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STUDYWORLD STUDYNOTES

The Call of the Wild

Quick/Fast Review

The story begins in the time of the Klondike gold rush, when dogs are a precious commodity. Buck, a 140 pound mixed St. Bernard and Scotch shepherd belonging to Judge Miller, enjoys a pampered life in Santa Clara Valley, California, until Manuel, a family employee, kidnaps the dog and sell him to pay a gambling debt. The kidnapper places Buck in the baggage car of a train bound for San Francisco. Though Buck bites the man's hand, Buck is unable to escape the cage that imprisons him.

Transferred from an express office to another railroad car, he rides for two more days without food or water. A man in a red sweater releases Buck from the cage and then beats him severely with a club. Buck is subdued and wary of the man. Perrault, a French-Canadian government employee, pays three hundred dollars for Buck and, with the help of Francois loads him aboard the Narwhal, along with Curly and two other dogs. After a long stretch of days aboard the boat, Buck disembarks, experiencing his first encounter with snow.

Buck's fist day at Dyea beach is filled with new experiences. He sees a pack of dogs surround and dismember Curly, gets his first feel of harness, suffers a cut to hi shoulder, and faces his fist night in the cold. Buck learns quickly and emulates Billee, who nestles in the snow to conserve body warmth. Perrault is pleased that Buck learns fast.

In the traces between Sol-leks and Dave, Buck does his part in pulling the courier's load the forty miles to Lake Bennett. He quickly adapts to the life of a sled dog, although he is never satisfied by the pound and a half of dried salmon that is his daily ration. He learns to protect his food and to steal.

In addition, Buck adapts to the hardships of Yukon life, sharpening his senses of sight and smell and biting the ice from his toes to protect his limbs from damage. He takes on the characteristics of his less-civilized ancestors.

Buck's rivalry with Spitz leads to daily fights, dissension, and roughhousing. The team, which sides with Buck, loses its solidarity but trudges on the four hundred miles to Dawson., On the way the animals encounter a pack of starving wild dogs, who fight under terrible odds to snatch a bite of nourishment. At times, Perrault steps in to punish his dogs or to keep off the aggressors. Usually the dogs must fend for themselves.

One night, as the pack converges on a fleeing rabbit, Buck seizes his opportunity to overwhelm Spitz. The fight is quick and savage. As the pack encircles Spitz, whose broken foreleg dooms him, Buck stands to one side, reveling in the mastery of his new role as champion.

Buck insists upon the position of lead dog and forces Perrault to accept him. He surprises his master with his quick wit and firmness in making the other dogs pull harder. Perrault insists that Buck is worth a thousand dollars after the team averages forty miles a day.

When Buck passes to a new owner, he finds pulling the mail train to Dawson a wearying task. His recall of Santa Clara Valley gives way to instinctual memories of his breed. Though the team survives eighteen hundred miles of travel, the mail train is too much for Dave. The Scotsman tries to ease the dog's pain by unhitching him from the harness and putting Sol-leks in his place, but Dave insists on pulling until he can no longer keep up. The Scotsman is forced to shoot Dave.

Thin, footsore, and bone-weary, the team ends a 2,500 mile journey in Skagway and is sold to two Americans, Hal and Charles, who are amateurs at the business of loading and managing a dog sled. Traveling with Charles's wife, Mercedes, the Americans move clumsily along the trail, at first overfeeding the tired dogs and then when the food runs low, underfeeding them. The strain produces casualties - first Dub, then the six outside dogs purchased in Skagway to increase their speed, later Billee and Koona.

At John Thornton's camp, the weary travelers stop and discuss the weather, which is rapidly turning to spring. John wars them that the ice is treacherously thin, but Hal sneers at the warning and declares that they will press on to Dawson.

The dogs struggle into place, but buck is unable to respond. Hal beats Buck severely with the club. As the dog fades into senselessness, John Thornton suddenly intervenes and cuts Buck from the traces. Hal and Charles load Mercedes on the sled and continue. A quarter of a mile away, the ice gives way and sled, dogs, and people disappear.

With the loving assistance of John Thornton and the nursing of Skeet, his female Irish setter, Buck recovers his strength. After his wounds heal, he plays with Skeet and Nig, a male mixed-breed dog, and demonstrates his adoration for John. Though Buck clings to the affectionate new master, he is aware of an instinctive inner drive, brought to his consciousness through months of hard scrabble against save dogs and brutal masters.

The lure of the wild balances Buck's love for John, but nightly, the great dog years for some satisfaction of the inner forces. His fierce nature finds release in protecting his master from the attack of a malicious attacker in Circle City. In a later episode, Buck saves John from drowning, breaking three ribs as rescuers haul him across jagged rocks.

When John accepts a bet with Matthewson in Dawson that Buck can break out a sled loaded with a half ton of flour and pull it a hundred yards, Buck distinguishes himself by winning the bet. A bystander offers first eight hundred, then a thousand, and finally twelve hundred dollars for the dog. John refuses to sell Buck.

Johns winnings in the bet with Matthewson enable him to search for a fabled lost gold mine to the east. On his leisurely journey, which extends from summer into the next winter, he feeds himself, his two companions, Pete and Hans, and the dogs by regular hunts for fresh meat. The next spring, they discover gold and load the treasure in mooosehide bags.

Buck, too, is discovering a deeply hidden treasure - the long buried tie with early ancestors. When the call comes form the wild, Buck follows his instincts and makes friends with a wolf but eventually returns to camp. John and his companions acknowledge Buck's radiant good health, yet they do not see the transformation that comes over him when he wanders off to join his "wild brother."

With the patience of a predator, Buck stalks a moose and, on the fourth day, captures him. He returns to John with some misgiving and finds his master's lodge beset by Yeehat Indians. Buck charges, scattering the panicky marauders, but is too late to save his master and the others.

When the call of the wild again pierces his consciousness, Buck is ready to join his "wild brothers." His decision is no longer inhibited by love for a master. After he joins the wolf pack, the Yeehats tell stories about a Ghost Dog that is famous for cunning and brave deeds.