In some way or other, the lone wolf had discovered that nets were made to catch fish. After that, for many weeks, each time he felt like it, he would search along the banks until he found the stake of a net. Then he would take to the water and swim to the net itself. Poking his head under the water he would choose the best looking white fish, leaving severely alone suckers, pickerel and such small fry, tear his prey out of the mesh, bring it back to shore and eat it at his leisure. So far, so good. Little harm was done.
But Mohican was intensely practical and like all wild animals, believed in simplifying matters as much as he could. One day he hit on the plan of dragging the net to the bank instead of swimming out to it. He therefore caught in his jaw the stout rope where it was tied to the stake. Then, proceeding backwards slowly but surely, pulled the whole net clean out of the water to the shore where he ate what he liked, leaving the rest of the catch to die and spoil in the sun.
From that day on, he pulled at all the nets which he found and his strength was enormous. Few stakes, however deeply they were driven in the mud, could resist the strain and prevent him doing all the mischief he wished.
Poor old Mohican! His cunning and intelligence were great, but he had committed the unpardonable sin of robbing the red man of his food.
One day at dawn he was seen by an Indian. The lone, old wolf was sitting on his haunches, tugging hard at the net’s rope.
The rifle cracked from behind a spruce tree, but Mohican never knew what hit him. It was a long shot, a pretty shot so far as that goes—four hundred yards—right across a small bay of the lake. He had to pay the price of his sin. Such is the law of the wilderness.
Tale XVIII: Fighting Against Starvation
In the dead of winter a few years ago, two Eskimo women, mother and daughter, were starving in their Igloo on the shores of Baffin Land. The rest of the tribe had gone inland searching for caribou. The older woman, who was lame, had been left behind with her daughter to look after her. They had been provided with a supply of food but the hunters were late in coming back and it had dwindled, little by little, to nothing. In the end the two women had killed and eaten the only dog that had remained with them. They were now helpless, waiting for death, without food of any sort, without fishing tackle and without firearms.