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HOOF AND CLAW


[Illustration: Logo]

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK. BOSTON. CHICAGO
DALLAS. ATLANTA. SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED
LONDON. BOMBAY. CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
TORONTO


[Illustration: "He saw Jeff with one lynx down, slashing at its throat."
_Frontispiece_]




HOOF AND CLAW

BY
CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS

AUTHOR OF "KINGS IN EXILE," "NEIGHBORS UNKNOWN,"
"THE FEET OF THE FURTIVE," ETC.

New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1917

_All rights reserved_


Copyright, 1913, by The Illustrated Sunday Magazine and by The Cosmopolitan
Magazine.

Copyright, 1914, by The Pictorial Review Company, by The Illustrated Sunday
Magazine, by The National Sunday Magazine, by the Cosmopolitan Magazine,
and by John Adams Thayer Corporation.

COPYRIGHT, 1914
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1914
Reprinted April, 1917.




CONTENTS

                                     PAGE

THE BEAR THAT THOUGHT HE WAS A DOG      1

THE TRAIL OF THE VANISHING HERDS       26

A MASTER OF SUPPLY                     49

THE WHITE WOLF                         66

UP A TREE                              90

THE EYES IN THE BUSH                  108

THE RUNNERS OF THE HIGH PEAKS         123

THE POOL                              145

THE SHADOWS AND JOHN HATCH            160

THE FISHER IN THE CHUTES              186

THE ASSAULT OF WINGS                  200

THE CABIN DOOR                        223

A BASKET OF FISH                      243

BRANNIGAN'S MARY                      259




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


"He Saw Jeff with One Lynx down, Slashing at Its Throat"  _Frontispiece_

                                                        FACING PAGE
"For a Day He Wandered Disconsolately over and about the Ruins"  14

"The Shambles of the Plain"      46

"He Found the Wolverine Head Downward in His Choicest Cellar"    62

"The Gaunt, Tirelessly Patrolling Shape of His White Sentinel"   78

"His Pronged Antlers Ripped it Wide Open"                       100

"And the Fiery Light in His Brain Went Out"                     116

"He Took No Pains to Choose an Easy Path"                       128




The Bear that thought he was a Dog


The gaunt, black mother lifted her head from nuzzling happily at the
velvet fur of her little one. The cub was but twenty-four hours old, and
engrossed every emotion of her savage heart; but her ear had caught the
sound of heavy footsteps coming up the mountain. They were confident,
fearless footsteps, taking no care whatever to disguise themselves, so
she knew at once that they were the steps of the only creature that
presumed to go so noisily through the great silences. Her heart pounded
with anxious suspicion. She gave the cub a reassuring lick, deftly set
it aside with her great paws, and thrust her head forth cautiously from
the door of the den.

She saw a man--a woodsman in brownish-grey homespuns and heavy
leg-boots, and with a gun over his shoulder--slouching up along the
faintly marked trail which led close past her doorway. Her own great
tracks on the trail had been obliterated that morning by a soft and
thawing fall of belated spring snow--"the robin snow," as it is called
in New Brunswick--and the man, absorbed in picking his way by this
unfamiliar route over the mountain, had no suspicion that he was in
danger of trespassing. But the bear, with that tiny black form at the
bottom of the den filling her whole horizon, could not conceive that the
man's approach had any other purpose than to rob her of her treasure.
She ran back to the little one, nosed it gently into a corner, and
anxiously pawed some dry leaves half over it. Then, her eyes aflame with
rage and fear, she betook herself once more to the entrance, and
crouched there motionless to await the coming of the enemy.

The man swung up the hill noisily, grunting now and again as his
foothold slipped on the slushy, moss-covered stones. He fetched a huge
breath of satisfaction as he gained a little strip of level ledge,
perhaps a dozen feet in length, with a scrubby spr