528 SKELETON OF WOLF. 
destroyed its prey; but the corresponding portions of the Wolf’s anatomy belong 
evidently to an animal which is not intended by nature to exert the clinging hold of the 
cat tribe, but to overtake its prey by fair chase, to run, and to bite. 
The sharp teeth with which the Wolf is furnished are strong enough to cut their way 
through substances which might be thought impervious to teeth. A hungry Wolf will 
devour a raw hide with enviable ease, and, when hard pressed by its unsatisfied appetite, 
has often been known to make a meal on thick leather traces that had been left 
unguarded for a few minutes. 
Bold as is the Wolf in ordinary circumstances, it is one of the most suspicious 
animals in existence, and is infected with the most abject terror at the sight of any 
object to which its eyes, nose, or ears are unaccustomed. 
Very fortunately for the hunters, this excess of caution on the part of the Wolf is 
the means of preserving their slaughtered game from the hunery maws of the Wolves 
that ever accompany a hunter, and hang on his steps in hope of obtaining the offal of 
such animals as he may slaughter, or of securing such creatures as he may wound and 
fail to kill on the spot. In order to preserve the carcass of a slain buffalo or deer, the 
2 
SKELETON OF WOLE. 
hunter merely plants a stick by the side of the animal, and ties to the top of the stick a 
fluttering piece of linen, or any similar substance, and then goes his way, secure that the 
Wolves will not dare to approach such an object. In default of a strip of calico or 
linen, the inflated bladder of the dead animal is an approved “ scare-wolf;” and, as a last 
resource, a strip of its hide is used for that purpose. 
To this peculiarity have been owing, not only the preservation of game, but the lives of 
defenceless travellers. It has several times happened that a band of Wolves have been 
pressing closely upon the footsteps of their human quarry, and have been checked in their 
onward course by the judicious exhibition of certain articles of which the Wolves were 
suspicious, and from which they kept aloof until they had satisfied themselves of its 
harmlessness. As one article began to lose its efficacy, another was exhibited, so that the 
persecuted travellers were enabled to gain the refuge of some friendly village, and to baftle 
the furious animals by means which in themselves were utterly inadequate to their effects. 
meee of rope trailed from a horse or carriage is always an object of much fear to the 
/olves, 
