Lip-lip continued so to darken his days that White Fang becamewickeder and more ferocious than it was his natural right to be.

　　Savageness was a part of his make-up, but the savageness thus developedexceeded his make-up. He acquired a reputation for wickedness amongstthe man-animals themselves. Wherever there was trouble and uproar incamp, fighting and squabbling or the outcry of a squaw over a bit of stolenmeat, they were sure to find White Fang mixed up in it and usually at thebottom of it. They did not bother to look after the causes of his conduct.

　　They saw only the effects, and the effects were bad. He was a sneak and athief, a mischief-maker, a fomenter of trouble; and irate squaws told himto his face, the while he eyed them alert and ready to dodge any quick-flung missile, that he was a wolf and worthless and bound to come to anevil end.

　　He found himself an outcast in the midst of the populous camp. All theyoung dogs followed Lip-lip's lead. There was a difference between WhiteFang and them. Perhaps they sensed his wild-wood breed, andinstinctively felt for him the enmity that the domestic dog feels for thewolf. But be that as it may, they joined with Lip-lip in the persecution.

　　And, once declared against him, they found good reason to continuedeclared against him. One and all, from time to time, they felt his teeth;and to his credit, he gave more than he received. Many of them he couldwhip in single fight; but single fight was denied him. The beginning ofsuch a fight was a signal for all the young dogs in camp to come runningand pitch upon him.

　　Out of this pack-persecution he learned two important things: how totake care of himself in a mass-fight against him - and how, on a single dog,to inflict the greatest amount of damage in the briefest space of time. Tokeep one's feet in the midst of the hostile mass meant life, and this helearnt well. He became cat- like in his ability to stay on his feet. Evengrown dogs might hurtle him backward or sideways with the impact oftheir heavy bodies; and backward or sideways he would go, in the air orsliding on the ground, but always with his legs under him and his feetdownward to the mother earth.

　　When dogs fight, there are usually preliminaries to the actual combat -snarlings and bristlings and stiff-legged struttings. But White Fang learnedto omit these preliminaries. Delay meant the coming against him of all theyoung dogs. He must do his work quickly and get away. So he learnt togive no warning of his intention. He rushed in and snapped and slashed onthe instant, without notice, before his foe could prepare to meet him. Thushe learned how to inflict quick and severe damage. Also he learned thevalue of surprise. A dog, taken off its guard, its shoulder slashed open orits ear ripped in ribbons before it knew what was happening, was a doghalf whipped.

　　Furthermore, it was remarkably easy to overthrow a dog taken bysurprise; while a dog, thus overthrown, invariably exposed for a momentthe soft underside of its neck - the vulnerable point at which to strike forits life. White Fang knew this point. It was a knowledge bequeathed tohim directly from the hunting generation of wolves. So it was that WhiteFang's method when he took the offensive, was: first to find a young dogalone; second, to surprise it and knock it off its feet; and third, to drive inwith his teeth at the soft throat.

　　Being but partly grown his jaws had not yet become large enough norstrong enough to make his throat-attack deadly; but many a young dogwent around camp with a lacerated throat in token of White Fang'sintention. And one day, catching one of his enemies alone on the edge ofthe woods, he managed, by repeatedly overthrowing him and attacking thethroat, to cut the great vein and let out the life. There was a great row thatnight. He had been observed, the news had been carried to the dead dog'smaster, the squaws remembered all the instances of stolen meat, and GreyBeaver was beset by many angry voices. But he resolutely held the door ofhis tepee, inside which he had placed the culprit, and refused to permit thevengeance for which his tribespeople clamoured.

　　White Fang became hated by man and dog. During this period of hisdevelopment he never knew a moment's security. The tooth of every dogwas against him, the hand of every man. He was greeted with snarls by hiskind, with curses and stones by his gods. He lived tensely. He was alwayskeyed up, alert for attack, wary of being attacked, with an eye for suddenand unexpected missiles, prepared to act precipitately and coolly, to leapin with a flash of teeth, or to leap away with a menacing snarl.

　　As for snarling he could snarl more terribly than any dog, young or old,in camp. The intent of the snarl is to warn or frighten, and judgment isrequired to know when it should be used. White Fang knew how to makeit and when to make it. Into his snarl he incorporated all that was vicious,malignant, and horrible. With nose serrulated by continuous spasms, hairbristling in recurrent waves, tongue whipping out like a red snake andwhipping back again, ears flattened down, eyes gleaming hatred, lipswrinkled back, and fangs exposed and dripping, he could compel a pauseon the part of almost any assailant. A temporary pause, when taken off hisguard, gave him the vital moment in which to think and determine hisaction. But often a pause so gained lengthened out until it evolved into acomplete cessation from the attack. And before more than one of thegrown dogs White Fang's snarl enabled him to beat an honourable retreat.

　　An outcast himself from the pack of the part-grown dogs, hissanguinary methods and remarkable efficiency made the pack pay for itspersecution of him. Not permitted himself to run with the pack, the curiousstate of affairs obtained that no member of the pack could run outside thepack. White Fang would not permit it. What of his bushwhacking andwaylaying tactics, the young dogs were afraid to run by themselves. Withthe exception of Lip-lip, they were compelled to hunch together for mutualprotection against the terrible enemy they had made. A puppy alone by theriver bank meant a puppy dead or a puppy that aroused the camp with itsshrill pain and terror as it fled back from the wolf-cub that had waylaid it.

　　But White Fang's reprisals did not cease, even when the young dogshad learned thoroughly that they must stay together. He attacked themwhen he caught them alone, and they attacked him when they werebunched. The sight of him was sufficient to start them rushing after him, atwhich times his swiftness usually carried him into safety. But woe the dogthat outran his fellows in such pursuit! White Fang had learned to turnsuddenly upon the pursuer that was ahead of the pack and thoroughly torip him up before the pack could arrive. This occurred with greatfrequency, for, once in full cry, the dogs were prone to forget themselvesin the excitement of the chase, while White Fang never forgot himself.

　　Stealing backward glances as he ran, he was always ready to whirl aroundand down the overzealous pursuer that outran his fellows.

　　Young dogs are bound to play, and out of the exigencies of thesituation they realised their play in this mimic warfare. Thus it was that thehunt of White Fang became their chief game - a deadly game, withal, andat all times a serious game. He, on the other hand, being the fastest-footed,was unafraid to venture anywhere. During the period that he waited vainlyfor his mother to come back, he led the pack many a wild chase throughthe adjacent woods. But the pack invariably lost him. Its noise and outcrywarned him of its presence, while he ran alone, velvet-footed, silently, amoving shadow among the trees after the manner of his father and motherbefore him. Further he was more directly connected with the Wild thanthey; and he knew more of its secrets and stratagems. A favourite trick ofhis was to lose his trail in running water and then lie quietly in a near-bythicket while their baffled cries arose around him.

　　Hated by his kind and by mankind, indomitable, perpetually warredupon and himself waging perpetual war, his development was rapid andone-sided. This was no soil for kindliness and affection to blossom in. Ofsuch things he had not the faintest glimmering. The code he learned was toobey the strong and to oppress the weak. Grey Beaver was a god, andstrong. Therefore White Fang obeyed him. But the dog younger or smallerthan himself was weak, a thing to be destroyed. His development was inthe direction of power. In order to face the constant danger of hurt andeven of destruction, his predatory and protective faculties were undulydeveloped. He became quicker of movement than the other dogs, swifterof foot, craftier, deadlier, more lithe, more lean with ironlike muscle andsinew, more enduring, more cruel, more ferocious, and more intelligent.

　　He had to become all these things, else he would not have held his ownnor survive the hostile environment in which he found himself.