had a thousand faces, and White Fang found he must meet them
all--thus, when he went to town, in to San Jose, running behind the
carriage or loafing about the streets when the carriage stopped. Life
flowed past him, deep and wide and varied, continually impinging upon his
senses, demanding of him instant and endless adjustments and
correspondences, and compelling him, almost always, to suppress his
natural impulses.
There were butcher-shops where meat hung within reach. This meat he must
not touch. There were cats at the houses the master visited that must be
let alone. And there were dogs everywhere that snarled at him and that
he must not attack. And then, on the crowded sidewalks there were
persons innumerable whose attention he attracted. They would stop and
look at him, point him out to one another, examine him, talk of him, and,
worst of all, pat him. And these perilous contacts from all these
strange hands he must endure. Yet this endurance he achieved.
Furthermore, he got over being awkward and self-conscious. In a lofty
way he received the attentions of the multitudes of strange gods. With
condescension he accepted their condescension. On the other hand, there
was something about him that prevented great familiarity. They patted
him on the head and passed on, contented and pleased with their own
daring.
But it was not all easy for White Fang. Running behind the carriage in
the outskirts of San Jose, he encountered certain small boys who made a
practice of flinging stones at him. Yet he knew that it was not
permitted him to pursue and drag them down. Here he was compelled to
violate his instinct of self-preservation, and violate it he did, for he
was becoming tame and qualifying himself for civilisation.
Nevertheless, White Fang was not quite satisfied with the arrangement. He
had no abstract ideas about justice and fair play. But there is a
certain sense of equity that resides in life, and it was this sense in
him that resented the unfairness of his being permitted no defence
against the stone-throwers. He forgot that in the covenant entered into
between him and the gods they were pledged to care for him and defend
him. But one day the master sprang from the carriage, whip in hand, and
gave the stone-throwers a thrashing. After that they threw stones no
more, and White Fang understood and was satisfied.
One other experience of similar nature was his. On the way to town,
hanging arou
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