maneuvering some time for advantage, without success, sneaked away. . . . The horse . . . remained unmolested for several days, when he was again seen making for the ferry with another pack of wolves at his heels. This time there were no less than a dozen, and it looked as if Buckskin's last moments were approaching very fast. Mart ran out on the ice and fired at the wolves when they had surrounded their victim on the bank, but the distance was too great for him to hit them. The report of the gun, however, frightened them so they did not attack, but sneaked around until it was dark, when the noise of snort- ing and snapping of teeth told Buck's friends that the battle was on again. It raged with more or less fury through the night. It was impossible for our bachelors to go to rest while the old horse was so bravely fighting for his life. A fire was built on the bank and guns were fired at short intervals until morning. When' it came, old Buck was still defiant, yet his tireless enemies still beset him. "What shall we do?" said Guy. "It is awful to stay here and not aid the poor old fellow when he neighs to us so piteously. . . . Can't we cut a channel through the ice for the ferryboat?" "That would be impossible. The ice has drifted and lodged about it many inches thick," answered his uncle. "Then let us make a raft." "I have been thinking about that," said Mart, "but we have nothing with which to make it. Our whole house, if taken down and made into a raft, would scarcely float us and we would freeze to death in this weather before we could build it again." "I'll tell you what," said Guy, "there are two large bar- rels in the house. They would float one of us." "Yes, but one of them is full of old rye whisky, which cost $4 a gallon, and there is nothing in which to empty it," said Mart.
