THE LONE TRAIL 207 



a leader, and he flouted the idea of placing himself 

 under the direction of a lesser beast than himself. 

 He might fight for the mastery, but now his head 

 was hornless, his weapons were his hoofs only, 

 and in tribal warfare the value set on hoofs is not 

 high. 



The gloominess of his solitude was increased by 

 the winter hush, which lay unbroken on the white 

 wilderness. There was no sound at all. Even to 

 an animal versed in loneliness and silence, so dismal 

 a stillness was inexpressibly solemn. 



Now and again he heard a distant footfall rattling 

 over the hard surface of the snow, and he would 

 travel as fast as he could to intercept it, only to 

 have the wayfarer elude him between the sombre 

 stark avenues. Here and there he came on the 

 further results of Cretney's presence — a fox, per- 

 haps, dragging his trap towards freedom, only to 

 be held up by the pole attachment becoming in- 

 extricably mixed up, as it was designed to do, in 

 low-growing scrub ; or an Arctic hare, the rabbit 

 of native nomenclature, caught in a wire noose set 

 in his runway. 



Then the sweet o' the year came in again, when 

 it seemed never so far away, and the lake broke up. 



