a time, White Fang heard strange noises approaching. He was quick in
his classification, for he knew them at once for man-animal noises. A few
minutes later the remainder of the tribe, strung out as it was on the march,
trailed in. There were more men and many women and children, forty souls of
them, and all heavily burdened with camp equipage and outfit. Also there were
many dogs; and these, with the exception of the part-grown puppies, were
likewise burdened with camp outfit. On their backs, in bags that fastened
tightly around underneath, the dogs carried from twenty to thirty pounds of
weight.
    White Fang had never seen dogs before, but at sight of them he felt that
they were his own kind, only somehow different. But they displayed little
difference from the wolf when they discovered the cub and his mother. There was
a rush. White Fang bristled and snarled and snapped in the face of the
open-mouthed oncoming wave of dogs, and went down and under them, feeling the
sharp slash of teeth in his body, himself biting and tearing at the legs and
bellies above him. There was a great uproar. He could hear the snarl of Kiche as
she fought for him; and he could hear the cries of the man-animals, the sound of
clubs striking upon bodies, and the yelps of pain from the dogs so struck.
    Only a few seconds elapsed before he was on his feet again. He could now see
the man-animals driving back the dogs with clubs and stones, defending him,
saving him from the savage teeth of his kind that somehow was not his kind. And
though there was no reason in his brain for a clear conception of so abstract a
thing as justice, nevertheless, in his own way, he felt the justice of the
man-animals, and he knew them for what they were - makers of law and executors
of law. Also, he appreciated the power with which they administered the law.
Unlike any animals he had ever encountered, they did not bite nor claw. They
enforced their live strength with the power of dead things. Dead things did
their bidding. Thus, sticks and stones, directed by these strange creatures,
leaped through the air like living things, inflicting grievous hurts upon the
dogs.
    To his mind this was power unusual, power inconceivable and beyond the
natural, power that was godlike. White Fang, in the very nature of him, could
never know anything about gods; at the best he could know only things that were
beyond knowing; but