any a little Calf had come that spring, and had drifted away on the
moss-barrens, to come back no more; for some were weaklings and some
were fools; some fell by the way, for that is law; and some would not
learn the rules, and so died. But the White Calf was strongest of them
all, and he was wise, so he learned of his mother, who was wisest of
them all. He learned that the grass on the sun side of a rock is sweet,
and though it looks the same in the dark hollows, it is there
worthless. He learned that when his mother's hoofs crackled he must be
up and moving, and when all the herd's hoofs crackled there was danger,
and he must keep by his mother's side. For this crackling is like the
whistling of a Whistler Duck's wings: it is to keep the kinds together.
He learned that where the little Bomuldblomster hangs its Cotton tufts
is dangerous bog; that the harsh cackle of the Ptarmigan means that
close at hand are Eagles, as dangerous for Fawn as for Bird. He learned
that the little troll-berries are deadly, that when the verra-flies
come stinging he must take refuge on a snow-patch, and that of all
animal smells only that of his mother was to be fully trusted. He
learned that he was growing. His flat calf sides and big joints were
changing to the full barrel and clean limbs of the Yearling, and the
little bumps which began to show on his head when he was only a
fortnight old were now sharp, hard spikes that could win in fight.

More than once they had smelt that dreaded destroyer of the north that
men call the Gjerv or Wolverene; and one day, as this danger-scent came
suddenly and in great strength, a huge blot of dark brown sprang
rumbling from a rocky ledge, and straight for the foremost--the White
Calf. His eye caught the flash of a whirling, shaggy mass, with
gleaming teeth and eyes, hot-breathed and ferocious. Blank horror set
his hair on end; his nostrils flared in fear: but before he fled there
rose within another feeling--one of anger at the breaker of his peace,
a sense that swept all fear away, braced his legs, and set his horns at
charge. The brown brute landed with a deep-chested growl, to be
received on the young one's spikes. They pierced him deeply, but the
shock was overmuch; it bore the White One down, and he might yet have
been killed but that his mother, alert and ever near, now charged the
attacking monster, and heavier, better armed, she hurled and speared
him to the ground. And the White Calf, with a ve