THE WOLF 



53 



and vegetables, or upon anything else which can 

 satisfy their raging hunger. 



The Cayeute ignores every sentiment of sym- 

 pathy, and for this reason inspires none. 



During the first epoch of the colonization of 

 Kentucky, the Cayeutes were so numerous in the 

 prairie south- of that State that the settlers durst 

 not quit their dwellings unless armed to the 

 teeth. The children and women were kept 

 strictly shut up within the house. The Cayeutes 

 which infested the country belonged to the race 

 with a dark gray skin ; a species very abundant 

 in the districts of the north, in the centre of the 

 dense forests and unexplored mountains of the 

 Green River. 



The village of Henderson, situated on the left 

 bank of the Ohio, near its point of confluence 

 with the Green River, was the cantonment most 

 frequented by these four-footed plunderers. 



The Pigs, Calves, and Sheep of the planters 

 paid a heavy tribute to them. In the heart of 

 winter, when the snow lay thick upon the ground, 

 and the Cattle were confined to their stalls, the 

 famished Cayeutes would even attack men ; and 

 more than one belated farmer, as he returned to 

 his home in the evening, was surrounded by a 

 furious pack, from whom he escaped with diffi- 

 culty. 



When Europe was covered with thick forests, 

 as it was once — yes, and Britain too — then the 

 Wolf lived in those forests in great numbers ; but 

 whenever man cuts down the forests, builds 

 cities, and cultivates vineyards and corn-fields, 

 then he begins a terrible war upon the Wolf, and 

 nothing will satisfy him but to get it entirely 

 destroyed. Many hundred years ago, there was 

 a Saxon king of England named Edgar, who 

 made the Welsh king, who paid him tribute, bring 



him three hundred Wolves' heads instead of gold 

 and silver ; and when a criminal had done some 

 very bad thing worthy of death, instead of hang- 

 ing him or taking off his head, he was made to 

 bring in a certain number of Wolves' tongues, to 

 show that he had killed the like number of these 

 animals. And so it was that -England was quite 

 cleared of Wolves before any other country of 

 Europe. In Scotland, however, they remained 

 sometime longer; and the very, last Wolf was 

 only killed in the far Highlands less than two 

 hundred years ago, by a Highland cliief, called 

 Sir Evan Cameron. 



Famished Wolves have different modes of at- 

 tacking different creatures, according to their 

 various habits ; and rather than call this cunning 

 and treachery, we may see in it the rudiments of 

 that sagacity which makes the Dog so valuable. 

 If a troop of wild Horses is to be attacked, then 

 there is a drawn battle. The Horses place their 

 females and young ones, who tremble excessively, 

 in the middle, to keep them as safe as possible, 

 while the males form a ring as deep as they can 

 around them on the outside. The Wolves come 

 on, led by the wisest and strongest, and then the 

 fight becomes terrible. The Horses use their 

 hoofs to kick with ; but as the Wolves are in 

 great numbers, and make their attack with the 

 utmost daring, troop after troop, it nearly always 

 ends in their having the victory. Many of the 

 Horses fall victims, and the rest save themselves 

 by flight as they best can. Again, if they have 

 Deer to attack, which can run faster than them- 

 selves they try if possible to get them driven 

 to the brink of a precipice, if there be such in 

 the neighborhood, and for this purpose they 

 form themselves into a crescent — that is, a line 

 curved in the shape of a half-moon. They ap- 



