tormentors. But he was thrown down and choked repeatedly, till
they succeeded in filing the heavy brass collar from off his neck.
Then the rope was removed, and he was flung into a cagelike crate.

There he lay for the remainder of the weary night, nursing his
wrath and wounded pride. He could not understand what it all
meant. What did they want with him, these strange men? Why were
they keeping him pent up in this narrow crate? He did not know
why, but he felt oppressed by the vague sense of impending
calamity. Several times during the night he sprang to his feet
when the shed door rattled open, expecting to see the Judge, or
the boys at least. But each time it was the bulging face of the
saloon-keeper that peered in at him by the sickly light of a
tallow candle. And each time the joyful bark that trembled in
Buck's throat was twisted into a savage growl.

But the saloon-keeper let him alone, and in the morning four men
entered and picked up the crate. More tormentors, Buck decided,
for they were evil-looking creatures, ragged and unkempt; and he
stormed and raged at them through the bars. They only laughed and
poked sticks at him, which he promptly assailed with his teeth
till he realized that that was what they wanted. Whereupon he lay
down sullenly and allowed the crate to be lifted into a wagon.
Then he, and the crate in which he was imprisoned, began a passage
through many hands. Clerks in the express office took charge of
him; he was carted about in another wagon; a truck carried him,
with an assortment of boxes and parcels, upon a ferry steamer; he
was trucked off the steamer into a great railway depot, and
finally he was deposited in an express car.