Plover came in hordes, sweeping over
the Straits from the Labrador; and when the wolves surrounded a flock of
the queer birds and hitched nearer and nearer, sinking their gray bodies
in the yielding gray moss till they looked like weather-worn logs, the
hunting was full of tense excitement, though the juicy mouthfuls were
few and far between. Fox cubs roamed abroad away from their mothers,
self-willed and reveling in the abundance; and it was now easy for two
of the young wolves to drive a fox out of his daytime cover and catch
him as he stole away.
After the plover came the ducks in myriads, filling the ponds and
flashets of the vast barrens with tumultuous quacking; and the young
wolves learned, like the foxes, to decoy the silly birds by rousing
their curiosity. They would hide in the grass, while one played and
rolled about on the open shore, till the ducks saw him and began to
stretch their necks and gabble their amazement at the strange thing,
which they had never seen before. Shy and wild as he naturally is, a
duck, like a caribou or a turkey, must take a peek at every new thing.
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