South Side High School - Optimist Yearbook (Newark, NJ)

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 THE OPTIMIST 1 5 ling of iliis huge upright being who carried him in his arms. This was his first experience with man and he did not like it. Arrived at a low log cabin in the center of a large clearing the man tied one end of a rope around the neck of the wolf and the other around a stake driven in the ground. The man tried to pet him but the wolf bristled and growled and showed his fangs for all the world as if he could chew up this mountain of flesh in front of him. The man chuckled and admiring his nerve decided to call him Grit. It took Grit a few days of starvation and longing to realize that he had 1 letter take what the man gave him. Somehow even tho this man did not harm him he did not like him. He sensed that his mother and father were no more and that this man with his lightning stick was mainly rcs| onsible for it. He grew larger and stronger with that same feeling in his mind and he grew to dislike the civilized smell of every thing around him. He had the pure wolf blood in him and at night when he heard the distant pack howling lie longed to rush off and join them, to l e free! to go and come as lie pleased! But always lie was kept in leash and as he got bigger and stronger the rope was made bigger and stronger until the man discarded it for a chain. Grit saw very little of his master. Sometimes he would not come home for days and in such cases Grit was locked inside the cabin with enough food to eat and water to drink. And always his master would come sneaking back in the dead of the morning with many pelts and furs. There was this sneakiness about the man that made Grit dislike him all the more and then again the man would never treat him over kind- ly. Grit knew that his fangs and his strength were all that saved him from a beating many times. Grit grew even taller and more lithe than his father or grandfather. His coat was a silvery grey contrasted by a black spot over each eye and another on the end of his magnificiently bushy tail. Then came a day of restless waiting and a night with a big full moon. Grit could con- tain himself no longer, he had to get away from this stuffy place out into the open freedom. The climax came when lie heard, far off. the first bay- ing of the jack, the call of the wild! With one long leap h e crashed through the cabin window carry- ing frame, glass and all with him. What cared he if he was cut around the head and shoulders, he w a s free! Free at last! With incredible speed he made straight for the place where he had heard the sound of the wolves come from. Then wit’ll startling suddenness lie came into a large clearing and there on the other side loomed the black outlines of the pack. They stood there glaring at the in- truder with eyes like saucers of fire. Grit Imundcd forward to greet them but an ominous growl warned him to stop. He was to them a thing of civilization, an outcast of the pack and they would not greet him as a friend. When Grit realized this h. was angry and a deep-throated growl was the signal for the leader to step forward and do combat. Then there was a glorious l attlc! Flangs flashed. . . . at night ... he heard the distant pack howling 11

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tegfl TTTe optimist well ahead of the rest and run them until their tongues lolled. Then he would give them a short respite and he off again looking and smelling all the time for the trail of some ani- mal they might attack. For a mate he took the pick of the females. A sturdy, ferocious slut who followed at his herls and fought at his side. When Crcywolf became too old ami weak to control the j ack one of his sons, as big and tall as Ik , stepped into his place. He was called Huskic. He had to whip about half the pack before his supremacy was hammered into the heads of a few of the ambitious to rule. After that he settled into the same routine as his father. Huskic. also, picked his mate from imong the lx st ami things went on smoothly until one particularly hard win- ter the half-starved pack drifted nearer and nearer to the ever advancing Ixmn- daries of civilization. The smell of food to their sharjK-ned appe- ti t c s overpowered their sense of danger. That terrible man- smell was not strong enough to keep them away from a possible meal. The rest of that winter they lived as best they could and when the first signs of spring came they found the picking so easy from the traps of the hunters that they hung al out. always careful to kc.’p just so far from detection yet near enough to rob the traps. They never could quite understand just how these steel jaws worked but they knew that they were very dangerous to the unwary. Hut as cautious as he was Huskic was destined to feel the powerful grip of those jaws. While silently stalking some prey he put his foot into one of the hidden traps. The jaws came to- gether with terrific force and broke the bone of his foot. He let out a blood curdling yell of pain and jumped straight into the air but he was jerked to the ground in the middle of his leap by the anchor on the trap. He tore, and snapped, and hit, and chewed, but all in vain. His fore paw. caught squarely in the trap felt like a lump of dead flesh yet only physical exhaus- tion made him stop lunging forward and he had already torn up half of the staple. His mate came looking for him and trotting at her heels was a chubby little fellow not yet old enough to chew a piece of meat. He paced his wabbly way along, head cocked on one side looking askance through wide, wondering eyes upon all this sunny world entirely oblivious of the shady side and all the pains and troubles that go with it. He saw his mother fall to biting and scratching at the thing which held his father and sensing that this was some new heartless enemy he growled ami bit and chewed also. Suddenly all three stopped ami sniffed the air. The young fellow smelled some- thing entirely new to him. He did not know, like his par- ents. that this was the dreaded man-smell. He did realize it was a new and greater danger when his par- ents l egan to work harder and faster than Iscfore. Then hap- pened something that changed the life of the pup entirely. A twig snapped and be- fore any could turn, a terrible bang split the silence and the she-wolf fell dead. A man stepped into the sunlight and Huskic turned handicapped as he was to meet his new foe; but again that flash and bang and he was beyond the reach of further pains. The little fellow stood there a moment irreso- lute. then he bared his tiny fangs and growled as deep a growl as his little body could master. The big burly man chuckled, stepped forward and caught up the pup which bit and kicked and fought as hard as he could. The man handled him easily and started with him toward his cabin. The little beast was by turns frightened, amazed and angered at the treatment and hand- 10

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Wl THE OPTIMIST fur ficw and blood ran. The pack sat in a cir- cle about the fighters and eagerly watched. Over and over the combatants rolled, now one on top, now the other, now apart, now a quick dart in, a tlash of fangs and rip of skin and a bound lack again. Grit let out all his pent up feelings in that fight. He towered over the other like a leviathan. It was all over in less time than it takes to tell it. Grit got a fatal hold upon the throat of his opponent and cut off the breath of life from his body. Then he was ready for the next but after that display they left him severely alone. This is why the lone wolf howled at the moon. He howled and howled until dawn and then lonesome a n 1 hungry h e started l»ack for civilization. Hut l eforc reaching the cabin he ran across a new scent. It was the scent of man but there was something different about it which made him curious to in- vestigate. Tom Norton, age thirty, came north to escape the evils of civilization. An inno- cent victim of circum- stances, he Ixrcamc an outcast of society, and made himself an out- cast of civilization. He came to God’s country liecause he loved it and he knew he would be free and away from the nar- row-minded influences of man. He built his cabin on the farthest boundary of civiliza- tion and began to trap and hunt to distract his mind rather than for pleasure or material gain. This morning he was absently inspecting his traps, thinking of the great wrong done him at home when he came face to face with an im- mense silvery wolf. His gun went to his shoul- der while Grit crouchtd ready to spring. For a moment they eyed each other and then Tom noticed the collar around the wolf's neck. It was a sign of civilization on a wild beast and the only thing that stopped Tom from shooting. Had it not been there my story would have been different. Here were two outcasts, two who had the same dislike for civilization. Why should they not be thrown together? Why should they not help each other by their companionship? How did the wolf know of the man’s likes and dis- likes?” you ask. That is not for me to say. That is a question which only the Watcher over such creatures can answer. I will but attempt to say that they were attracted to each other; that they did find companion- ship in each other and I can only tell you of how it ended. One evening some time later, in his cheery little cabin sat Tom in a large ami comfortable armchair and at his feet lay Grit perfectly con- tented because h i s second taste of man was so much more pleasing than the first. Tom had given him the first bit of real kindness that he had ever known and the heart of the great wolf went out to him. Tom got up and walked leisurely to the door. Grit fol- lowed him only with his eyes. Just to watch Tom was enough for him and Tom found in the wolf the one redeeming thing of the world. He opened the door and looked up at the ominous clouds hanging over the landscape. On the edge of the clearing could be seen the tall dark shapes of the trees standing out as black objects against a black setting. The food and other things were stored in a cache not far from the cabin. Tom walked over there to sec if everything was secure for the 12 Then there was a glorius battle . . . the pack sat and watched