History tells us that packs of wolves once howled around the city of Paris all night and even tore people to pieces in the very streets of the city. Stories are told of travelers pursued by hungry packs of wolves and tales of horror are brought by the very few who have escaped with their lives. Legends, fables, myths, and traditions which describe the savage ferocity of the wolf are numerous. How often we hear the expressions,—“a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” and “keep the wolf from the door”!
Such a reputation, coming from so early a date, we may be sure has a foundation in fact. We have not been taught to fear these animals without reason. Wolves are among the wildest and fiercest of animals, and farther removed from human association than any others. Men have tried again and again to tame them, but have been successful only in rare instances.
Some authorities argue that the fact that wolves have occasionally been tamed goes to prove that the wild, ferocious disposition of the wolf is the result of circumstances. Very rare instances are known in which these creatures have been captured and tamed, following their masters like dogs, even making good watch dogs, and learning to bark almost like a dog. A merchant in Petrograd drove a pair in harness, having trained them when very young. But then we have the story of the Duke of Württemberg, who kept a tame wolf in his beautiful Castle of Louisburg. It had been trained like a dog, and had never been known to attack any one. But suddenly one day without any provocation whatever it flew at an officer and bit a piece out of his cheek.
Treachery, caution, and cunning are the qualities usually attributed to wolves. No one has ever accused them of stupidity, however. On the other hand, trappers have been amazed and chagrined by the shrewdness displayed by these animals. When traps have been placed to which a fuse of gunpowder was attached, they have frequently been known to gnaw the strings so as to prevent the explosion, and then make away with the bait, unharmed. Only extreme hunger, however, will ever drive them near a trap.
Wolves belong to the same family as dogs and look very much like them. We can see in our picture that they are about the same size as a large dog, only leaner and more gaunt, and with a wicked expression on their faces. This expression comes partly from the eyes, which are oblique or slanting, the pupils round; and partly from the muzzle, which is somewhat longer than that of most dogs and displays their cruel-looking teeth. The ears are rather small and are held erect.
Wolves are very powerful and very active, and their claws and teeth are formidable even to look at. All their senses seem unusually well developed, so that they can hear, smell, and see an object long before we could.
They travel with great speed. Hunters tell us of the tireless gallop with which they pursue their prey. A horse can outrun them, but only when the distance is not too great.
Wolves are born in dark caverns or in gloomy holes in trees or rocks. They are of many different kinds and colors—red, black, white, and gray. They are still to be found in many countries, and chiefly in the unfrequented and mountainous regions in the northern parts of Europe, Russia, and North America; but man has almost succeeded in exterminating them. We usually think and read of wolves in packs, but authorities tell us that they do not live in communities, and do not go about in groups or packs unless in search of prey.
Ernest Thompson Seton describes the three calls of the hunting wolf. The first is “the long-drawn, deep howl, the muster that tells of game discovered but too strong for the finder to manage alone”; the second call is higher, “that ringing and swelling is the cry of the pack on a hot scent”; the last is a sharp bark and short howl, which, “seeming least of all, is yet a gong of doom, for this is the cry, ‘Close in! This is the finish.’”
The “Charmer” in this picture does not impress us as a hunter who has been surrounded by wolves and is now turning his music to account in making his escape, but rather makes us feel that he has been far within the wilderness of rocks and woods calling these animals to him with the music of his bagpipe. He has a sort of wild, wolf-like look himself. One critic has suggested that he seems to be gnawing the pipes rather than playing upon them, and that his toes look like the claws of the wolves.