Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories

Brown Wolf and Other Jack
London Stories

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Jack London This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost
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Title: Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories Chosen and Edited
By Franklin K. Mathiews
Author: Jack London
Release Date: May 14, 2004 [EBook #12336]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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WOLF AND OTHER JACK ***

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BROWN WOLF
[Illustration]

Brown Wolf

AND
Other Jack London Stories
As chosen by
Franklin K. Mathiews
Chief Scout Librarian, Boy Scouts of America

TABLE OF CONTENTS
BROWN WOLF
THAT SPOT
TRUST
ALL GOLD CANYON
THE STORY OF KEESH
NAM-BOK THE UNVERACIOUS
YELLOW HANDKERCHIEF
MAKE WESTING
THE HEATHEN
THE HOBO AND THE FAIRY
"JUST MEAT"
A NOSE FOR THE KING
INTRODUCTION
Boys delight in men who have had adventures, and when they are
privileged to read of such exploits in thrilling story form, that is the
"seventh heaven" for them. Such a "boys' man" was Jack London,
whose whole life was one of stirring action on land and sea. Gifted as a
story teller, he wrote books almost without end. Some of them, "The
Call of the Wild," "The Sea Wolf" and "White Fang," have already
been recognized as fine books for boys. Others, volumes of short
stories, contain many of like interest, possessing the same qualities that
have made the other and longer stories so acceptable as juveniles.
Effort has been made by the editor to bring together in one volume a
number of such stories, not for the reason alone that there might be
another Jack London book for boys, but also in order to add to our
juvenile literature a volume likely "to be chewed and digested," as
Bacon says, a book worthy "to be read whole, and with diligence and
attention." For my belief is that boys read altogether too few of such
books. Or perhaps it would be more correct to say, have too few
opportunities to read such books, because so often we fail to see how

quick in their reading their minds are to grasp the more difficult, and
how keen and competent their conscience to draw the right conclusion
when situations are presented wherein men err so grievously.
It is hoped the stories presented will serve to exercise both the boy's
mind and conscience; that seeing and feeling life and nature as Jack
London saw and felt it--the best and the worst in human nature, with
the Infinite always near and from whom there is no escape--seeing and
feeling such things boys will develop the emotional muscles of the
spirit, have opened up new windows to their imaginations, and withal
add some line or color to their life's ideals.
FRANKLIN K. MATHIEWS, Chief Scout Librarian, Boy Scouts of
America.
[Illustration]

BROWN WOLF
She had delayed, because of the dew-wet grass, in order to put on her
overshoes, and when she emerged from the house found her waiting
husband absorbed in the wonder of a bursting almond-bud. She sent a
questing glance across the tall grass and in and out among the orchard
trees.
"Where's Wolf?" she asked.
"He was here a moment ago." Walt Irvine drew himself away with a
jerk from the metaphysics and poetry of the organic miracle of blossom,
and surveyed the landscape. "He was running a rabbit the last I saw of
him."
"Wolf! Wolf! Here, Wolf!" she called, as they left the clearing and took
the trail that led down through the waxen-belled manzanita jungle to
the county road.
Irvine thrust between his lips the little finger of each hand and lent to
her efforts a shrill whistling.
She covered her ears hastily and made a wry grimace.
"My! for a poet, delicately attuned and all the rest of it, you can make
unlovely noises. My eardrums are pierced. You outwhistle----"
"Orpheus."
"I was about to say a street-arab," she concluded severely.
"Poesy does not prevent one from being practical--at least it doesn't
prevent me. Mine is no futility of genius that can't sell gems to the

magazines."
He assumed a mock extravagance, and went on:
"I am no attic singer, no ballroom warbler. And why? Because I am
practical. Mine is no squalor of song that cannot transmute itself, with
proper exchange value, into a flower-crowned cottage, a sweet
mountain-meadow, a grove of redwoods, an orchard of thirty-seven
trees, one long row of blackberries and two short rows of strawberries,
to say nothing of a quarter of a mile of gurgling brook."