e kept himself in the midst of the
pack, and he fought often to maintain it. But such fights were of brief
duration. He was too quick for the others. They were slashed open and
bleeding before they knew what had happened, were whipped almost before
they had begun to fight.

As rigid as the sled-discipline of the gods, was the discipline
maintained by White Fang amongst his fellows. He never allowed them any
latitude. He compelled them to an unremitting respect for him. They
might do as they pleased amongst themselves. That was no concern of his.
But it _was_ his concern that they leave him alone in his isolation, get
out of his way when he elected to walk among them, and at all times
acknowledge his mastery over them. A hint of stiff-leggedness on their
part, a lifted lip or a bristle of hair, and he would be upon them,
merciless and cruel, swiftly convincing them of the error of their way.

He was a monstrous tyrant. His mastery was rigid as steel. He oppressed
the weak with a vengeance. Not for nothing had he been exposed to the
pitiless struggles for life in the day of his cubhood, when his mother
and he, alone and unaided, held their own and survived in the ferocious
environment of the Wild. And not for nothing had he learned to walk
softly when superior strength went by. He oppressed the weak, but he
respected the strong. And in the course of the long journey with Grey
Beaver he walked softly indeed amongst the full-grown dogs in the camps
of the strange man-animals they encountered.

The months passed by. Still continued the journey of Grey Beaver. White
Fang's strength was developed by the long hours on trail and the steady
toil at the sled; and it would have seemed that his mental development
was well-nigh complete. He had come to know quite thoroughly the world
in which he lived. His outlook was bleak and materialistic. The world
as he saw it was a fierce and brutal world, a world without warmth, a
world in which caresses and affection and the bright sweetnesses of the
spirit did not exist.

He had no affection for Grey Beaver. True, he was a god, but a most
savage god. White Fang was glad to acknowledge his lordship, but it was
a lordship based upon superior intelligence and brute strength. There
was something in the fibre of White Fang's being that made his lordship a
thing to be desired, else he would not have come back from the Wild when
he did to tender his allegiance. There were