“You see, Jack, as I always told you, my team is faster than yourn and all it needs to show speed is a rabbit for a pace maker,” was Bill’s comment as he picked himself up.
In their goings and comings they ran across all sorts of wild animal life from the little lemmings, a mouse-like animal with short ears and tail, which looks like a miniature yellow rabbit, to the giant moose. In between these two extremes they saw squirrels, snowshoe rabbits, red and black foxes, lynxes, gray wolves and caribou. They had also seen the tracks of bears, for the species of bear that live in the sub-Arctic regions does not hibernate.
They often shot squirrel, rabbit and ptarmigan (pronounced tar’-mi-gan), a bird of the grouse order, and these served as dishes of great delicacy for the boys, as well as giving the dogs a welcome change from dried fish. Bill declared it to be the open season for bagging some big game and Jack agreed that they must. But it is hard to seek cached treasure and be big game hunters at the same time.
Once while they were moving leisurely along after a satisfying dinner and they were talking about hunting the caribou, moose and bear, the tables were suddenly turned on them when they became the hunted prey of wild beasts, for a pack of famished wolves had scented them out and were headed straight for them.
Pell-mell came the lean, long-legged beasts with ears erect, ribs bulging out of their loose skins, tails drooping and starved to desperation. Instantly the boys halted their teams and had barely time enough to cut the dogs out of their traces before the pack was upon them. The dogs knew they were in for a fight to the death and braced themselves for it, while the boys drew their revolvers and stood on their sleds ready for the attack.
In less than a minute the wolves were upon them and the fight was on. The dogs met the onslaught with the strength and courage the wolves lacked; and in between pistol shots, each of which picked off a wolf, the dogs snapped in two the legs, and broke the necks of their savage ancestors with a crunch of their powerful jaws, or opened their bellies, which let their entrails half out, or severed the jugular veins when streams of blood spurted forth from the rips made by merciless fangs.
But the dogs suffered too, for often three or even four wolves would fight a single one and in this unequal struggle he would go down unless his master took a hand and evened up numbers by a few well-placed bullets. Nor was it easy for the boys to shoot the wolves, for the fight was so fast and furious it was well-nigh impossible at times to send a piece of cold lead into their miserable carcasses without the danger of hitting their dogs.
One of the curious things was that when a wolf got hold of the harness on a dog it mistook it for brute substance instead of inert leather and it would bite it viciously and shake it furiously without getting the living response that it had the right to expect.
When the number of wolves had been brought down to twice that of the dogs, they knew they were beaten and the moment this happened their courage failed them and those that were left with strength enough to take to their heels slunk quickly away.
An examination of the dogs showed that far from coming out of the fight unscathed every one of them was in a bad way and, still more sad to relate, Jennie and Prince, two of the outside dogs of Jack’s team, had to be shot to put them out of their misery. As the dogs were so badly off and the harness cut up and chewed to pieces the boys had to make camp on the spot.