"Three teams," says Springer, "in the winter of 1844, all in
the same neighbourhood, were beset with these ravenous animals.
They were of unusually large size, manifesting a most singular
boldness, and even familiarity, without the usual appearance of
ferocity so characteristic of the animal. Sometimes one, and in
another instance three, in a most unwelcome manner, volunteered
their attendance, accompanying the teamster a long distance on
his way. They would even jump on the log and ride, and approach
very near the oxen. One of them actually jumped upon the sled,
and down between the bars, while the sled was in motion. Some of
the teamsters were much alarmed, keeping close to the oxen, and
driving on as fast as possible. Others, more courageous, would
run forward and strike at them with their goad-sticks; but the
wolves sprang out of the way in an instant. But, although they
seemed to act without a motive, there was something so cool and
impudent in their conduct that it was trying to the nerves--even
more so than an active encounter. For some time after this,
firearms were a constant part of the teamster's equipage."
The distant howling and screaming of the wolves, compared by an old
Yankee hunter to the screeching of forty pair of old cart-wheels,
is particularly ominous and disagreeable. Springer has collected a
number of curious anecdotes concerning them. One night a pack of the
prowling marauders were seen trailing down Mattawamkeag River on the
ice. The dwellers in a log-house hard by soaked some meat in poison
and threw it out. Next morning the meat was gone, and six wolves lay
dead, all within sight of each other. "Every one of them had dug a
hole down through the snow into the frozen earth, in which they had
thrust their noses, either for water to quench the burning thirst
produced by the poison, or to snuff some antidote to the fatal
drug. A bounty was obtained on each of ten dollars, besides their
hides, making a fair job of it, as well as ridding the neighbourhood
of an annoying enemy." Several of Mr Springer's logging and
lumbering friends have contributed to his book the results of their
experience, and narratives of their adventures, some of which he
gives in their own words. Amongst these is an ill-written, but yet a
very exciting, account of a wolf-chase, or we should perhaps rather
say a man-chase, the wolves in this instance being the pursuers,
and Springer's neighbour the pursued. The person in question was
passionately fond of skating, and one night he left a friend's
house to skate a short distance up the frozen Kennebeck, which
flowed before the door. It was a bright still evening; the new moon
silvered the frosty pines. After gliding a couple of miles up the
river, the skater turned off into a little tributary stream, over
which fir and hemlock twined their evergreen branches. The archway
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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