WHITE FANG
Part III: The Gods of
the Wild
Chapter 1
THE MAKERS OF FIRE
The cub came upon it
suddenly. It was his own fault. He had been careless.
He had left the cave and run down to the stream to drink. It might have been
that he took no notice because he was heavy with sleep. (He had been out all
night on the meat-trail, and had but just then awakened). And his carelessness
might have been due to the familiarity of the trail to the pool. He had
travelled it often, and nothing had ever happened on it.
He went down past the
blasted pine, crossed the open space, and trotted in amongst the trees. Then,
at the same instant, he saw and smelt. Before him, sitting silently on their
haunches, were five live things, the like of which he had never seen before. It
was his first glimpse of mankind. But at the sight of him the five men did not
spring to their feet, nor show their teeth, nor snarl. They did not move, but
sat there, silent and ominous.
Nor did the cub move.
Every instinct of his nature would have impelled him to dash wildly away, had
there not suddenly and for the first time arisen in him another and counter
instinct. A great awe descended upon him. He was beaten down to movelessness by
an overwhelming sense of his own weakness and littleness. Here was mastery and power,
something far and away beyond him.
The cub had never seen
man, yet the instinct concerning man was his. In dim ways he recognized in man
the animal that had fought itself to primacy over the other animals of the
Wild. Not alone out of his own eyes, but out of the eyes of all his ancestors
was the cub now looking upon man -- out of eyes that had circled in the
darkness around countless winter campfires, that had peered from safe distances
and from the hearts of thickets at the strange, two-legged animal that was lord
over living things. The spell of the cub's heritage was upon him, the fear and
the respect born of the centuries of struggle and the accumulated experience of
the generations. The heritage was too compelling for a wolf that was only a cub.
Had he been full-grown, he would have run away. As it was, he cowered down in a
paralysis of fear, already half proffering the submission that his kind had
proffered from the first time a wolf came in to sit by man's fire and be made
warm.
One of the Indians arose
and walked over to him and stooped above him. The cub cowered closer to the
ground. It was the unknown, objectified at last, in concrete flesh and blood,
bending over him and reaching down to seize hold of him. His hair bristled
involuntarily; his lips writhed back and his little fangs were bared. The hand,
poised like doom above him, hesitated, and the man spoke, laughing, "Wabam
wabisca ip pit tah." ("Look! The white
fangs!")
The other Indians
laughed loudly, and urged the man on to pick up the cub. As the hand descended
closer and closer, there raged within the cub a battle of the instincts. He
experienced two great impulsions, -- to yield and to fight. The resulting
action was a compromise. He did both. He yielded till the hand almost touched
him. Then he fought, his teeth flashing in a snap that sank them into the hand.
The next moment he received a clout alongside the head that knocked him over on
his side. Then all fight fled out of him. His puppyhood and the instinct of
submission took charge of him. He sat up on his haunches and ki-yi'd. But the
man whose hand he had bitten was angry. The cub received a clout on the other
side of his head. Whereupon he sat up and ki-yi'd louder than
ever.
The four Indians laughed
more loudly, while even the man who had been bitten began to laugh. They
surrounded the cub and laughed at him, while he wailed out his terror and his
hurt. In the midst of it, he heard something. The Indians heard it, too. But
the cub knew what it was, and with a last, long wail that had in it more of
triumph than grief, he ceased his noise and waited for the coming of his
mother, of his ferocious and indomitable mother who fought and killed all
things and was never afraid. She was snarling as she ran. She had heard the cry
of her cub and was dashing to save him.
She bounded in amongst
them, her anxious and militant motherhood making her anything but a pretty
sight. But to the cub the spectacle of her protective rage was pleasing. He
uttered a glad little cry and bounded to meet her, while the man-animals went
back hastily several steps. The she-wolf stood over against her cub, facing the
men, with bristling hair, a snarl rumbling deep in her throat. Her face was
distorted and malignant with menace, even the bridge of the nose wrinkling from
tip to eyes so prodigious was her snarl.
Then it was that a cry
went up from one of the men. "Kiche!" was what he uttered. It was an
exclamation of surprise. The cub felt his mother wilting at the sound.
"Kiche!" the
man cried again, this time with sharpness and authority.
And then the cub saw his
mother, the she-wolf, the fearless one, crouching down till her belly touched
the ground, whimpering, wagging her tail, making peace signs. The cub could not
understand. He was appalled. The awe of man rushed over him again. His instinct
had been true. His mother verified it. She, too, rendered
submission to the man-animals.
The man who had spoken
came over to her. He put his hand upon her head, and she only crouched closer.
She did not snap, nor threaten to snap. The other men came up, and surrounded
her, and felt her, and pawed her, which actions she made no attempt to resent.
They were greatly excited, and made many noises with their mouths. These noises
were not indications of danger, the cub decided, as he crouched near his
mother, still bristling from time to time but doing his best to submit.
"It is not
strange," an Indian was saying. "Her father was a wolf. It is true,
her mother was a dog; but did not my brother tie her out in the woods all of
three nights in the mating season? Therefore was the father of Kiche a
wolf."
"It is a year, Gray
Beaver, since she ran away," spoke a second Indian.
"It is not strange,
Salmon Tongue," Gray Beaver answered. "It was the time of the famine,
and there was no meat for the dogs."
"She has lived with
the wolves," said a third Indian.
"So it would seem,
Three Eagles," Gray Beaver answered, laying his hand on the cub; "and
this be the sign of it."
The cub snarled a little
at the touch of the hand, and the hand flew back to administer a clout.
Whereupon the cub covered its fangs and sank down submissively, while the hand,
returning, rubbed behind his ears, and up and down his back.
"This be the sign of it," Gray Beaver went on. "It is
plain that his mother is Kiche. But his father was a wolf. Wherefore is there
in him little dog and much wolf. His fangs be white,
and White Fang shall be his name. I have spoken. He is my dog. For was not
Kiche my brother's dog? And is not my brother dead?"
The cub, who had thus
received a name in the world, lay and watched. For a time the man-animals
continued to make their mouth-noises. Then Gray Beaver took a knife from a
sheath that hung around his neck, and went into the thicket and cut a stick.
White Fang watched him. He notched the stick at each end and in the notches
fastened strings of raw-hide. One string he tied around the throat of Kiche.
Then he led her to a small pine, around which he tied the other string. [Stop
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White Fang followed and
lay down beside her. Salmon Tongue's hand reached out to him and rolled him
over on his back. Kiche looked on anxiously. White Fang felt fear mounting in
him again. He could not quite suppress a snarl, but he made no offer to snap.
The hand, with fingers crooked and spread apart, rubbed his stomach in a
playful way and rolled him from side to side. It was ridiculous and ungainly,
lying there on his back with legs sprawling in the air. Besides, it was a
position of such utter helplessness that White Fang's whole nature revolted
against it. He could do nothing to defend himself. If this man-animal intended
harm, White Fang knew that he could not escape it. How could he spring away
with his four legs in the air above him? Yet submission made him master his
fear, and he only growled softly. This growl he could not suppress; nor did the
man-animal resent it by giving him a blow on the head. And furthermore, such
was the strangeness of it, White Fang experienced an
unaccountable sensation of pleasure as the hand rubbed back and forth. When he
was rolled on his side he ceased the growl; when the fingers pressed and
prodded at the base of his ears the pleasurable sensation increased; and when,
with a final rub and scratch, the man left him alone and went away, all fear
had died out of White Fang. He was to know fear many times in his dealings with
man; yet it was a token of the fearless companionship with man that was
ultimately to be his.
After a time, White Fang
heard strange noises approaching. He was quick in his classification, for he
knew them at once for man-animal noises. A few minutes later the remainder of
the tribe, strung out as it was on the march, trailed in. There were more men
and many women and children, forty souls of them, and all heavily burdened with
camp equipage and outfit. Also there were many dogs; and these, with the
exception of the part-grown puppies, were likewise burdened with camp outfit. On their backs, in bags that fastened tightly around underneath,
the dogs carried from twenty to thirty pounds of weight.
White Fang had never
seen dogs before, but at sight of them he felt that they were his own kind,
only somehow different. But they displayed little difference from the wolf when
they discovered the cub and his mother. There was a rush. White Fang bristled
and snarled and snapped in the face of the open-mouthed oncoming wave of dogs,
and went down and under them, feeling the sharp slash of teeth in his body,
himself biting and tearing at the legs and bellies above him. There was a great
uproar. He could hear the snarl of Kiche as she fought for him; and he could
hear the cries of the man-animals, the sound of clubs striking upon bodies, and
the yelps of pain from the dogs so struck.
Only a few seconds
elapsed before he was on his feet again. He could now see the man-animals
driving back the dogs with clubs and stones, defending him, saving him from the
savage teeth of his kind that somehow was not his kind. And though there was no
reason in his brain for a clear conception of so abstract a thing as justice,
nevertheless, in his own way, he felt the justice of the man-animals, and he
knew them for what they were -- makers of law and executors of law. Also, he
appreciated the power with which they administered the law. Unlike any animals
he had ever encountered, they did not bite nor claw. They enforced their live
strength with the power of dead things. Dead things did their bidding. Thus,
sticks and stones, directed by these strange creatures, leaped through the air
like living things, inflicting grievous hurts upon the dogs.
To his mind this was
power unusual, power inconceivable and beyond the natural, power that was
godlike. White Fang, in the very nature of him, could never know anything about
gods; at the best he could know only things that were beyond knowing; but the
wonder and awe that he had of these man-animals in ways resembled what would be
the wonder and awe of man at sight of some celestial creature, on a mountain
top, hurling thunderbolts from either hand at an astonished world.
The last dog had been
driven back. The hubbub died down. And White Fang licked his hurts and
meditated upon this, his first taste of pack-cruelty and his introduction to
the pack. He had never dreamed that his own kind consisted of more than One
Eye, his mother, and himself. They had constituted a kind apart, and here,
abruptly, he had discovered many more creatures apparently of his own kind. And
there was a subconscious resentment that these, his kind, at first sight had
pitched upon him and tried to destroy him. In the same way he resented his
mother being tied with a stick, even though it was done by the superior
man-animals. It savored of the trap, of bondage. Yet of the trap and of bondage
he knew nothing. Freedom to roam and run and lie down at will, had been his heritage; and here it was being infringed upon.
His mother's movements were restricted to the length of a stick, and by the
length of that same stick was he restricted, for he had not yet got beyond the
need of his mother's side.
He did not like it. Nor
did he like it when the man-animals arose and went on with their march; for a
tiny man-animal took the other end of the stick and led Kiche captive behind
him, and behind Kiche followed White Fang, greatly perturbed and worried by
this new adventure he had entered upon.
They went down the
valley of the stream, far beyond White Fang's widest ranging, until they came
to the end of the valley, where the stream ran into the
It was this last that especially
affected him. The elevation of frames of poles caught his eye; yet this in
itself was not so remarkable, being done by the same creatures that flung
sticks and stones to great distances. But when the frames of poles were made
into tepees by being covered with cloth and skins, White Fang was astounded. It
was the colossal bulk of them that impressed him. They arose around him, on
every side, like some monstrous quick-growing form of life. They occupied
nearly the whole circumference of his field of vision. He was afraid of them.
They loomed ominously above him; and when the breeze stirred them into huge
movements, he cowered down in fear, keeping his eyes warily upon them, and
prepared to spring away if they attempted to precipitate themselves upon him.
But in a short while his
fear of the tepees passed away. He saw the women and children passing in and
out of them without harm, and he saw the dogs trying often to get into them,
and being driven away with sharp words and flying stones. After a time, he left
Kiche's side and crawled cautiously toward the wall of the nearest tepee. It
was the curiosity of growth that urged him on -- the necessity of learning and
living and doing that brings experience. The last few inches to the wall of the
tepee were crawled with painful slowness and precaution. The day's events had
prepared him for the unknown to manifest itself in most stupendous and
unthinkable ways. At last his nose touched the canvas. He waited. Nothing
happened. Then he smelled the strange fabric, saturated with the man-smell. He
closed on the canvas with his teeth and gave a gentle tug. Nothing happened,
though the adjacent portions of the tepee moved. He tugged harder. There was a
greater movement. It was delightful. He tugged still harder, and repeatedly,
until the whole tepee was in motion. Then the sharp cry of a squaw inside sent
him scampering back to Kiche. But after that he was afraid no more of the
looming bulks of the tepees. [Stop reading here: 1,459 = 87,540 = words
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A moment later he was
straying away again from his mother. Her stick was tied to a peg in the ground
and she could not follow him. A part-grown puppy, somewhat larger and older
than he, came toward him slowly, with ostentatious and belligerent importance.
The puppy's name, as White Fang was afterward to hear him called, was Lip-lip.
He had had experience in puppy fights and was already something of a bully.
Lip-lip was White Fang's
own kind, and, being only a puppy, did not seem dangerous; so White Fang
prepared to meet him in friendly spirit. But when the stranger's walk became
stiff-legged and his lips lifted clear of his teeth, White Fang stiffened, too,
and answered with lifted lips. They half circled about each other, tentatively,
snarling and bristling. This lasted several minutes, and White Fang was
beginning to enjoy it, as a sort of game. But suddenly, with remarkable
swiftness, Lip-lip leaped in, delivered a slashing snap, and leaped away again.
The snap had taken effect on the shoulder that had been hurt by the lynx and
that was still sore deep down near the bone. The surprise and hurt of it
brought a yelp out of White Fang; but the next moment, in a rush of anger, he
was upon Lip-lip and snapping viciously.
But Lip-lip had lived
his life in camp and had fought many puppy fights. Three times, four times, and
half a dozen times, his sharp little teeth scored on the newcomer, until White
Fang, yelping shamelessly, fled to the protection of his mother. It was the
first of the many fights he was to have with Lip-lip, for they were enemies
from the start, born so, with natures destined perpetually to clash.
Kiche licked White Fang
soothingly with her tongue, and tried to prevail upon him to remain with her.
But his curiosity was rampant, and several minutes later he was venturing forth
on a new quest. He came upon one of the man-animals, Gray Beaver, who was
squatting on his hams and doing something with sticks and dry moss spread
before him on the ground. White Fang came near to him and watched. Gray Beaver
made mouth-noises which White Fang interpreted as not hostile, so he came still
nearer.
Women and children were
carrying more sticks and branches to Gray Beaver. It was evidently an affair of
moment. White Fang came in until he touched Gray Beaver's knee, so curious was
he, and already forgetful that this was a terrible man-animal. Suddenly he saw
a strange thing like mist beginning to arise from the sticks and moss beneath
Gray Beaver's hands. Then, amongst the sticks themselves,
appeared a live thing, twisting and turning, of a color like the color of the
sun in the sky. White Fang knew nothing about fire. It drew him as the light in
the mouth of the cave had drawn him in his early puppyhood. He crawled the several steps toward the flame. He heard Gray
Beaver chuckle above him, and he knew the sound was not hostile. Then his nose
touched the flame, and at the same instant his little tongue went out to it.
For a moment he was
paralyzed. The unknown, lurking in the midst of the sticks and moss, was
savagely clutching him by the nose. He scrambled backward, bursting out in an
astonished explosion of ki-yi's. At the sound, Kiche
leaped snarling to the end of her stick, and there raged terribly because she
could not come to his aid. But Gray Beaver laughed loudly, and slapped his
thighs, and told the happening to all the rest of the camp, till everybody was
laughing uproariously. But White Fang sat on his haunches and ki-yi'd and ki-yi'd, a forlorn and pitiable little figure in the midst of
the man-animals.
It was the worst hurt he
had ever known. Both nose and tongue had been scorched by the live thing,
sun-colored, that had grown up under Gray Beaver's hands. He cried and cried
interminably, and every fresh wail was greeted by bursts of laughter on the
part of the man-animals. He tried to soothe his nose with his tongue, but the
tongue was burnt too, and the two hurts coming together produced greater hurt;
whereupon he cried more hopelessly and helplessly than ever.
And then shame came to
him. He knew laughter and the meaning of it. It is not given us to know how
some animals know laughter, and know when they are being laughed at; but it was
this same way that White Fang knew it. And he felt shame that the man-animals
should be laughing at him. He turned and fled away, not from the hurt of the
fire, but from the laughter that sank even deeper, and hurt in the spirit of
him. And he fled to Kiche, raging at the end of her stick like an animal gone
mad -- to Kiche, the one creature in the world who was not laughing at him.
Twilight drew down and
night came on, and White Fang lay by his mother's side. His nose and tongue
still hurt, but he was perplexed by a greater trouble. He was homesick. He felt
a vacancy in him, a need for the hush and quietude of the stream and the cave
in the cliff. Life had become too populous. There were so many of the
man-animals, men, women, and children, all making noises and irritations. And
there were the dogs, ever squabbling and bickering, bursting into uproars and
creating confusions. The restful loneliness of the only life he had known was
gone. Here the very air was palpitant with life. It hummed and buzzed
unceasingly. Continually changing its intensity and abruptly variant in pitch,
it impinged on his nerves and senses, made him nervous and restless and worried
him with a perpetual imminence of happening.
He watched the
man-animals, coming and going and moving about the camp. In fashion distantly
resembling the way men look upon the gods they create, so looked White Fang
upon the man-animals before him. They were superior creatures, of a verity,
gods. To his dim comprehension they were as much wonder-workers as gods are to
men. They were creatures of mastery, possessing all manner of unknown and
impossible potencies, overlords of the alive and the not alive, -- making obey
that which moved, imparting movement to that which did not move, and making
life, sun-colored and biting life, to grow out of dead moss and wood. They were
fire-makers! They were gods! [Stop
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