was now dependent.

CHAPTER V--THE COVENANT

When December was well along, Grey Beaver went on a journey up the
Mackenzie. Mit-sah and Kloo-kooch went with him. One sled he drove
himself, drawn by dogs he had traded for or borrowed. A second and
smaller sled was driven by Mit-sah, and to this was harnessed a team of
puppies. It was more of a toy affair than anything else, yet it was the
delight of Mit-sah, who felt that he was beginning to do a man's work in
the world. Also, he was learning to drive dogs and to train dogs; while
the puppies themselves were being broken in to the harness. Furthermore,
the sled was of some service, for it carried nearly two hundred pounds of
outfit and food.

White Fang had seen the camp-dogs toiling in the harness, so that he did
not resent overmuch the first placing of the harness upon himself. About
his neck was put a moss-stuffed collar, which was connected by two
pulling-traces to a strap that passed around his chest and over his back.
It was to this that was fastened the long rope by which he pulled at the
sled.

There were seven puppies in the team. The others had been born earlier
in the year and were nine and ten months old, while White Fang was only
eight months old. Each dog was fastened to the sled by a single rope. No
two ropes were of the same length, while the difference in length between
any two ropes was at least that of a dog's body. Every rope was brought
to a ring at the front end of the sled. The sled itself was without
runners, being a birch-bark toboggan, with upturned forward end to keep
it from ploughing under the snow. This construction enabled the weight
of the sled and load to be distributed over the largest snow-surface; for
the snow was crystal-powder and very soft. Observing the same principle
of widest distribution of weight, the dogs at the ends of their ropes
radiated fan-fashion from the nose of the sled, so that no dog trod in
another's footsteps.

There was, furthermore, another virtue in the fan-formation. The ropes
of varying length prevented the dogs attacking from the rear those that
ran in front of them. For a dog to attack another, it would have to turn
upon one at a shorter rope. In which case it would find itself face to
face with the dog attacked, and also it would find itself facing the whip
of the driver. But the most peculiar virtue of all lay in the fact that
the dog that strove to attack one in front of him m