang, standing by his side.\n\n\"Now growl, damn you, growl,\" he said, as he patted the responsive head\nand rubbed the flattening ears.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II--THE SOUTHLAND\n\n\nWhite Fang landed from the steamer in San Francisco.  He was appalled.\nDeep in him, below any reasoning process or act of consciousness, he had\nassociated power with godhead.  And never had the white men seemed such\nmarvellous gods as now, when he trod the slimy pavement of San Francisco.\nThe log cabins he had known were replaced by towering buildings.  The\nstreets were crowded with perils--waggons, carts, automobiles; great,\nstraining horses pulling huge trucks; and monstrous cable and electric\ncars hooting and clanging through the midst, screeching their insistent\nmenace after the manner of the lynxes he had known in the northern woods.\n\nAll this was the manifestation of power.  Through it all, behind it all,\nwas man, governing and controlling, expressing himself, as of old, by his\nmastery over matter.  It was colossal, stunning.  White Fang was awed.\nFear sat upon him.  As in his cubhood he had been made to feel his\nsmallness and puniness on the day he first came in from the Wild to the\nvillage of Grey Beaver, so now, in his full-grown stature and pride of\nstrength, he was made to feel small and puny.  And there were so many\ngods!  He was made dizzy by the swarming of them.  The thunder of the\nstreets smote upon his ears.  He was bewildered by the tremendous and\nendless rush and movement of things.  As never before, he felt his\ndependence on the love-master, close at whose heels he followed, no\nmatter what happened never losing sight of him.\n\nBut White Fang was to have no more than a nightmare vision of the city--an\nexperience that was like a bad dream, unreal and terrible, that haunted\nhim for long after in his dreams.  He was put into a baggage-car by the\nmaster, chained in a corner in the midst of heaped trunks and valises.\nHere a squat and brawny god held sway, with much noise, hurling trunks\nand boxes about, dragging them in through the door and tossing them into\nthe piles, or flinging them out of the door, smashing and crashing, to\nother gods who awaited them.\n\nAnd here, in this inferno of luggage, was White Fang deserted by the\nmaster.  Or at least White Fang thought he was deserted, until he smelled\nout the master's canvas clothes-bags alongside of him, and proceeded to\nmount guard over them.\n\n\"'Bout time you come,\" growled the god of the car, an hour later, when\nWeedon Scott appeared at the door.  \"That dog of yourn won't let me lay a\nfinger on your stuff.\"\n\nWhite Fang emerged from the car.  He was astonished.  The nightmare city\nwas gone.  The car had been to him no more than a room in a house, and\nwhen he had entered it the city had been all around him.  In the interval\nthe city had disappeared.  The roar of it no longer dinned upon his ears.\nBefore him was smiling country, streaming with sunshine, lazy with\nquietude.  But he had little time to marvel at the transformation.  He\naccepted it as he accepted all the unaccountable doings and\nmanifestations of the gods.  It was their way.\n\nThere was a carriage waiting.  A man and a woman approached the master.\nThe woman's arms went out and clutched the master around the neck--a\nhostile act!  The next moment Weedon Scott had torn loose from the\nembrace and closed with White Fang, who had become a snarling, raging\ndemon.\n\n\"It's all right, mother,\" Scott was saying as he kept tight hold of White\nFang and placated him.  \"He thought you were going to injure me, and he\nwouldn't stand for it.  It's all right.  It's all right.  He'll learn\nsoon enough.\"\n\n\"And in the meantime I may be permitted to love my son when his dog is\nnot around,\" she laughed, though she was pale and weak from the fright.\n\nShe looked at White Fang, who snarled and bristled and glared\nmalevolently.\n\n\"He'll have to learn, and he shall, without postponement,\" Scott said.\n\nHe spoke softly to White Fang until he had quieted him, then his voice\nbecame firm.\n\n\"Down, sir!  Down with you!\"\n\nThis had been one of the things taught him by the master, and White Fang\nobeyed, though he lay down reluctantly and sullenly.\n\n\"Now, mother.\"\n\nScott opened his arms to her, but kept his eyes on White Fang.\n\n\"Down!\" he warned.  \"Down!\"\n\nWhite Fang, bristling silently, half-crouching as he rose, sank back and\nwatched the hostile act repeated.  But no harm came of it, nor of the\nembrace from the strange man-god that followed.  Then the clothes-bags\nwere taken into the carriage, the strange gods and the love-master\nfollowed, and White Fang pursued, now running vigilantly behind, now\nbristling up to the running horses and warning them that he was there to\nsee that no harm befell the god they dragged so swiftly across the earth.\n\nAt the end of fifteen minutes, the carriage swung in through a stone\ngateway and on between a double row of arched and interlacing walnut\ntrees.  On either side stretched lawns, their broad sweep broken here and\nthere by great sturdy-limbed oaks.  In the near distance, in contrast\nwith the young-green of the tended grass, sunburnt hay-fields showed tan\nand gold; while beyond were the tawny hills and upland pastures.  From\nthe head of the lawn, on the first soft swell from the valley-level,\nlooked down the deep-porched, many-windowed house.\n\nLittle opportunity was given White Fang to see all this.  Hardly had the\ncarriage entered the grounds, when he was set upon by a sheep-dog, bright-\neyed, sharp-muzzled, righteously indignant and angry.  It was between him\nand the master, cutting him off.  White Fang snarled no warning, but his\nhair bristled as he made his silent and deadly rush.  This rush was never\ncompleted.  He halted with awkward abruptness, with stiff fore-legs\nbracing himself against his momentum, almost sitting down on his\nhaunches, so desirous was he of avoiding contact with the dog he was in\nthe act of attacking.  It was a female, and the law of his kind thrust a\nbarrier between.  For him to attack her would require nothing less than a\nviolation of his instinct.\n\nBut with the sheep-dog it was otherwise.  Being a female, she possessed\nno such instinct.  On the other hand, being a sheep-dog, her instinctive\nfear of the Wild, and especially of the wolf, was unusually keen.  White\nFang was to her a wolf, the hereditary marauder who had preyed upon her\nflocks from the time sheep were first herded and guarded by some dim\nancestor of hers.  And so, as he abandoned his rush at her and braced\nhimself to avoid the contact, she sprang upon him.  He snarled\ninvoluntarily as he felt her teeth in his shoulder, but beyond this made\nno offer to hurt her.  He backed away, stiff-legged with\nself-consciousness, and tried to go around her.  He dodged this way and\nthat, and curved and turned, but to no purpose.  She remained always\nbetween him and the way he wanted to go.\n\n\"Here, Collie!\" called the strange man in the carriage.\n\nWeedon Scott laughed.\n\n\"Never mind, father.  It is good discipline.  White Fang will have to\nlearn many things, and it's just as well that he begins now.  He'll\nadjust himself all right.\"\n\nThe carriage drove on, and still Collie blocked White Fang's way.  He\ntried to outrun her by leaving the drive and circling across the lawn but\nshe ran on the inner and smaller circle, and was always there, facing him\nwith her two rows of gleaming teeth.  Back he circled, across the drive\nto the other lawn, and again she headed him off.\n\nThe carriage was bearing the master away.  White Fang caught glimpses of\nit disappearing amongst the trees.  The situation was desperate.  He\nessayed another circle.  She followed, running swiftly.  And then,\nsuddenly, he turned upon her.  It was his old fighting trick.  Shoulder\nto shoulder, he struck her squarely.  Not only was she overthrown.  So\nfast had she been running that she rolled along, now on her back, now on\nher side, as she struggled to stop, clawing gravel with her feet and\ncrying shrilly her hurt pride and indignation.\n\nWhite Fang did not wait.  The way was clear, and that was all he had\nwanted.  She took after him, never ceasing her outcry.  It was the\nstraightaway now, and when it came to real running, White Fang could\nteach her things.  She ran frantically, hysterically, straining to the\nutmost, advertising the effort she was making with every leap: and all\nthe time White Fang slid smoothly away from her silently, without effort,\ngliding like a ghost over the ground.\n\nAs he rounded the house to the _porte-cochere_, he came upon the\ncarriage.  It had stopped, and the master was alighting.  At this moment,\nstill running at top speed, White Fang became suddenly aware of an attack\nfrom the side.  It was a deer-hound rushing upon him.  White Fang tried\nto face it.  But he was going too fast, and the hound was too close.  It\nstruck him on the side; and such was his forward momentum and the\nunexpectedness of it, White Fang was hurled to the ground and rolled\nclear over.  He came out of the tangle a spectacle of malignancy, ears\nflattened back, lips writhing, nose wrinkling, his teeth clipping\ntogether as the fangs barely missed the hound's soft throat.\n\nThe master was running up, but was too far away; and it was Collie that\nsaved the hound's life.  Before White Fang could spring in and deliver\nthe fatal stroke, and just as he was in the act of springing in, Collie\narrived.  She had been out-manoeuvred and out-run, to say nothing of her\nhaving been unceremoniously tumbled in the gravel, and her arrival was\nlike that of a tornado--made up of offended dignity, justifiable wrath,\nand instinctive hatred for this marauder from the Wild.  She struck White\nFang at right angles in the midst of his spring, and again he was knocked\noff his feet and rolled over.\n\nThe next moment the master arrived, and with one hand held White Fang,\nwhile the father called off the dogs.\n\n\"I say, this is a pretty warm reception for a poor lone wolf from the\nArctic,\" the master said, while White Fang calmed down under his\ncaressing hand.  \"In all his life he's only been known once to go off his\nfeet, and here he's been rolled twice in thirty seconds.\"\n\nThe carriage had driven away, and other strange gods had appeared from\nout the house.  Some of these stood respectfully at a distance; but two\nof them, women, perpetrated the hostile act of clutching the master\naround the neck.  White Fang, however, was beginning to tolerate this\nact.  No harm seemed to come of it, while the noises the gods made were\ncertainly not threatening.  These gods also made overtures to White Fang,\nbut he warned them off with a snarl, and the master did likewise with\nword of mouth.  At such times White Fang leaned in close against the\nmaster's legs and received reassuring pats on the head.\n\nThe hound, under the command, \"Dick!  Lie down, sir!\" had gone up the\nsteps and lain down to one side of the porch, still growling and keeping\na sullen watch on the intruder.  Collie had been taken in charge by one\nof the woman-gods, who held arms around her neck and petted and caressed\nher; but Collie was very much perplexed and worried, whining and\nrestless, outraged by the permitted presence of this wolf and confident\nthat the gods were making a mistake.\n\nAll the gods started up the steps to enter the house.  White Fang\nfollowed closely at the master's heels.  Dick, on the porch, growled, and\nWhite Fang, on the steps, bristled and growled back.\n\n\"Take Collie inside and leave the two of them to fight it out,\" suggested\nScott's father.  \"After that they'll be friends.\"\n\n\"Then White Fang, to show his friendship, will have to be chief mourner\nat the funeral,\" laughed the master.\n\nThe elder Scott looked incredulously, first at White Fang, then at Dick,\nand finally at his son.\n\n\"You mean . . .?\"\n\nWeedon nodded his head.  \"I mean just that.  You'd have a dead Dick\ninside one minute--two minutes at the farthest.\"\n\nHe turned to White Fang.  \"Come on, you wolf.  It's you that'll have to\ncome inside.\"\n\nWhite Fang walked stiff-legged up the steps and across the porch, with\ntail rigidly erect, keeping his eyes on Dick to guard against a flank\nattack, and at the same time prepared for whatever fierce manifestation\nof the unknown that might pounce out upon him from the interior of the\nhouse.  But no thing of fear pounced out, and when he had gained the\ninside he scouted carefully around, looking at it and finding it not.\nThen he lay down with a contented grunt at the master's feet, observing\nall that went on, ever ready to spring to his feet and fight for life\nwith the terrors he felt must lurk under the trap-roof of the dwelling.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III--THE GOD'S DOMAIN\n\n\nNot only was White Fang adaptable by nature, but he had travelled much,\nand knew the meaning and necessity of adjustment.  Here, in Sierra Vista,\nwhich was the name of Judge Scott's place, White Fang quickly began to\nmake himself at home.  He had no further serious trouble with the dogs.\nThey knew more about the ways of the Southland gods than did he, and in\ntheir eyes he had qualified when he accompanied the gods inside the\nhouse.  Wolf that he was, and unprecedented as it was, the gods had\nsanctioned his presence, and they, the dogs of the gods, could only\nrecognise this sanction.\n\nDick, perforce, had to go through a few stiff formalities at first, after\nwhich he calmly accepted White Fang as an addition to the premises.  Had\nDick had his way, they would have been good friends; but White Fang\nwas averse to friendship.  All he asked of other dogs was to be let\nalone.  His whole life he had kept aloof from his kind, and he still\ndesired to keep aloof.  Dick's overtures bothered him, so he snarled Dick\naway.  In the north he had learned the lesson that he must let the\nmaster's dogs alone, and he did not forget that lesson now.  But he\ninsisted on his own privacy and self-seclusion, and so thoroughly ignored\nDick that that good-natured creature finally gave him up and scarcely\ntook as much interest in him as in the hitching-post near the stable.\n\nNot so with Collie.  While she accepted him because it was the mandate of\nthe gods, that was no reason that she should leave him in peace.  Woven\ninto her being was the memory of countless crimes he and his had\nperpetrated against her ancestry.  Not in a day nor a generation were the\nravaged sheepfolds to be forgotten.  All this was a spur to her, pricking\nher to retaliation.  She could not fly in the face of the gods who\npermitted him, but that did not prevent her from making life miserable\nfor him in petty ways.  A feud, ages old, was between them, and she, for\none, would see to it that he was reminded.\n\nSo Collie took advantage of her sex to pick upon White Fang and maltreat\nhim.  His instinct would not permit him to attack her, while her\npersistence would not permit him to ignore her.  When she rushed at him\nhe turned his fur-protected shoulder to her sharp teeth and walked away\nstiff-legged and stately.  When she forced him too hard, he was compelled\nto go about in a circle, his shoulder presented to her, his head turned\nfrom her, and on his face and in his eyes a patient and bored expression.\nSometimes, however, a nip on his hind-quarters hastened his retreat and\nmade it anything but stately.  But as a rule he managed to maintain a\ndignity that was almost solemnity.  He ignored her existence whenever it\nwas possible, and made it a point to keep out of her way.  When he saw or\nheard her coming, he got up and walked off.\n\nThere was much in other matters for White Fang to learn.  Life in the\nNorthland was simplicity itself when compared with the complicated\naffairs of Sierra Vista.  First of all, he had to learn the family of the\nmaster.  In a way he was prepared to do this.  As Mit-sah and Kloo-kooch\nhad belonged to Grey Beaver, sharing his food, his fire, and his\nblankets, so now, at Sierra Vista, belonged to the love-master all the\ndenizens of the house.\n\nBut in this matter there was a difference, and many differences.  Sierra\nVista was a far vaster affair than the tepee of Grey Beaver.  There were\nmany persons to be considered.  There was Judge Scott, and there was his\nwife.  There were the master's two sisters, Beth and Mary.  There was his\nwife, Alice, and then there were his children, Weedon and Maud, toddlers\nof four and six.  There was no way for anybody to tell him about all\nthese people, and of blood-ties and relationship he knew nothing whatever\nand never would be capable of knowing.  Yet he quickly worked it out that\nall of them belonged to the master.  Then, by observation, whenever\nopportunity offered, by study of action, speech, and the very intonations\nof the voice, he slowly learned the intimacy and the degree of favour\nthey enjoyed with the master.  And by this ascertained standard, White\nFang treated them accordingly.  What was of value to the master he\nvalued; what was dear to the master was to be cherished by White Fang and\nguarded carefully.\n\nThus it was with the two children.  All his life he had disliked\nchildren.  He hated and feared their hands.  The lessons were not tender\nthat he had learned of their tyranny and cruelty in the days of the\nIndian villages.  When Weedon and Maud had first approached him, he\ngrowled warningly and looked malignant.  A cuff from the master and a\nsharp word had then compelled him to permit their caresses, though he\ngrowled and growled under their tiny hands, and in the growl there was no\ncrooning note.  Later, he observed that the boy and girl were of great\nvalue in the master's eyes.  Then it was that no cuff nor sharp word was\nnecessary before they could pat him.\n\nYet White Fang was never effusively affectionate.  He yielded to the\nmaster's children with an ill but honest grace, and endured their fooling\nas one would endure a painful operation.  When he could no longer endure,\nhe would get up and stalk determinedly away from them.  But after a time,\nhe grew even to like the children.  Still he was not demonstrative.  He\nwould not go up to them.  On the other hand, instead of walking away at\nsight of them, he waited for them to come to him.  And still later, it\nwas noticed that a pleased light came into his eyes when he saw them\napproaching, and that he looked after them with an appearance of curious\nregret when they left him for other amusements.\n\nAll this was a matter of development, and took time.  Next in his regard,\nafter the children, was Judge Scott.  There were two reasons, possibly,\nfor this.  First, he was evidently a valuable possession of the master's,\nand next, he was undemonstrative.  White Fang liked to lie at his feet on\nthe wide porch when he read the newspaper, from time to time favouring\nWhite Fang with a look or a word--untroublesome tokens that he recognised\nWhite Fang's presence and existence.  But this was only when the master\nwas not around.  When the master appeared, all other beings ceased to\nexist so far as White Fang was concerned.\n\nWhite Fang allowed all the members of the family to pet him and make much\nof him; but he never gave to them what he gave to the master.  No caress\nof theirs could put the love-croon into his throat, and, try as they\nwould, they could never persuade him into snuggling against them.  This\nexpression of abandon and surrender, of absolute trust, he reserved for\nthe master alone.  In fact, he never regarded the members of the family\nin any other light than possessions of the love-master.\n\nAlso White Fang had early come to differentiate between the family and\nthe servants of the household.  The latter were afraid of him, while he\nmerely refrained from attacking them.  This because he considered that\nthey were likewise possessions of the master.  Between White Fang and\nthem existed a neutrality and no more.  They cooked for the master and\nwashed the dishes and did other things just as Matt had done up in the\nKlondike.  They were, in short, appurtenances of the household.\n\nOutside the household there was even more for White Fang to learn.  The\nmaster's domain was wide and complex, yet it had its metes and bounds.\nThe land itself ceased at the county road.  Outside was the common domain\nof all gods--the roads and streets.  Then inside other fences were the\nparticular domains of other gods.  A myriad laws governed all these\nthings and determined conduct; yet he did not know the speech of the\ngods, nor was there any way for him to learn save by experience.  He\nobeyed his natural impulses until they ran him counter to some law.  When\nthis had been done a few times, he learned the law and after that\nobserved it.\n\nBut most potent in his education was the cuff of the master's hand, the\ncensure of the master's voice.  Because of White Fang's very great love,\na cuff from the master hurt him far more than any beating Grey Beaver or\nBeauty Smith had ever given him.  They had hurt only the flesh of him;\nbeneath the flesh the spirit had still raged, splendid and invincible.\nBut with the master the cuff was always too light to hurt the flesh.  Yet\nit went deeper.  It was an expression of the master's disapproval, and\nWhite Fang's spirit wilted under it.\n\nIn point of fact, the cuff was rarely administered.  The master's voice\nwas sufficient.  By it White Fang knew whether he did right or not.  By\nit he trimmed his conduct and adjusted his actions.  It was the compass\nby which he steered and learned to chart the manners of a new land and\nlife.\n\nIn the Northland, the only domesticated animal was the dog.  All other\nanimals lived in the Wild, and were, when not too formidable, lawful\nspoil for any dog.  All his days White Fang had foraged among the live\nthings for food.  It did not enter his head that in the Southland it was\notherwise.  But this he was to learn early in his residence in Santa\nClara Valley.  Sauntering around the corner of the house in the early\nmorning, he came upon a chicken that had escaped from the chicken-yard.\nWhite Fang's natural impulse was to eat it.  A couple of bounds, a flash\nof teeth and a frightened squawk, and he had scooped in the adventurous\nfowl.  It was farm-bred and fat and tender; and White Fang licked his\nchops and decided that such fare was good.\n\nLater in the day, he chanced upon another stray chicken near the stables.\nOne of the grooms ran to the rescue.  He did not know White Fang's breed,\nso for weapon he took a light buggy-whip.  At the first cut of the whip,\nWhite Fang left the chicken for the man.  A club might have stopped White\nFang, but not a whip.  Silently, without flinching, he took a second cut\nin his forward rush, and as he leaped for the throat the groom cried out,\n\"My God!\" and staggered backward.  He dropped the whip and shielded his\nthroat with his arms.  In consequence, his forearm was ripped open to the\nbone.\n\nThe man was badly frightened.  It was not so much White Fang's ferocity\nas it was his silence that unnerved the groom.  Still protecting his\nthroat and face with his torn and bleeding arm, he tried to retreat to\nthe barn.  And it would have gone hard with him had not Collie appeared\non the scene.  As she had saved Dick's life, she now saved the groom's.\nShe rushed upon White Fang in frenzied wrath.  She had been right.  She\nhad known better than the blundering gods.  All her suspicions were\njustified.  Here was the ancient marauder up to his old tricks again.\n\nThe groom escaped into the stables, and White Fang backed away before\nCollie's wicked teeth, or presented his shoulder to them and circled\nround and round.  But Collie did not give over, as was her wont, after a\ndecent interval of chastisement.  On the contrary, she grew more excited\nand angry every moment, until, in the end, White Fang flung dignity to\nthe winds and frankly fled away from her across the fields.\n\n\"He'll learn to leave chickens alone,\" the master said.  \"But I can't\ngive him the lesson until I catch him in the act.\"\n\nTwo nights later came the act, but on a more generous scale than the\nmaster had anticipated.  White Fang had observed closely the\nchicken-yards and the habits of the chickens.  In the night-time, after\nthey had gone to roost, he climbed to the top of a pile of newly hauled\nlumber.  From there he gained the roof of a chicken-house, passed over\nthe ridgepole and dropped to the ground inside.  A moment later he was\ninside the house, and the slaughter began.\n\nIn the morning, when the master came out on to the porch, fifty white\nLeghorn hens, laid out in a row by the groom, greeted his eyes.  He\nwhistled to himself, softly, first with surprise, and then, at the end,\nwith admiration.  His eyes were likewise greeted by White Fang, but about\nthe latter there were no signs of shame nor guilt.  He carried himself\nwith pride, as though, forsooth, he had achieved a deed praiseworthy and\nmeritorious.  There was about him no consciousness of sin.  The master's\nlips tightened as he faced the disagreeable task.  Then he talked harshly\nto the unwitting culprit, and in his voice there was nothing but godlike\nwrath.  Also, he held White Fang's nose down to the slain hens, and at\nthe same time cuffed him soundly.\n\nWhite Fang never raided a chicken-roost again.  It was against the law,\nand he had learned it.  Then the master took him into the chicken-yards.\nWhite Fang's natural impulse, when he saw the live food fluttering about\nhim and under his very nose, was to spring upon it.  He obeyed the\nimpulse, but was checked by the master's voice.  They continued in the\nyards for half an hour.  Time and again the impulse surged over White\nFang, and each time, as he yielded to it, he was checked by the master's\nvoice.  Thus it was he learned the law, and ere he left the domain of the\nchickens, he had learned to ignore their existence.\n\n\"You can never cure a chicken-killer.\"  Judge Scott shook his head sadly\nat luncheon table, when his son narrated the lesson he had given White\nFang.  \"Once they've got the habit and the taste of blood . . .\"  Again\nhe shook his head sadly.\n\nBut Weedon Scott did not agree with his father.  \"I'll tell you what I'll\ndo,\" he challenged finally.  \"I'll lock White Fang in with the chickens\nall afternoon.\"\n\n\"But think of the chickens,\" objected the judge.\n\n\"And furthermore,\" the son went on, \"for every chicken he kills, I'll pay\nyou one dollar gold coin of the realm.\"\n\n\"But you should penalise father, too,\" interpose Beth.\n\nHer sister seconded her, and a chorus of approval arose from around the\ntable.  Judge Scott nodded his head in agreement.\n\n\"All right.\" Weedon Scott pondered for a moment.  \"And if, at the end of\nthe afternoon White Fang hasn't harmed a chicken, for every ten minutes\nof the time he has spent in the yard, you will have to say to him,\ngravely and with deliberation, just as if you were sitting on the bench\nand solemnly passing judgment, 'White Fang, you are smarter than I\nthought.'\"\n\nFrom hidden points of vantage the family watched the performance.  But it\nwas a fizzle.  Locked in the yard and there deserted by the master, White\nFang lay down and went to sleep.  Once he got up and walked over to the\ntrough for a drink of water.  The chickens he calmly ignored.  So far as\nhe was concerned they did not exist.  At four o'clock he executed a\nrunning jump, gained the roof of the chicken-house and leaped to the\nground outside, whence he sauntered gravely to the house.  He had learned\nthe law.  And on the porch, before the delighted family, Judge Scott,\nface to face with White Fang, said slowly and solemnly, sixteen times,\n\"White Fang, you are smarter than I thought.\"\n\nBut it was the multiplicity of laws that befuddled White Fang and often\nbrought him into disgrace.  He had to learn that he must not touch the\nchickens that belonged to other gods.  Then there were cats, and rabbits,\nand turkeys; all these he must let alone.  In fact, when he had but\npartly learned the law, his impression was that he must leave all live\nthings alone.  Out in the back-pasture, a quail could flutter up under\nhis nose unharmed.  All tense and trembling with eagerness and desire, he\nmastered his instinct and stood still.  He was obeying the will of the\ngods.\n\nAnd then, one day, again out in the back-pasture, he saw Dick start a\njackrabbit and run it.  The master himself was looking on and did not\ninterfere.  Nay, he encouraged White Fang to join in the chase.  And thus\nhe learned that there was no taboo on jackrabbits.  In the end he worked\nout the complete law.  Between him and all domestic animals there must be\nno hostilities.  If not amity, at least neutrality must obtain.  But the\nother animals--the squirrels, and quail, and cottontails, were creatures\nof the Wild who had never yielded allegiance to man.  They were the\nlawful prey of any dog.  It was only the tame that the gods protected,\nand between the tame deadly strife was not permitted.  The gods held the\npower of life and death over their subjects, and the gods were jealous of\ntheir power.\n\nLife was complex in the Santa Clara Valley after the simplicities of the\nNorthland.  And the chief thing demanded by these intricacies of\ncivilisation was control, restraint--a poise of self that was as delicate\nas the fluttering of gossamer wings and at the same time as rigid as\nsteel.  Life had a thousand faces, and White Fang found he must meet them\nall--thus, when he went to town, in to San Jose, running behind the\ncarriage or loafing about the streets when the carriage stopped.  Life\nflowed past him, deep and wide and varied, continually impinging upon his\nsenses, demanding of him instant and endless adjustments and\ncorrespondences, and compelling him, almost always, to suppress his\nnatural impulses.\n\nThere were butcher-shops where meat hung within reach.  This meat he must\nnot touch.  There were cats at the houses the master visited that must be\nlet alone.  And there were dogs everywhere that snarled at him and that\nhe must not attack.  And then, on the crowded sidewalks there were\npersons innumerable whose attention he attracted.  They would stop and\nlook at him, point him out to one another, examine him, talk of him, and,\nworst of all, pat him.  And these perilous contacts from all these\nstrange hands he must endure.  Yet this endurance he achieved.\nFurthermore, he got over being awkward and self-conscious.  In a lofty\nway he received the attentions of the multitudes of strange gods.  With\ncondescension he accepted their condescension.  On the other hand, there\nwas something about him that prevented great familiarity.  They patted\nhim on the head and passed on, contented and pleased with their own\ndaring.\n\nBut it was not all easy for White Fang.  Running behind the carriage in\nthe outskirts of San Jose, he encountered certain small boys who made a\npractice of flinging stones at him.  Yet he knew that it was not\npermitted him to pursue and drag them down.  Here he was compelled to\nviolate his instinct of self-preservation, and violate it he did, for he\nwas becoming tame and qualifying himself for civilisation.\n\nNevertheless, White Fang was not quite satisfied with the arrangement.  He\nhad no abstract ideas about justice and fair play.  But there is a\ncertain sense of equity that resides in life, and it was this sense in\nhim that resented the unfairness of his being permitted no defence\nagainst the stone-throwers.  He forgot that in the covenant entered into\nbetween him and the gods they were pledged to care for him and defend\nhim.  But one day the master sprang from the carriage, whip in hand, and\ngave the stone-throwers a thrashing.  After that they threw stones no\nmore, and White Fang understood and was satisfied.\n\nOne other experience of similar nature was his.  On the way to town,\nhanging around the saloon at the cross-roads, were three dogs that made a\npractice of rushing out upon him when he went by.  Knowing his deadly\nmethod of fighting, the master had never ceased impressing upon White\nFang the law that he must not fight.  As a result, having learned the\nlesson well, White Fang was hard put whenever he passed the cross-roads\nsaloon.  After the first rush, each time, his snarl kept the three dogs\nat a distance but they trailed along behind, yelping and bickering and\ninsulting him.  This endured for some time.  The men at the saloon even\nurged the dogs on to attack White Fang.  One day they openly sicked the\ndogs on him.  The master stopped the carriage.\n\n\"Go to it,\" he said to White Fang.\n\nBut White Fang could not believe.  He looked at the master, and he looked\nat the dogs.  Then he looked back eagerly and questioningly at the\nmaster.\n\nThe master nodded his head.  \"Go to them, old fellow.  Eat them up.\"\n\nWhite Fang no longer hesitated.  He turned and leaped silently among his\nenemies.  All three faced him.  There was a great snarling and growling,\na clashing of teeth and a flurry of bodies.  The dust of the road arose\nin a cloud and screened the battle.  But at the end of several minutes\ntwo dogs were struggling in the dirt and the third was in full flight.  He\nleaped a ditch, went through a rail fence, and fled across a field.  White\nFang followed, sliding over the ground in wolf fashion and with wolf\nspeed, swiftly and without noise, and in the centre of the field he\ndragged down and slew the dog.\n\nWith this triple killing his main troubles with dogs ceased.  The word\nwent up and down the valley, and men saw to it that their dogs did not\nmolest the Fighting Wolf.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV--THE CALL OF KIND\n\n\nThe months came and went.  There was plenty of food and no work in the\nSouthland, and White Fang lived fat and prosperous and happy.  Not alone\nwas he in the geographical Southland, for he was in the Southland of\nlife.  Human kindness was like a sun shining upon him, and he flourished\nlike a flower planted in good soil.\n\nAnd yet he remained somehow different from other dogs.  He knew the law\neven better than did the dogs that had known no other life, and he\nobserved the law more punctiliously; but still there was about him a\nsuggestion of lurking ferocity, as though the Wild still lingered in him\nand the wolf in him merely slept.\n\nHe never chummed with other dogs.  Lonely he had lived, so far as his\nkind was concerned, and lonely he would continue to live.  In his\npuppyhood, under the persecution of Lip-lip and the puppy-pack, and in\nhis fighting days with Beauty Smith, he had acquired a fixed aversion for\ndogs.  The natural course of his life had been diverted, and, recoiling\nfrom his kind, he had clung to the human.\n\nBesides, all Southland dogs looked upon him with suspicion.  He aroused\nin them their instinctive fear of the Wild, and they greeted him always\nwith snarl and growl and belligerent hatred.  He, on the other hand,\nlearned that it was not necessary to use his teeth upon them.  His naked\nfangs and writhing lips were uniformly efficacious, rarely failing to\nsend a bellowing on-rushing dog back on its haunches.\n\nBut there was one trial in White Fang's life--Collie.  She never gave him\na moment's peace.  She was not so amenable to the law as he.  She defied\nall efforts of the master to make her become friends with White Fang.\nEver in his ears was sounding her sharp and nervous snarl.  She had never\nforgiven him the chicken-killing episode, and persistently held to the\nbelief that his intentions were bad.  She found him guilty before the\nact, and treated him accordingly.  She became a pest to him, like a\npoliceman following him around the stable and the hounds, and, if he even\nso much as glanced curiously at a pigeon or chicken, bursting into an\noutcry of indignation and wrath.  His favourite way of ignoring her was\nto lie down, with his head on his fore-paws, and pretend sleep.  This\nalways dumfounded and silenced her.\n\nWith the exception of Collie, all things went well with White Fang.  He\nhad learned control and poise, and he knew the law.  He achieved a\nstaidness, and calmness, and philosophic tolerance.  He no longer lived\nin a hostile environment.  Danger and hurt and death did not lurk\neverywhere about him.  In time, the unknown, as a thing of terror and\nmenace ever impending, faded away.  Life was soft and easy.  It flowed\nalong smoothly, and neither fear nor foe lurked by the way.\n\nHe missed the snow without being aware of it.  \"An unduly long summer,\"\nwould have been his thought had he thought about it; as it was, he merely\nmissed the snow in a vague, subconscious way.  In the same fashion,\nespecially in the heat of summer when he suffered from the sun, he\nexperienced faint longings for the Northland.  Their only effect upon\nhim, however, was to make him uneasy and restless without his knowing\nwhat was the matter.\n\nWhite Fang had never been very demonstrative.  Beyond his snuggling and\nthe throwing of a crooning note into his love-growl, he had no way of\nexpressing his love.  Yet it was given him to discover a third way.  He\nhad always been susceptible to the laughter of the gods.  Laughter had\naffected him with madness, made him frantic with rage.  But he did not\nhave it in him to be angry with the love-master, and when that god\nelected to laugh at him in a good-natured, bantering way, he was\nnonplussed.  He could feel the pricking and stinging of the old anger as\nit strove to rise up in him, but it strove against love.  He could not be\nangry; yet he had to do something.  At first he was dignified, and the\nmaster laughed the harder.  Then he tried to be more dignified, and the\nmaster laughed harder than before.  In the end, the master laughed him\nout of his dignity.  His jaws slightly parted, his lips lifted a little,\nand a quizzical expression that was more love than humour came into his\neyes.  He had learned to laugh.\n\nLikewise he learned to romp with the master, to be tumbled down and\nrolled over, and be the victim of innumerable rough tricks.  In return he\nfeigned anger, bristling and growling ferociously, and clipping his teeth\ntogether in snaps that had all the seeming of deadly intention.  But he\nnever forgot himself.  Those snaps were always delivered on the empty\nair.  At the end of such a romp, when blow and cuff and snap and snarl\nwere last and furious, they would break off suddenly and stand several\nfeet apart, glaring at each other.  And then, just as suddenly, like the\nsun rising on a stormy sea, they would begin to laugh.  This would always\nculminate with the master's arms going around White Fang's neck and\nshoulders while the latter crooned and growled his love-song.\n\nBut nobody else ever romped with White Fang.  He did not permit it.  He\nstood on his dignity, and when they attempted it, his warning snarl and\nbristling mane were anything but playful.  That he allowed the master\nthese liberties was no reason that he should be a common dog, loving here\nand loving there, everybody's property for a romp and good time.  He\nloved with single heart and refused to cheapen himself or his love.\n\nThe master went out on horseback a great deal, and to accompany him was\none of White Fang's chief duties in life.  In the Northland he had\nevidenced his fealty by toiling in the harness; but there were no sleds\nin the Southland, nor did dogs pack burdens on their backs.  So he\nrendered fealty in the new way, by running with the master's horse.  The\nlongest day never played White Fang out.  His was the gait of the wolf,\nsmooth, tireless and effortless, and at the end of fifty miles he would\ncome in jauntily ahead of the horse.\n\nIt was in connection with the riding, that White Fang achieved one other\nmode of expression--remarkable in that he did it but twice in all his\nlife.  The first time occurred when the master was trying to teach a\nspirited thoroughbred the method of opening and closing gates without the\nrider's dismounting.  Time and again and many times he ranged the horse\nup to the gate in the effort to close it and each time the horse became\nfrightened and backed and plunged away.  It grew more nervous and excited\nevery moment.  When it reared, the master put the spurs to it and made it\ndrop its fore-legs back to earth, whereupon it would begin kicking with\nits hind-legs.  White Fang watched the performance with increasing\nanxiety until he could contain himself no longer, when he sprang in front\nof the horse and barked savagely and warningly.\n\nThough he often tried to bark thereafter, and the master encouraged him,\nhe succeeded only once, and then it was not in the master's presence.  A\nscamper across the pasture, a jackrabbit rising suddenly under the\nhorse's feet, a violent sheer, a stumble, a fall to earth, and a broken\nleg for the master, was the cause of it.  White Fang sprang in a rage at\nthe throat of the offending horse, but was checked by the master's voice.\n\n\"Home!  Go home!\" the master commanded when he had ascertained his\ninjury.\n\nWhite Fang was disinclined to desert him.  The master thought of writing\na note, but searched his pockets vainly for pencil and paper.  Again he\ncommanded White Fang to go home.\n\nThe latter regarded him wistfully, started away, then returned and whined\nsoftly.  The master talked to him gently but seriously, and he cocked his\nears, and listened with painful intentness.\n\n\"That's all right, old fellow, you just run along home,\" ran the talk.\n\"Go on home and tell them what's happened to me.  Home with you, you\nwolf.  Get along home!\"\n\nWhite Fang knew the meaning of \"home,\" and though he did not understand\nthe remainder of the master's language, he knew it was his will that he\nshould go home.  He turned and trotted reluctantly away.  Then he\nstopped, undecided, and looked back over his shoulder.\n\n\"Go home!\" came the sharp command, and this time he obeyed.\n\nThe family was on the porch, taking the cool of the afternoon, when White\nFang arrived.  He came in among them, panting, covered with dust.\n\n\"Weedon's back,\" Weedon's mother announced.\n\nThe children welcomed White Fang with glad cries and ran to meet him.  He\navoided them and passed down the porch, but they cornered him against a\nrocking-chair and the railing.  He growled and tried to push by them.\nTheir mother looked apprehensively in their direction.\n\n\"I confess, he makes me nervous around the children,\" she said.  \"I have\na dread that he will turn upon them unexpectedly some day.\"\n\nGrowling savagely, White Fang sprang out of the corner, overturning the\nboy and the girl.  The mother called them to her and comforted them,\ntelling them not to bother White Fang.\n\n\"A wolf is a wolf!\" commented Judge Scott.  \"There is no trusting one.\"\n\n\"But he is not all wolf,\" interposed Beth, standing for her brother in\nhis absence.\n\n\"You have only Weedon's opinion for that,\" rejoined the judge.  \"He\nmerely surmises that there is some strain of dog in White Fang; but as he\nwill tell you himself, he knows nothing about it.  As for his\nappearance--\"\n\nHe did not finish his sentence.  White Fang stood before him, growling\nfiercely.\n\n\"Go away!  Lie down, sir!\" Judge Scott commanded.\n\nWhite Fang turned to the love-master's wife.  She screamed with fright as\nhe seized her dress in his teeth and dragged on it till the frail fabric\ntore away.  By this time he had become the centre of interest.\n\nHe had ceased from his growling and stood, head up, looking into their\nfaces.  His throat worked spasmodically, but made no sound, while he\nstruggled with all his body, convulsed with the effort to rid himself of\nthe incommunicable something that strained for utterance.\n\n\"I hope he is not going mad,\" said Weedon's mother.  \"I told Weedon that\nI was afraid the warm climate would not agree with an Arctic animal.\"\n\n\"He's trying to speak, I do believe,\" Beth announced.\n\nAt this moment speech came to White Fang, rushing up in a great burst of\nbarking.\n\n\"Something has happened to Weedon,\" his wife said decisively.\n\nThey were all on their feet now, and White Fang ran down the steps,\nlooking back for them to follow.  For the second and last time in his\nlife he had barked and made himself understood.\n\nAfter this event he found a warmer place in the hearts of the Sierra\nVista people, and even the groom whose arm he had slashed admitted that\nhe was a wise dog even if he was a wolf.  Judge Scott still held to the\nsame opinion, and proved it to everybody's dissatisfaction by\nmeasurements and descriptions taken from the encyclopaedia and various\nworks on natural history.\n\nThe days came and went, streaming their unbroken sunshine over the Santa\nClara Valley.  But as they grew shorter and White Fang's second winter in\nthe Southland came on, he made a strange discovery.  Collie's teeth were\nno longer sharp.  There was a playfulness about her nips and a gentleness\nthat prevented them from really hurting him.  He forgot that she had made\nlife a burden to him, and when she disported herself around him he\nresponded solemnly, striving to be playful and becoming no more than\nridiculous.\n\nOne day she led him off on a long chase through the back-pasture land\ninto the woods.  It was the afternoon that the master was to ride, and\nWhite Fang knew it.  The horse stood saddled and waiting at the door.\nWhite Fang hesitated.  But there was that in him deeper than all the law\nhe had learned, than the customs that had moulded him, than his love for\nthe master, than the very will to live of himself; and when, in the\nmoment of his indecision, Collie nipped him and scampered off, he turned\nand followed after.  The master rode alone that day; and in the woods,\nside by side, White Fang ran with Collie, as his mother, Kiche, and old\nOne Eye had run long years before in the silent Northland forest.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V--THE SLEEPING WOLF\n\n\nIt was about this time that the newspapers were full of the daring escape\nof a convict from San Quentin prison.  He was a ferocious man.  He had\nbeen ill-made in the making.  He had not been born right, and he had not\nbeen helped any by the moulding he had received at the hands of society.\nThe hands of society are harsh, and this man was a striking sample of its\nhandiwork.  He was a beast--a human beast, it is true, but nevertheless\nso terrible a beast that he can best be characterised as carnivorous.\n\nIn San Quentin prison he had proved incorrigible.  Punishment failed to\nbreak his spirit.  He could die dumb-mad and fighting to the last, but he\ncould not live and be beaten.  The more fiercely he fought, the more\nharshly society handled him, and the only effect of harshness was to make\nhim fiercer.  Strait-jackets, starvation, and beatings and clubbings\nwere the wrong treatment for Jim Hall; but it was the treatment he\nreceived.  It was the treatment he had received from the time he was a\nlittle pulpy boy in a San Francisco slum--soft clay in the hands of\nsociety and ready to be formed into something.\n\nIt was during Jim Hall's third term in prison that he encountered a guard\nthat was almost as great a beast as he.  The guard treated him unfairly,\nlied about him to the warden, lost his credits, persecuted him.  The\ndifference between them was that the guard carried a bunch of keys and a\nrevolver.  Jim Hall had only his naked hands and his teeth.  But he\nsprang upon the guard one day and used his teeth on the other's throat\njust like any jungle animal.\n\nAfter this, Jim Hall went to live in the incorrigible cell.  He lived\nthere three years.  The cell was of iron, the floor, the walls, the roof.\nHe never left this cell.  He never saw the sky nor the sunshine.  Day was\na twilight and night was a black silence.  He was in an iron tomb, buried\nalive.  He saw no human face, spoke to no human thing.  When his food was\nshoved in to him, he growled like a wild animal.  He hated all things.\nFor days and nights he bellowed his rage at the universe.  For weeks and\nmonths he never made a sound, in the black silence eating his very soul.\nHe was a man and a monstrosity, as fearful a thing of fear as ever\ngibbered in the visions of a maddened brain.\n\nAnd then, one night, he escaped.  The warders said it was impossible, but\nnevertheless the cell was empty, and half in half out of it lay the body\nof a dead guard.  Two other dead guards marked his trail through the\nprison to the outer walls, and he had killed with his hands to avoid\nnoise.\n\nHe was armed with the weapons of the slain guards--a live arsenal that\nfled through the hills pursued by the organised might of society.  A\nheavy price of gold was upon his head.  Avaricious farmers hunted him\nwith shot-guns.  His blood might pay off a mortgage or send a son to\ncollege.  Public-spirited citizens took down their rifles and went out\nafter him.  A pack of bloodhounds followed the way of his bleeding feet.\nAnd the sleuth-hounds of the law, the paid fighting animals of society,\nwith telephone, and telegraph, and special train, clung to his trail\nnight and day.\n\nSometimes they came upon him, and men faced him like heroes, or stampeded\nthrough barbed-wire fences to the delight of the commonwealth reading the\naccount at the breakfast table.  It was after such encounters that the\ndead and wounded were carted back to the towns, and their places filled\nby men eager for the man-hunt.\n\nAnd then Jim Hall disappeared.  The bloodhounds vainly quested on the\nlost trail.  Inoffensive ranchers in remote valleys were held up by armed\nmen and compelled to identify themselves.  While the remains of Jim Hall\nwere discovered on a dozen mountain-sides by greedy claimants for blood-\nmoney.\n\nIn the meantime the newspapers were read at Sierra Vista, not so much\nwith interest as with anxiety.  The women were afraid.  Judge Scott pooh-\npoohed and laughed, but not with reason, for it was in his last days on\nthe bench that Jim Hall had stood before him and received sentence.  And\nin open court-room, before all men, Jim Hall had proclaimed that the day\nwould come when he would wreak vengeance on the Judge that sentenced him.\n\nFor once, Jim Hall was right.  He was innocent of the crime for which he\nwas sentenced.  It was a case, in the parlance of thieves and police, of\n\"rail-roading.\"  Jim Hall was being \"rail-roaded\" to prison for a crime\nhe had not committed.  Because of the two prior convictions against him,\nJudge Scott imposed upon him a sentence of fifty years.\n\nJudge Scott did not know all things, and he did not know that he was\nparty to a police conspiracy, that the evidence was hatched and perjured,\nthat Jim Hall was guiltless of the crime charged.  And Jim Hall, on the\nother hand, did not know that Judge Scott was merely ignorant.  Jim Hall\nbelieved that the judge knew all about it and was hand in glove with the\npolice in the perpetration of the monstrous injustice.  So it was, when\nthe doom of fifty years of living death was uttered by Judge Scott, that\nJim Hall, hating all things in the society that misused him, rose up and\nraged in the court-room until dragged down by half a dozen of his blue-\ncoated enemies.  To him, Judge Scott was the keystone in the arch of\ninjustice, and upon Judge Scott he emptied the vials of his wrath and\nhurled the threats of his revenge yet to come.  Then Jim Hall went to his\nliving death . . . and escaped.\n\nOf all this White Fang knew nothing.  But between him and Alice, the\nmaster's wife, there existed a secret.  Each night, after Sierra Vista\nhad gone to bed, she rose and let in White Fang to sleep in the big hall.\nNow White Fang was not a house-dog, nor was he permitted to sleep in the\nhouse; so each morning, early, she slipped down and let him out before\nthe family was awake.\n\nOn one such night, while all the house slept, White Fang awoke and lay\nvery quietly.  And very quietly he smelled the air and read the message\nit bore of a strange god's presence.  And to his ears came sounds of the\nstrange god's movements.  White Fang burst into no furious outcry.  It\nwas not his way.  The strange god walked softly, but more softly walked\nWhite Fang, for he had no clothes to rub against the flesh of his body.\nHe followed silently.  In the Wild he had hunted live meat that was\ninfinitely timid, and he knew the advantage of surprise.\n\nThe strange god paused at the foot of the great staircase and listened,\nand White Fang was as dead, so without movement was he as he watched and\nwaited.  Up that staircase the way led to the love-master and to the love-\nmaster's dearest possessions.  White Fang bristled, but waited.  The\nstrange god's foot lifted.  He was beginning the ascent.\n\nThen it was that White Fang struck.  He gave no warning, with no snarl\nanticipated his own action.  Into the air he lifted his body in the\nspring that landed him on the strange god's back.  White Fang clung with\nhis fore-paws to the man's shoulders, at the same time burying his fangs\ninto the back of the man's neck.  He clung on for a moment, long enough\nto drag the god over backward.  Together they crashed to the floor.  White\nFang leaped clear, and, as the man struggled to rise, was in again with\nthe slashing fangs.\n\nSierra Vista awoke in alarm.  The noise from downstairs was as that of a\nscore of battling fiends.  There were revolver shots.  A man's voice\nscreamed once in horror and anguish.  There was a great snarling and\ngrowling, and over all arose a smashing and crashing of furniture and\nglass.\n\nBut almost as quickly as it had arisen, the commotion died away.  The\nstruggle had not lasted more than three minutes.  The frightened\nhousehold clustered at the top of the stairway.  From below, as from out\nan abyss of blackness, came up a gurgling sound, as of air bubbling\nthrough water.  Sometimes this gurgle became sibilant, almost a whistle.\nBut this, too, quickly died down and ceased.  Then naught came up out of\nthe blackness save a heavy panting of some creature struggling sorely for\nair.\n\nWeedon Scott pressed a button, and the staircase and downstairs hall were\nflooded with light.  Then he and Judge Scott, revolvers in hand,\ncautiously descended.  There was no need for this caution.  White Fang\nhad done his work.  In the midst of the wreckage of overthrown and\nsmashed furniture, partly on his side, his face hidden by an arm, lay a\nman.  Weedon Scott bent over, removed the arm and turned the man's face\nupward.  A gaping throat explained the manner of his death.\n\n\"Jim Hall,\" said Judge Scott, and father and son looked significantly at\neach other.\n\nThen they turned to White Fang.  He, too, was lying on his side.  His\neyes were closed, but the lids slightly lifted in an effort to look at\nthem as they bent over him, and the tail was perceptibly agitated in a\nvain effort to wag.  Weedon Scott patted him, and his throat rumbled an\nacknowledging growl.  But it was a weak growl at best, and it quickly\nceased.  His eyelids drooped and went shut, and his whole body seemed to\nrelax and flatten out upon the floor.\n\n\"He's all in, poor devil,\" muttered the master.\n\n\"We'll see about that,\" asserted the Judge, as he started for the\ntelephone.\n\n\"Frankly, he has one chance in a thousand,\" announced the surgeon, after\nhe had worked an hour and a half on White Fang.\n\nDawn was breaking through the windows and dimming the electric lights.\nWith the exception of the children, the whole family was gathered about\nthe surgeon to hear his verdict.\n\n\"One broken hind-leg,\" he went on.  \"Three broken ribs, one at least of\nwhich has pierced the lungs.  He has lost nearly all the blood in his\nbody.  There is a large likelihood of internal injuries.  He must have\nbeen jumped upon.  To say nothing of three bullet holes clear through\nhim.  One chance in a thousand is really optimistic.  He hasn't a chance\nin ten thousand.\"\n\n\"But he mustn't lose any chance that might be of help to him,\" Judge\nScott exclaimed.  \"Never mind expense.  Put him under the X-ray--anything.\nWeedon, telegraph at once to San Francisco for Doctor Nichols.  No\nreflection on you, doctor, you understand; but he must have the advantage\nof every chance.\"\n\nThe surgeon smiled indulgently.  \"Of course I understand.  He deserves\nall that can be done for him.  He must be nursed as you would nurse a\nhuman being, a sick child.  And don't forget what I told you about\ntemperature.  I'll be back at ten o'clock again.\"\n\nWhite Fang received the nursing.  Judge Scott's suggestion of a trained\nnurse was indignantly clamoured down by the girls, who themselves\nundertook the task.  And White Fang won out on the one chance in ten\nthousand denied him by the surgeon.\n\nThe latter was not to be censured for his misjudgment.  All his life he\nhad tended and operated on the soft humans of civilisation, who lived\nsheltered lives and had descended out of many sheltered generations.\nCompared with White Fang, they were frail and flabby, and clutched life\nwithout any strength in their grip.  White Fang had come straight from\nthe Wild, where the weak perish early and shelter is vouchsafed to none.\nIn neither his father nor his mother was there any weakness, nor in the\ngenerations before them.  A constitution of iron and the vitality of the\nWild were White Fang's inheritance, and he clung to life, the whole of\nhim and every part of him, in spirit and in flesh, with the tenacity that\nof old belonged to all creatures.\n\nBound down a prisoner, denied even movement by the plaster casts and\nbandages, White Fang lingered out the weeks.  He slept long hours and\ndreamed much, and through his mind passed an unending pageant of\nNorthland visions.  All the ghosts of the past arose and were with him.\nOnce again he lived in the lair with Kiche, crept trembling to the knees\nof Grey Beaver to tender his allegiance, ran for his life before Lip-lip\nand all the howling bedlam of the puppy-pack.\n\nHe ran again through the silence, hunting his living food through the\nmonths of famine; and again he ran at the head of the team, the gut-whips\nof Mit-sah and Grey Beaver snapping behind, their voices crying \"Ra!\nRaa!\" when they came to a narrow passage and the team closed together\nlike a fan to go through.  He lived again all his days with Beauty Smith\nand the fights he had fought.  At such times he whimpered and snarled in\nhis sleep, and they that looked on said that his dreams were bad.\n\nBut there was one particular nightmare from which he suffered--the\nclanking, clanging monsters of electric cars that were to him colossal\nscreaming lynxes.  He would lie in a screen of bushes, watching for a\nsquirrel to venture far enough out on the ground from its tree-refuge.\nThen, when he sprang out upon it, it would transform itself into an\nelectric car, menacing and terrible, towering over him like a mountain,\nscreaming and clanging and spitting fire at him.  It was the same when he\nchallenged the hawk down out of the sky.  Down out of the blue it would\nrush, as it dropped upon him changing itself into the ubiquitous electric\ncar.  Or again, he would be in the pen of Beauty Smith.  Outside the pen,\nmen would be gathering, and he knew that a fight was on.  He watched the\ndoor for his antagonist to enter.  The door would open, and thrust in\nupon him would come the awful electric car.  A thousand times this\noccurred, and each time the terror it inspired was as vivid and great as\never.\n\nThen came the day when the last bandage and the last plaster cast were\ntaken off.  It was a gala day.  All Sierra Vista was gathered around.  The\nmaster rubbed his ears, and he crooned his love-growl.  The master's wife\ncalled him the \"Blessed Wolf,\" which name was taken up with acclaim and\nall the women called him the Blessed Wolf.\n\nHe tried to rise to his feet, and after several attempts fell down from\nweakness.  He had lain so long that his muscles had lost their cunning,\nand all the strength had gone out of them.  He felt a little shame\nbecause of his weakness, as though, forsooth, he were failing the gods in\nthe service he owed them.  Because of this he made heroic efforts to\narise and at last he stood on his four legs, tottering and swaying back\nand forth.\n\n\"The Blessed Wolf!\" chorused the women.\n\nJudge Scott surveyed them triumphantly.\n\n\"Out of your own mouths be it,\" he said.  \"Just as I contended right\nalong.  No mere dog could have done what he did.  He's a wolf.\"\n\n\"A Blessed Wolf,\" amended the Judge's wife.\n\n\"Yes, Blessed Wolf,\" agreed the Judge.  \"And henceforth that shall be my\nname for him.\"\n\n\"He'll have to learn to walk again,\" said the surgeon; \"so he might as\nwell start in right now.  It won't hurt him.  Take him outside.\"\n\nAnd outside he went, like a king, with all Sierra Vista about him and\ntending on him.  He was very weak, and when he reached the lawn he lay\ndown and rested for a while.\n\nThen the procession started on, little spurts of strength coming into\nWhite Fang's muscles as he used them and the blood began to surge through\nthem.  The stables were reached, and there in the doorway, lay Collie, a\nhalf-dozen pudgy puppies playing about her in the sun.\n\nWhite Fang looked on with a wondering eye.  Collie snarled warningly at\nhim, and he was careful to keep his distance.  The master with his toe\nhelped one sprawling puppy toward him.  He bristled suspiciously, but the\nmaster warned him that all was well.  Collie, clasped in the arms of one\nof the women, watched him jealously and with a snarl warned him that all\nwas not well.\n\nThe puppy sprawled in front of him.  He cocked his ears and watched it\ncuriously.  Then their noses touched, and he felt the warm little tongue\nof the puppy on his jowl.  White Fang's tongue went out, he knew not why,\nand he licked the puppy's face.\n\nHand-clapping and pleased cries from the gods greeted the performance.  He\nwas surprised, and looked at them in a puzzled way.  Then his weakness\nasserted itself, and he lay down, his ears cocked, his head on one side,\nas he watched the puppy.  The other puppies came sprawling toward him, to\nCollie's great disgust; and he gravely permitted them to clamber and\ntumble over him.  At first, amid the applause of the gods, he betrayed a\ntrifle of his old self-consciousness and awkwardness.  This passed away\nas the puppies' antics and mauling continued, and he lay with half-shut\npatient eyes, drowsing in the sun."