this strange Southland dog. And strange Buck was to him, for of
the many Southland dogs he had known, not one had shown up
worthily in camp and on trail. They were all too soft, dying
under the toil, the frost, and starvation. Buck was the
exception. He alone endured and prospered, matching the husky in
strength, savagery, and cunning. Then he was a masterful dog, and
what made him dangerous was the fact that the club of the man in
the red sweater had knocked all blind pluck and rashness out of
his desire for mastery. He was preeminently cunning, and could
bide his time with a patience that was nothing less than
primitive.

It was inevitable that the clash for leadership should come. Buck
wanted it. He wanted it because it was his nature, because he had
been gripped tight by that nameless, incomprehensible pride of the
trail and trace--that pride which holds dogs in the toil to the
last gasp, which lures them to die joyfully in the harness, and
breaks their hearts if they are cut out of the harness. This was
the pride of Dave as wheel-dog, of Sol-leks as he pulled with all
his strength; the pride that laid hold of them at break of camp,
transforming them from sour and sullen brutes into straining,
eager, ambitious creatures; the pride that spurred them on all day
and dropped them at pitch of camp at night, letting them fall back
into gloomy unrest and uncontent. This was the pride that bore up
Spitz and made him thrash the sled-dogs who blundered and shirked
in the traces or hid away at harness-up time in the morning.
Likewise it was this pride that made him fear Buck as a possible
lead-dog. And this was Buck's pride, too.

He openly threatened the other's leadership. He came between him