Into the Primitive

“Old longings nomadic leap,Chafing at custom’s chain;Again from its brumal sleepWakens the ferine strain.”Buck did not read the newspapers, or he would have known that trouble was brewing, not alone for himself, but for every tide-water dog, strong of muscle and with warm, long hair, from Puget Sound to San Diego. Because men, groping in the Arctic darkness, had found a yellow metal, and because steamship and transportation companies were booming the find, thousands of men were rushing into the...