230 Hunting the Grisly 



supposed to be fighting dogs, able to tackle 

 him without special training. I have known 

 one wolf to kill with a single snap a bulldog 

 which had rushed at it, while another which 

 had entered the yard of a Montana ranch 

 house slew in quick succession both of the 

 large mastiffs by which it was assailed. The 

 immense agility and ferocity of the wild 

 beast, the terrible snap of his long-toothed 

 jaws, and the admirable training, in which 

 he always is, give him a great advantage over 

 fat, small-toothed, smooth-skinned dogs, even 

 though they are nominally supposed to be- 

 long to the fighting classes. In the way that 

 bench competitions are arranged nowadays 

 this is but natural, as there is no temptation 

 to produce a worthy class of fighting dog 

 when the rewards are given upon technical 

 points wholly unconnected with the dog's use- 

 fulness. A prize-winning mastiff or bulldog 

 may be almost useless for the only purposes 

 for which his kind is ever useful at all. A 

 mastiff; if properly trained and of sufficient 

 size, might possibly be able to meet a young 

 or undersize^i Texan wolf; but I have never 

 seen a dog of this variety which I would 

 esteem a match single-handed for one of the 

 huge timber wolves of western Montana. 



