Page:Under the Sun.djvu/263

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Bears, Wolves, Dogs, Rats.
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stories, fairy tales, and fables have taught them long ago the likeness of the wolf and its character, and the first look at the sharp snout set in gray fur reminds them of that face that little Red Riding Hood found looking out at her, one fine May morning, from under her dear old grandmother's nightcap. If the literature of the nursery has thus familiarized the wolf to the younger generation, their elders also, of whatever nation they may be, and whatever language they may speak, have continued to learn from a hundred sources of the implacable brute (the totem of the Pawnees) that makes the great highways of forest and plain in Northern and Eastern Europe and the mountain paths of the Pyrenees and Apennines so perilous to belated travellers, — that robs the Indian mothers of their children, or pulls down the solitary wood-gatherer as he goes trudging home at nightfall along the pathway that skirts the jungle. Tales of horror crowd into their memory as they look at the unkempt and restless -creatures, condemned to-day to civilization and monotony, but once, perhaps, actors themselves in the very scenes that make the narratives of wolf adventure so appalling. In a bare cage, with iron bars before it, it is difficult to realize the full meaning of the thing before you.

There is nothing in its appearance, except that sinister proximity of its eyes, to betoken a creature so eminently dangerous when wild, no significance of cruel fury in its voice, no profession of murderous strength in its limbs. It looks like a shabby dog, and howls like an unhappy one. There is no fierce tiger-eloquence of eye, no ravening hyena-clamor in its voice, no lion-majesty of form. It seems a poor thing for any one, even a child, to be afraid of, for it appears half-fed and weak-