6o 



TmWayof 

 We Wolf 



and tufts of grass till the precise moment 

 came, and then leaping with the swoop of a 

 goshawk on a ptarmigan. A wolf that cannot 

 catch a grasshopper has no business hunting 

 rabbits — this seemed to be the unconscious 

 motive that led the old mother, every sunny 

 afternoon, to ignore the thickets where game 

 was hiding plentifully and take her cubs to 

 the dry, sunny plains on the edge of the 

 caribou barrens. There for hours at a time 

 they hunted elusive grasshoppers, rushing 

 helter-skelter over the dry moss, leaping up 

 to strike at the flying game with their paws 

 like a kitten, or snapping wildly to catch it 

 in their mouths and coming down with a 

 back-breaking wriggle to keep themselves 

 from tumbling over on their heads. Then 

 on again, with a droll expression and noses 

 sharpened like exclamation points, to find 

 another grasshopper. 



Small business indeed and often ludicrous, 

 this playing at grasshopper hunting. So it 

 seems to us ; so also, perhaps, to the wise old 

 mother, which knew all the ways of game, 

 from crickets to caribou and from ground 



- -In i ., 



