“Why does he run after me?” thought the wolf with annoyance.  “I suppose he wants me to eat him.”

She lived with her cubs in a shallow hole; three years before, a tall old pine tree had been torn up by the roots in a violent storm, and the hole had been formed by it.  Now there were dead leaves and moss at the bottom, and around it lay bones and bullocks’ horns, with which the little ones played.  They were by now awake, and all three of them, very much alike, were standing in a row at the edge of their hole, looking at their returning mother, and wagging their tails.  Seeing them, the puppy stopped a little way off, and stared at them for a very long time; seeing that they, too, were looking very attentively at him, he began barking angrily, as at strangers.

By now it was daylight and the sun had risen, the snow sparkled all around, but still the puppy stood a little way off and barked.  The cubs sucked their mother, pressing her thin belly with their paws, while she gnawed a horse’s bone, dry and white; she was tormented by hunger, her head ached from the dog’s barking, and she felt inclined to fall on the uninvited guest and tear him to pieces.

At last the puppy was hoarse and exhausted; seeing they were not afraid of him, and not even attending to him, he began somewhat timidly approaching the cubs, alternately squatting down and bounding a few steps forward.  Now, by daylight, it was easy to have a good look at him. . . .  His white forehead was big, and on it was a hump such as is only seen on very stupid dogs; he had little, blue, dingy-looking eyes, and the expression of his whole face was extremely stupid.  When he reached the cubs he stretched out his broad paws, laid his head upon them, and began: 

“Mnya, myna . . . nga—­nga—­nga . . . !”

The cubs did not understand what he meant, but they wagged their tails.  Then the puppy gave one of the cubs a smack on its big head with his paw.  The cub, too, gave him a smack on the head.  The puppy stood sideways to him, and looked at him askance, wagging his tail, then dashed off, and ran round several times on the frozen snow.  The cubs ran after him, he fell on his back and kicked up his legs, and all three of them fell upon him, squealing with delight, and began biting him, not to hurt but in play.  The crows sat on the high pine tree, and looked down on their struggle, and were much troubled by it.  They grew noisy and merry.  The sun was hot, as though it were spring; and the woodcocks, continually flitting through the pine tree that had been blown down by the storm, looked as though made of emerald in the brilliant sunshine.

As a rule, wolf-mothers train their children to hunt by giving them prey to play with; and now watching the cubs chasing the puppy over the frozen snow and struggling with him, the mother thought: 

“Let them learn.”

When they had played long enough, the cubs went into the hole and lay down to sleep.  The puppy howled a little from hunger, then he, too, stretched out in the sunshine.  And when they woke up they began playing again.