Call of the Wild: Chapter 4

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
This is a LibriVox recording. All liberyvox recordings are in
the public domain. For more information, please visit liberyvox dot
blogsom dot com. Today's reading by Krista mc quillan, Call
of the Wild by Jack London, Chapter four, Who has
won to mastership? Eh? What I say, I speak too

(00:23):
when I say, dat Buck too devil. This was Francois's
speech the next morning when he discovered Spits missing and
Buck covered with wounds. He drew him to the fire
and by its light, pointed them out. Dot Spitz fight
like hell, said Peurot as he surveyed the gaping rips
and cuts. And dot Buck fight like too, hell, was

(00:44):
Francois's answer, And now we make good time. No more Spitz,
no more trouble. Sure. While Perrout packed the camp outfit
and loaded the sled, the dog driver proceeded to harness
the dogs. Buck trotted up to the place Spitz would
have occupied his leader, but Francois, not noticing him, brought
Solex to the coveted position. In his judgment, Solex was

(01:07):
the best lead dog left. Buck sprang upon Solex in
a fury, driving him back and standing in his place,
eh he, Francois cried, slapping his thighs gleefully. Look at
tat buck in'n keeldout spetzen tink to take the job.
Go away, Chuck, he cried, but Buck refused to budge.

(01:27):
He took Buck by the scruff of the neck, and
though the dog growled threateningly, dragged him to one side
and replaced Solex. The old dog did not like it
and showed plainly that he was afraid of Buck. Francois
was obdurate, but when he turned his back, Buck again
displaced Solex, who was not at all unwilling to go.
Francois was angry now by garat I fix you, he cried,

(01:50):
coming back with a heavy club in his hand. Buck
remembered the man in the red sweater and retreated slowly.
Nor did he attempt to charge in when Soolex was
once more brought forward, but he circled just beyond the
range of the club, snarling with bitterness and rage. And
while he circled, he watched the club so as to
dodge it if thrown by Francois, for he was become

(02:11):
wise in the way of clubs. The driver went about
his work, and he called to Buck when he was
ready to put him in his old place in front
of Dave. Buck retreated two or three steps. Francois followed
him up, whereupon he again retreated. After some time of this,
Francois threw down the club, thinking that Buck feared a thrashing.
But Buck was an open revolt. He wanted not to

(02:33):
escape a clubbing, but to have the leadership. It was
his by right, he had earned it, and he would
not be content with less. Perrolt took a hand between them.
They ran him about for the better part of an hour.
They threw clubs at him. He dodged. They cursed him
and his fathers and mothers before him, and all his
seed to come after him, down to the remotest generation,

(02:54):
and every hair in his body and drop of blood
in his veins. And he answered curse with snarl. Kept
out of their reach. He did not try to run away,
but retreated around and around the camp, advertising plainly that
when his desire was met, he would come in and
be good. Francois sat down and scratched his head. Perrault
looked at his watch and swore time was flying, and

(03:15):
they should have been on the trail. An hour gone,
Francois scratched his head again. He shook it and grinned
sheepishly at the courier, who shrugged his shoulders and signed
that they were beaten. Then Francois went up to where
Solek stood and called to Buck. Buck laughed as dog's laugh,
yet kept his distance. Francois unfastened Solec's traces and put

(03:36):
him back in his old place. The team stood harnessed
to the sled in an unbroken line, ready for the trail.
There was no place for Buck save at the front.
Once more Francois called, and once more Buck laughed and
kept away. Troll down to club. Pierau commanded. Francois complied,
whereupon Buck trotted in, laughing triumphantly, and swung into position

(04:00):
at the head of the team. His traces were fastened.
The sledge broken out, and with both men running, they
dashed out onto the river trail. Highly as the dog
driver had four valued Buck with his two devils, he found,
while the day was yet young, that he had undervalued
At a bound Buck took up the duties of leadership
and where judgment was required, and quick thinking and quick

(04:20):
acting he showed himself the superior even of Spits, of
whom Francois had never seen an equal. But it was
in giving the law and making his mates live up
to it that Buck excelled. Dave and Solex did not
mind the change in leadership. It was none of their business.
Their business was to toil, and toil mightily in the traces.
So long as that were not interfered with, they did
not care what happened. Billy, the good natured, could lead

(04:43):
for all they cared, so long as he kept order.
The rest of the team, however, had grown unruly during
the last days of Spits, and their surprise was great
now that Buck proceeded to lick them into shape. Pike,
who pulled at Buck's heels, and who never put an
ounce more of his weight against the breast band than
he was compelled to do, was swiftly and repeatedly shaken
for loathing, and near the first day was done, he

(05:04):
was pulling more than ever before in his life. The
first night in camp, Joe the sour one was punished roundly,
a thing that Spitz had never succeeded in doing. Buck
simply smothered him by virtue of his superior weight and
cut him up until he ceased snapping and began to
whine for mercy. The general tone of the team picked
up immediately. It recovered its old time solidarity, and once

(05:25):
more the dog sleaped as one dog in the traces
at the rink rapids. Two native huskies, Teak and Cuno,
were added, and the celerity with which Buck broke them
in took away Francois's breath. Neville, such a dog as
dab buck, He cried, No, Neville e'n worth one thousand
dollars back count eh, what you say, perol? Emperor nodded.

(05:47):
He was ahead of the record then and gaining day
by day. The trail was in excellent condition, well packed
and hard, and there was no new fallen snow with
which to contend. It was not too cold. The temperature
dropped to fifty below zero and remained there the whole trip.
The men rode and ran by turn, and the dogs
were kept on the jump, but with infrequent stoppages. The
thirty mile river it was comparatively coated with ice, and

(06:10):
they covered in one day going out what had taken
them ten days coming in. In one run, they made
a sixty mile dash from the foot of Lake Lebarge
to the White Horse Rapids, across Marsh to Guiche and
Bennett seventy miles of lakes. They flew so fast that
the man whose turn it was to run towed behind
the sled at the end of a rope. And on
the last night of the second week, they topped White

(06:32):
Pass and dropped down the sea slope with the lights
of Sagoway and of the shipping at their feet. It
was a record run. Each day for fourteen days they
had averaged forty miles. For three days, Pirot and Francois
threw chests up and down the main street of Saguway
and were deluged with invitations to drink, while the team
was the constant center of a worshipful crowd of dog

(06:53):
busters and mushers. Then three or four Western bad men
aspired to clean out the town and were riddled by
pepper boxes for their pains, and the public interest turned
to other ridols. Next came official orders. Francois called buck
to him, threw his arms around him and wept over him.
And that was the last of Francois and perout. Like

(07:13):
other men. They passed out of Buck's life for good.
A Scotch half breed took charge of him and his mates,
and in company with a dozen other dog teams, he
started back over the weary trail to Dawson. There was
no light running now, nor record time, but heavy toil
each day with a heavy load behind, for this was
the mail train, carrying word from the world to the

(07:35):
men who sought gold under the shadow of the pole.
Buck did not like it, but he bore up well
to the work, taking pride in it after the manner
of Dave and Solex, and seeing that his mates, whether
they prided in it or not, did their fair share.
It was a monotonous life, operating with machine like regularity.
One day was very like another. At a certain time

(07:57):
each morning, the cooks turned out, fires were built, and
breakfast was eaten. Then, while some broke camp, others harnessed
the dogs, and they were under way an hour or
so before the darkness spell which gave warning of dawn.
At night, camp was made. Some pitched the flies, others
cut firewood and pine boughs for the beds, and still
others carried water or ice for the cooks. Also, the

(08:18):
dogs were fed to them This was the one feature
of the day, though it was good to loaf around
after the fish was eaten for an hour or so
with the other dogs, of which there were five, score
and odd. They were fierce fighters among them, but three
battles with the fiercest brought Buck to mastery, so that
when he bristled and showed his teeth, they got out
of the way. Best of all, perhaps he loved to

(08:38):
lie near the fire, hind legs crouched under him, four
legs stretched out in front, head raised, and eyes blinking
dreamily at the flames. Sometimes he thought of Judge Miller's
big house in the sun kissed Santa Clara Valley, and
of the cement swimming tank, and Isabelle the Mexican hairless
and Toots the Japanese pug. But oftener he remembered them

(09:00):
Man in the red sweater, the death of Curly, the
great fight with spits, and the good things he had
eaten and would like to eat. He was not homesick.
The sunland was very dim and distant, and such memories
had no power over him. Far more potent were the
memories of his heredity, that gave things he had never
seen before. A seeming familiarity, The instincts which were but

(09:22):
the memories of his ancestors become habits which had lapsed
in later days and still later in him, quickened and
became alive again. Sometimes, as he crouched there, blinking dreamily
at the flames, it seemed that the flames were of
another fire, and that as he crouched by this other fire,
he saw another and different man from the half breed
cook before him. This other man was shorter of leg

(09:46):
and longer of arm, with muscles that were stringy and
knotty rather than rounded and swelling. The hair of this
man was long and matted, and his head slanted back
under it from the eyes. He uttered strange sounds, and
seemed very much afraid of the darkckness into which he peered, continually,
clutching in his hand, which hung midway between knee and foot,
a stick with a heavy stone made fast to the end.

(10:08):
He was all but naked, a ragged and fire scorched
skin hanging part way down his back, but on his
body there was much hair in some places across the
chest and shoulders, and down the outside of the arms
and thighs. It was matted into almost a thick fur.
He did not stand erect, but with trunk inclimbed forward
from the hips on legs that bent at the knees.

(10:30):
About his body there was a peculiar springiness or resiliency,
almost catlike, and a quick alertness, as of one who
lived in perpetual fear of things seen and unseen. At
other times, this hairy man squatted by the fire with
head between his legs, and slept. On such occasions his
elbows were on his knees, his hands clasped above his head,

(10:51):
as though to shed rain by the hairy arms. And
beyond that fire, in the circling darkness, Buck could see
many gleaming coals, two by two, always two by two,
which he knew to be the eyes of great beasts
of prey. He could hear the crashing of their bodies
through the undergrowth, and the noises that they made in
the night. And dreaming there by the Yukon bank with

(11:12):
lazy eyes blinking by the fire, these sights and sounds
of another world would make the hair to rise along
his back and stand on end across his shoulders and
up his neck, till he whimpered low and suppressedly, or
growled softly, and the half breed cook shouted at him, Hey,
you buck, wake up, whereupon the other world would vanish
and the real world come into his eyes. Then he

(11:33):
would get up and yawn and stretch as though he'd
been asleep. It was a hard trip with the mail
behind them, and the heavy work wore them down. They
were short of weight and in poor condition when they
made Dawson, and should have had ten days or a
week's rest at least, But in two days time they
dropped down the Yukon Bank from the barracks, loaded with
letters for the outside. The dogs were tired, the drivers grumbling,

(11:57):
and to make matters worse, it snowed every day. This
meant a soft trail, greater friction on the runners, and
heavier pulling for the dogs. Yet the drivers were fair
through it all and did their best for the animals.
Each night, the dogs were attended to first. They ate
before the drivers ate, and no man sought his sleeping
robe till he had seen to the feet of the
dogs he drove. Still, their strength went down since the

(12:20):
beginning of the winter. Since the beginning of the winter,
they had traveled eighteen hundred miles dragging sleds the whole
weary distance, and eighteen hundred miles will tell upon life
of the toughest buck stood it, keeping his mates up
to their work and maintaining discipline, though he too was
very tired. Billy cried and whimpered regularly in his sleep
each night. Joe was sourer than ever, and Soules was

(12:43):
unapproachable blind side or other side. But it was Dave
who suffered most of all. Something had gone wrong with him.
He became morose and irritable, and when camp was pitched
at once made his nest, where his driver fed him.
Once out of the harness and down. He did not
get on his feet again till harness up time in
the morning. Sometimes in the traces, when jerked by a

(13:06):
sudden stoppage of the sled or straining to start, he
would cry out with pain. The driver examined him, but
could find nothing. All the drivers became interested in his case.
They talked it over at meal time and over their
last pipes before going to bed, and one night they
held a consultation. He was brought from his nest to
the fire and was pressed and prodded till he cried out.

(13:26):
Many times something was wrong inside, but they could locate
no broken bones and could not make it out. By
the time cassiar Bar was reached, he was so weak
that he was falling repeatedly in the traces. The Scotch
halfbreed called a halt and took him out of the team,
making the next dog, Soles, fast to the sled. His
intention was to rest Dave, letting him run free behind

(13:48):
the sled. Sick as he was, Dave resented being taken out,
grunting and growling while the traces were unfastened, and whimpering
broken heartedly. When he saw Soles in the position he
had held and served so long for the pride of
trace and trail was his, and sick unto death, he
could not bear that another dog should do his work.
When the sledge started, he floundered in the soft snow

(14:10):
alongside the beaten trail, attacking Souleks with his teeth rushing
against him and trying to thrust him off into the
soft snow on the other side, striving to leap inside
his traces and get between him and the sled, and
all the while whining and yelping and crying with grief
and pain. The half breed tried to drive him away
with the whip, but he paid no heed to the
stinging lash, and the man had not the heart to

(14:31):
strike harder. Dave refused to ran quietly on the trail
behind the sled where the going was easy, but continued
to flounder alongside in the soft snow, where the going
was most difficult, till exhausted. Then he fell and lay
where he fell, howling lugubriously as the long train of
sleds turned by. With the last remnant of his strength,

(14:51):
he managed to stagger along behind till the train made
another stop. When he floundered past the sleds to his own,
where he stood alongside Soleks. His driver lingered a moment
to get a light for his pipe from the man behind,
then he returned and started his dogs. They swung out
on the trail with remarkable lack of exertion, turned their
heads uneasily, and stopped in surprise. The driver was surprised too,

(15:15):
the sled had not moved. He called his comrades to
witness the sight. Dave had bitten through both of sole
Ex's traces and was standing directly in front of the
sled in his proper place. He pleaded with his eyes
to remain there. The driver was perplexed. His comrades talked
of how a dog could break its heart through being
denied the work that killed it, and recalled instances they

(15:36):
had known were dogs too old for the toil or injured,
had died because they were cut out of the traces. Also,
they held it a mercy, since Dave was to die anyway,
that he should die in the traces. Heart easy and content,
so he was harnessed in again, and proudly he pulled
as of old, though more than once he cried out
involuntarily from the bite of his inward hurt. Several times

(15:56):
he fell down and was dragged in the traces, and
once the sled ran upon it, so that he limped
thereafter in one of his hind legs. But he held
out till camp was reached, when his driver made a
place for him by the fire. Morning found him too
weak to travel at harness up time, he tried to
crawl to his driver by convulsive efforts. He got on
his feet, staggered, and fell. Then he wormed his way

(16:17):
forward slowly toward where the harnesses were being put on
his mates. He would advance his fore legs and drag
his body up with a sort of hitching movement. Then
he would advance his fore legs and hitch again ahead
for a few more inches. His strength left him, and
the last his mates saw of him, he lay gasping
in the snow and yearning toward them. But they could
hear him mournfully howling till they passed out of sight

(16:39):
behind a belt of river timber. Here the train was halted.
The Scotch half breed slowly retraced his steps to the
camp they had left. The men ceased talking. A revolver
shot rang out. The man came back hurriedly. The whip snapped,
the bells tinkled merrily, the sleds churned along the trail.
But bucknew and every dog neew what had taken place

(17:03):
behind the belt of river trees. End of chapter four