The Call of the Wild

artners into the East after a fabled lost mine, thehistory of which was as old as the history of the country. Many menhad sought it; few had found it; and more than a few there were w

ad sworn to it,and to the mine the site of which it marked, clinching their t

he East on an unknown trail to achievewhere men and dogs as good as themselves had failed. They sleddedseventy miles up the Yukon, swung to the left into the Stewart Ri

thewild. With a handful of salt and a rifle he could plunge into t

e kept ontravelling, secure in the knowledge that sooner or later he would come toit. So, on this great journey into the East, straight mea

e, the dogs loafing and the men burning holesthrough frozen muck and gravel and washing countless pans of dirt bythe heat of the fire. Sometimes they went hungry, sometimes theyfeasted riotously, all according to the abund

untains betweenthe timber line and the eternal snows, dropped into summer valleys amidswarming gnats and flies, and in the shadows of glaciers pickedstrawberries and flowers as ripe and fair as any the Southland couldboast. In the fall of the year they

sof men who had gone before. Once, they came upon a path blazedthro

wreckage ofa hunting lodge, and amid the shreds of rotted blankets John Thorntonfound a long-barrelled flint-lock. He knew it for a Hudson BayCompany gun of the young days in the Northw

ound, not the Lost Cabin, but a shallow placer in a broad valley wheret

d every day. Thegold was sacked in moose-hide bags, fifty pounds to the bag, and piledlike so much firewood outside the

long hours musingby the fire. The vision of the short-legged hairy man came to him morefrequently, now that there was

lly into thedarkness and fling more wood upon the fire. Did they walk by thebeach of a sea, where the hairy man gathered shell- fish and ate them as hegathered, it was with eyes that roved everywhere for hidden danger andwith legs prepared to run like t

s adozen feet apart, letting go and catching, never falling, never missing hisgrip. In fact, he seemed as much at home among the trees as

of the forest. It filled him with a great unrestand strange desires. It caused him to feel a

k soil where long grasses grew, and snort with joy at the fat earthsmells; or he would crouch for hours, as if in concealment, behindfungus- covered trunks of fallen trees, wide-eyed and wide-eared to allthat moved and

cross the open spaces where the niggerheads bunched. He loved torun down dry watercourses, and to creep and spy upon the bird life in thewoods. For a day at a time he would lie in the underbrush where hecould watch the partridges drumming and strutting up and down. Butespecially

te as never before,--a long-drawn howl, like, yet unlike,any noise made by husky dog. And he knew it, in the old familiar way,as a sound heard before. He sprang through the sleeping camp and inswift silence dashed through the w

gathered compactly together, tail straight and stiff, feet falling withunwonted care. Every movement advertised commingled threateninga

here a timber jam barredthe way. The wolf whirled about, pivoting on his hind legs after thefashion of Joe and of all

riendly advances. The wolf was suspicious and afraid; for Buck madet

, he darted away, and

r Buck could not so easily have overtaken him. Hewould run till Buck's head was even with h

- coy way withwhich fierce beasts belie their fierceness. After some time of this thewolf started off at an easy lope in a manner that plainly showed he wasgoing somewhere. He made it clear to

armer. Buck was wildly glad. Heknew he was at last answering the call, running by the side of his woodbrother toward the place from where the call surely came. Oldmemories were coming upon him fast, and he was stirring to them as ofold he sti

,sniffing noses and making actions as though to encourage him. ButBuck turned about and started slowly on the back track. For the betterpart of an hour the wild brother ran by his side, whinin

on, overturning him, scramblingupon him, licking his face, biting his hand--"playing the general tom-f

fter two days the call in the forest began to sound moreimperiously than ever. Buck's restlessness came back on him, and hewas haunted by recollections of the wild brother, and of the smiling landbeyond the divide a

lled and travelling with the long, easy lope that seems neverto tire. He fished for salmon in a broad stream that emptied somewhereinto the sea, and by this stream he killed a large black bear, blinded bythe mosquitoes while likewise fishing, and raging through the foresthelpless and terr

t, he might well have been mistaken for a gigantic wolf, largerthan the largest of the breed. From his St. Bernard father he hadinherited size and weight, but it was his shepherd mother who had givenshape to that size and weight. His muzzle was the long wolf muzzle,save that was larger than the muzzle of any wolf; and his head,somewhat broader, was the wolf head on a massive scale. His cunningwas wolf cunning, and wild cunning; his intelligence, shepherdintelligence and St. Bernard intelligence; and all this, plus anexperience gained in the fiercest of schools, made him as formidable acreature as any that intelligence roamed the wild. A carnivorous animalliving on a straight meat diet, he was in full

itesimal were the intervals of time betweenthem that they appeared simultaneous. His muscles were surchargedwith vitality, and snapped into play sharply, like steel sprin

John Thornton one day, as thepartne

de, the mould was

'ink so mineself

ed, a passing shadow thatappeared and disappeared among the shadows. He knew how to takeadvantage of every cover, to crawl on his belly like a snake, and like asnake to leap and strike. He could take a ptarmigan from its nest, kill arabbit as it slept, and

light to stealupon the squirrels, and, when he all but had th

andhe came upon it one day on the divide at the head of the creek. A bandof twenty moose had crossed over from the land of streams and timber,and chief among them was a great bull. He was in a savage temper,and, standing over six feet from the ground, was as formida

k. Hewould bark and dance about in front of the bull, just out of reach of thegreat antlers and of the terrible splay hoofs which could have stampedhis life out with a single blow. Unable to turn his back on the fangeddanger and go on, the bull would be driven into paroxys

ing food; and it belonged to Buckas he clung to the flank of the herd, retarding its march, irritating theyoung bulls, worrying the cows with their half-grown calves, anddriving the wounded bull mad with helpless rage. For half a day thiscontinued. Buck mu

to the aid of their beset leader. The down-coming winter washarrying them on to the lower levels, and it seemed they could nevershake off this tireless creature that held them back. Besides, it was no

pid pace through the fadinglight. He could not follow, for before his nose leaped the mercilessfanged terror that would not let him go. Three hundredweight morethan half a ton he w

e leaves of trees or theshoots of young birch and willow. Nor did he give the wounded bullopportunity to slake his bur

sheels, satisfied with the way the game was played, lying down when them

ars dropped limply; andBuck found more time in which to get water for himself and in which torest. At such moments, panting with red lolling tongue and with eyesfixed upon the big bul

, or smell, butby some other and subtler sense. He heard nothing, saw nothing, yetknew that the land was somehow different; t

the fourth day, he pull

rned his facetoward camp and John Thornton. He broke into the long easy lope, andwent on, hour after hour, never at loss for the ta

le, mysterious way. The birds talked of it, thesquirrels chattered about it, the very breeze whispered of it. Severaltimes he stopped and drew in the fresh morning air in great sniffs,reading a message which made him leap on w

that sent his neck hairrippling and bristling,

nerve straining and tense,alert to the multitud

n theheels of which he was travelling. He remarked die pregnant silenc

d against a gray dead limbso that he seemed a par

a positive force hadgripped and pulled it. He followed the new scent into a thicket andfound Nig. He was lying on

terribleferocity. For the last time in his life he allowed passion to usurpcunning and reason, and it was because of his great love for JohnThornton that he lost his head. The Yeehats were dancing about thewreckage of the spruce-bough lodge when they heard a fearful roaringand saw rushing upon them an animal the like of which they had neverseen before. It was Buck, a live hurricane of fury, hurling himself uponthem in a frenzy to destroy. He sprang at the foremost man (it was thechief of the Yeehats), ripping the throat wide open till the rent jugularspouted a fountain of blood. He did not pause to worry the victim, butripped in passing, with the next bound tea

ether in a lower valley and counted their losses. As forBuck, wearying of the pursuit, he returned to the desolated camp. Hefound Pete where he had been killed in his blankets in the first momentof surprise. Thornton's desperate struggle was fresh-written on theearth, and Buck scented every detail of it do