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The Big Man always spoke pleasantly to the dogs, and had won Baldy's approval by not interfering as did the Woman in Kennel affairs; and the malamute the Yellow Peril, as the Woman had named him was plainly antagonistic to the Racers, at whom he growled with much enthusiasm.
On the whole, it is far better to let them alone; for, encouraged at all, they are terrible thieves what hungry creatures are not? and make all sorts of trouble with one's own team. The pure malamute and the pure husky do not bark at all, they howl; barking is a sure sign of an admixture of other strains.
That sort of thing can be done on the 'outside', but in here where grub is worth its weight in gold, and none expect comforts, why waste time? We came here for that we cannot obtain in the States at least I did for gold, gold, and I'll have it, too, by Gad!" Then pricking up his ears again at the end of his soliloquy, he listened and laughed aloud. "Hear those malamute cusses!
Men must reasonably do this in self defense. That a brow-beaten dog gives up and drops from the race through sheer discouragement often happens; but well fed and with considerate treatment a malamute will bravely work to the last moment. A few hundred miles farther east and these dogs would be exchanged for "Hudson Bay huskies", or sent back over the trail to Dawson to be sold.
Almost at once; for the arrival of our eight dogs had made a commotion amongst the canine population of the place, that after repeated outbreaks of noisy animosity and defiance seemed to turn by common consent into a friendly and most protracted howling contest in which my malamute "Muk" plainly outdid all competitors.
The malamute and the husky are the two chief sources of the white man's dog teams, though cross-breeding with setters and pointers, hounds of various sorts, mastiffs, Saint Bernards, and Newfoundlands has resulted in a general admixture of breeds, so that the work dogs of Alaska are an heterogeneous lot to-day.
"He has a certain malamute stubbornness that might cause me a lot of annoyance just when I could least afford the time to correct him." "Well, after your famous victory over Jack McMillan I do not anticipate seeing any real difficulty with Fisher," was the Big Man's confident reply.
He fell and wrenched his ankle and came hobbling into Candle half an hour after the monthly mail for Nome had left. Three weeks later Folsom wrote his wife for the third time, and again a month after that. All three letters joined company in Candle Creek; for meanwhile the mail-man's lead dog had been killed in a fight with a big malamute at Lane's Landing, causing its owner to miss a trip.
When he is in good condition and his coat is taken care of he is a handsome fellow, and he will weigh from seventy-five to eighty-five or ninety pounds. The husky is a long, rangy dog, with more body and longer legs than the malamute and with a shorter coat. The coat is very thick and dense, however, and furnishes a sufficient protection.
"Muk," the counterpart of Peary's "King Malamute," has thriven for years on his daily ration of dried fish, tallow, and rice, and eats biscuits and doughnuts whenever he can get them. The malamute is affectionate and faithful and likes to be made a pet of, but he is very jealous and an incorrigible fighter.
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