For Megaleep is
full of curiosity as a wild turkey, and always stops to get a little
entertainment out of every new thing that does not threaten him with
instant death. Then out of the woods behind them trotted five white
wolves,--not hunting, certainly! for whenever the caribou stopped to
look the wolves sat down on their tails and yawned. One lay down and
rolled over and over in the soft snow; another chased and capered after
his own brush, whirling round and round like a little whirlwind, and the
shrill _ki-yi_ of a cub wolf playing came faintly across the barren.
It was a strange scene, yet one often witnessed on the lonely plains of
the far North: the caribou halting, running away, and halting again to
look back and watch the queer antics of their big enemies, which seemed
now so playful and harmless; the cunning wolves playing on the game's
curiosity at every turn, knowing well that if once frightened the deer
would break away at a pace which would make pursuit hopeless. So they
followed rather than drove the foolish deer across the barren, holding
them with monkey tricks and kitten's capers, and restraining with an
iron grip their own fearful hunger and the blind impulse to rush in
headlong and have it all quickly over.
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