. The drifts in the passes had packed so firmly as to afford good
footing and the game was coming back to the summer range. After the
first few had made the crossing the rest followed their trails and the
main tide of the elk migration set in, great droves of cows boiling
through all the passes and streaming down into the green spots in the
meadows. There was now meat in plenty, and the yelping barks of the cows
sounded in the valleys that had been wrapped in white silence for so
many months; but there was not a sound from the bulls; the antlered
lords whose ringing challenges had filled the whole expanse of the hills
the previous fall seemed voiceless now. These old fellows had remained
up among the high bald ridges, their new antler growth tender in its
velvet sheath, and nothing would be heard from them till after the
porous growth had hardened and their points were polished for the next
rutting time.

The wolf family returned to the den no more, except perhaps for a casual
inspection when their wanderings chanced to lead them to the
neighborhood.

The bears had come from their long sleep and left the dens. There were
black and brown bears and monster grizzlies roaming in the meadows. At
first the diet of these huge beasts consisted almost entirely of grass
and twigs but their appetites rapidly increased and it was no unusual
thing for a bear to appropriate one of Breed's kills.

Breed did not fear bears, knowing that their speed was less than his own
and that they were harmless so long as he did not molest them and come
into too close quarters. He accepted this stealing of his meat as part
of the established order of things and always moved away when a bear
came swaying leisurely up to his kill.

Shady, on the contrary, had a wholesome fear of bears and was excited at
their approach, but at the same time she could not view their thieving
ways in such a philosophical light and her resentment rankled deeper
with each recurring theft.

The wolf family returned to a kill to find a great silvertip feeding
there. Shady's rage boiled over and she swept down upon him with a
furious burst of barking. She would have halted short of him but there
was no need. Breed was profoundly amazed to see the mighty baldface flee
down the slope with Shady in full cry behind him.

Breed knew that bears did not fear him, even though his fighting ability
far surpassed that of his mate, yet a grizzly fled at the first sound of
her voic