with fuller volume, but the change was so slight as to escape
detection from the ears of man. These pups were the same sort of hybrids
as Breed, their parental strains identical, yet among them all he found
only one with his own qualities, the coyote fur and the voice of the
wolf. In all others this was reversed.

Breed's own pups grew strong and active, capable of covering ten miles
of rough hill country in a single night, and the family would soon have
left the den but that Shady indulged in one of her flighty streaks,--a
streak prompted by the dog strain in her rising temporarily above the
wild.

She had hunted tirelessly but had failed to bring home a scrap of meat.
Her hopes ran high and she ranged continually farther from the den till
she eventually crossed over the divide for a look at the west slope. The
breeze held steadily from the west and Shady caught a whiff of wood
smoke and moved toward it to investigate. She scouted along the edge of
the timber, watching the cabin in the little clearing for signs of life.
It appeared deserted. She crossed to it and sniffed at a crack,--then
fled for her life. At the first sniff there came a deafening bellow and
a great hound surged round the corner of the house.

As Shady fled she rolled her eyes back, coyote fashion, for a glimpse
behind. She noted that the hound seemed to have trouble in getting
started, and once back in the timber she stopped. She heard the rattle
of a chain,--the hound was anchored! From long experience in the past
Shady knew the futility of striving to break a chain. The dog was
powerless to harm her. Even if he should free himself it would avail him
nothing; these slow running hounds were known to her, and their speed
was no match for her own.

Shady returned to the cabin and peered round one corner at the raging
hound whose six-foot chain prevented his clearing the next corner by
more than a foot. She moved along the side of the house till within ten
feet of him and sat down, her tongue lolling out contentedly as she
watched the frenzied hound almost strangle himself in his efforts to
reach her.

A flutter of canvas caught her eye and she rose with her forefeet
against the logs as she stretched her nose up toward it. The prospector
had rolled the cloth round a ten-pound piece of fresh venison to keep
the flies from it. Shady sprang and seized it, swinging clear of the
ground, all four feet braced against the logs, then fell sprawling as
the