Wolves and Wolf-Hounds. 407 



not dare touch him. However the end was at hand. In 

 another moment Old Abe and General Grant came run- 

 ning up at headlong speed and smashed into the wolf like 

 a couple of battering-rams. He rose on his hind-legs like 

 a wrestler as they came at him, the greyhounds also rising 

 and bouncing up and down like rubber balls. I could just 

 see the wolf and the first big dog locked together, as the 

 second one made good his throat-hold. In another mo- 

 ment overall three tumbled, while the greyhounds and one 

 or two of the track-hounds jumped in to take part in the 

 killing. The big dogs more than occupied the wolf's 

 attention and took all the punishing, while in a trice one 

 of the greyhounds, having seized him by the hind-leg, 

 stretched him out, and the others were biting his un- 

 defended belly. The snarling and yelling of the worry 

 made a noise so fiendish that it was fairly bloodcurdling ; 

 then it gradually died down, and the second wolf lay 

 limp on the plain, killed by the dogs unassisted. This 

 wolf was rather heavier and decidedly taller than either 

 of the big dogs, with more sinewy feet and longer fangs. 

 I have several times seen wolves run down and stopped 

 by greyhounds after a break-neck gallop and a wildly 

 exciting finish, but this was the only occasion on which I 

 ever saw the dogs kill a big, full-grown he-wolf unaided. 

 Nevertheless various friends of mine own packs that have 

 performed the feat again and again. One pack, formerly 

 kept at Fort Benton, until wolves in that neighborhood 

 became scarce, had nearly seventy-five to its credit, most 

 of them killed without any assistance from the hunter ; 

 killed moreover by the greyhounds alone, there being no 



