them so
close to the hidden hunters that they could almost have touched them
with their guns.

"Steady, boys!" were Mustagan's whispered words to the white lads, who,
crouching down near him with their fingers on the triggers of their
guns, had caught his cool, brave spirit; and although the blood-curdling
howls of the wolves were now distinctly heard they flinched not in the
strain of those trying moments.

As Frank and Sam's guns were on this excursion only single-barrelled,
while the rest were double-barrelled, Mustagan said:

"When first wolf reach that stone, Frank, kill him. Then Sam hit the
next one. Then I kill some. Then other Indians fire. Perhaps other
wolves run away. Perhaps not, so have axes handy."

This advice was not neglected, for each axe, keen-edged and serviceable,
was at the side of its owner.

"Now here they come!" shouted Mustagan.

Nothing can be more trying to brave hunters than was such a position as
this. The travellers in Russia and elsewhere who have been assailed by
packs of these fierce wolves, sending out their merciless, blood-
curdling howlings, can appreciate the position of Frank and Sam. Yet
they were true as steel, and when the word was given by the old Indian,
in whom they had such implicit confidence, the guns were raised, and
with nerves firm and strong they fired with unerring accuracy, and two
great grey wolves fell dead, pierced through by the death-dealing
bullets.

Then Mustagan fired. He was too wise a hunter to waste a bullet on a
single wolf, if with it there was a possibility of killing two; and so,
as the two leaders who had been a little in advance of the pack had
fallen, he fired at two who were running side by side. His bullet first
went through the body of the one nearer to him and then broke the back
of the second.

In a second or two there rang out the reports of the other guns, and as
many more of the wolves lay dead or dying on the ground. Now was the
uncertainty of the battle. Wolves are the most treacherous and erratic
animals to hunt. Sometimes they are the most arrant cowards, and will
turn and run away at the slightest appearance of resistance or attack.
At other times they will continue to advance against all odds. Their
courage and ferocity seem to increase with their numbers, and are of
course greatest when they are half-famished for food. Gaunt and half-
starved those fierce ones seemed to be. And so, when the guns suddenly
ra