THE GRAY WOLF. 147 



spring, and it is no unusual thing for a party of half a 

 dozen to return to the settlements, after one campaign, 

 with from six to twelve thousand cured skins ; and as they 

 realize from one and a half to two dollars each, it is evi- 

 dent that the business is profitable if the season is even 

 indifferently good. 



When the majority of these men receive their money 

 they spend it in the most reckless manner, and when it is 

 exhausted they disappear from the settlements, and are not 

 seen again until the following spring, when they return to 

 renew their debauch. Where they go to after their spree 

 no person seems to know ; but, from their character, one 

 might infer that they wandered about like the animal with 

 which they are so closely identified. A few of them, how- 

 ever, are wise enough to keep their money, and they soon 

 retire for good from the business, or seek a more congenial 

 occupation. I knew one " wolfer " to save up eight thou- 

 sand dollars in five years, and when I last saw him he was 

 a prosperous merchant in a Western city. Another, whom 

 I met in Montana, was a man of intelligence, a keen sports- 

 man, a good amateur naturalist, and a successful stock- 

 raiser. He cultivated a farm in spring and summer, and 

 hunted in winter ; but his greatest wealth, in his own esti- 

 mation, consisted in an interesting family, and, after them, 

 in his herds of mustangs and horned cattle. He had a 

 thorough knowledge of the character of the wolf, and so 

 much contempt did he have for it that he could only com- 

 pare it to an Indian. Although he destroyed many with 

 strychnine, yet his greatest amusement was to hunt them 

 with a pack of half a dozen huge fierce hounds which 

 seemed to be a cross between the deer - hound and the 

 blood-hound. These were bred by a Scotch half-breed in 

 British America, their parents having been obtained from 

 an officer in the British array. They were powerful ani- 

 mals, which would run either by sight or scent, and any 

 one of which was almost a match for a wolf either in 

 strength or stride ; but they were difficult to manage, be- 

 ing so intractable and bad-tempered that he dare not strike 



