The book is about a dog named Buck. He is a mix between a St. Bernard and a Scotch sheep-dog. He is very tiny, and only weighs about ine hundred and forty pounds. He had until the book starts, lived a quiet life, which was only four years. But hunting and other kinds of outdoor life had kept down the fat and made his muscles hard. Buck lives in a big house with large gardens in the Santa Clara Valley. There he lives with Judge Miller. On the winter nights he lay at the Judge''''s feet in front of the fire. He carries the Judge''''s grandsons on his back, roll them in the grass, and follows them down to the lake. He is a part of the family, basicly. Buck did not know that one of the gardener''''s helper, Manuel, was a bad man. One day when both the Judge and the boys were away, Manuel took Buck on what Buck thought was only a walk. They arrived to a little station called College Park, and there was a man there waiting for them. He put a piece fo strong rope around Buck''''s neck. Buck had learned to trust in the men we knew, and got surprised when Manuel tighted up the rope even more. Buck was put on a train, and when he got off, he was in San Francisco. The man who had met him back in the College Park, sold him to a saloon-keeper. Buck was put into a box and taken to another train and for two days and nights he traveled again and on that time he neither ate or drank. When the train stopped, he was in Seattle. A man in a red sweater was there to meet the train. He had bought Buck from the saloon-keeper. He let Buck out, and Buck tried to attack him, but the man had a club and hit him with the club again and again, and Buck was brought to the ground, again and again. A dozen times he attacked, and as often the club smashed him down. Buck was too tired to jump, and the man hit him one last time, and Buck went down, senseless. After a while Buck''''s senses came back to him, but not his strenght. As the days went by, other dogs came, and one and all he saw them fight the man in the red sweater and be beaten. The lesson was brought back to Buck all the time, a man with a club was a master. Men came, strangers, who talked to the man in the red sweater. Sometimes money passed between them, and the strangers took one or more dogs away with them. They never came back, and Buck wondered where they went, but he was glad each time he was not taken. Yet this time came, and a man who spoke broken english came in and asked for the prize on Buck. His name was appearently Perrault, and he knew dogs, so when he looked at Buck, he knew that he was one in a thousand. Money was passed between Perrault and the man in the red sweater, and a Newfoundland dog named Curly and Buck were led away by the little man. That was the last he saw of the man in the red sweater, and when he and Curly looked at Seattle from the deck of a car, it was the last he saw of the warm Southland. Buck and Curly were given to a big man with a black face called Francois. Buck soon learned that Perrault and Francois were fair men and knew too much about dogs to be fooled by them. Buck and Curly met two other dogs on the Nawhal. One of them as a big snowwhite dog from Spitzenbergen. That''''s why he was called Spitz. He stole Buck''''s food and when Buck went back to punish him, Francois whip sang through the air and hit the thief before Buck did. That was fair of Francois and Buck liked him better for it. The other dog was called Dave, and the only things Dave did was eating and sleeping. He took interest in nothing. When Buck and Curly were half wild with fear in the sea, he raised his head, yawned, and went asleep again. At last, the ship that they were traveling on was laying still. Buck and the other dogs felt that there would be a big change soon. When Buck came up on deck, he felt his first snow. Buck''''s first day on Dyea Beach was terrible. This was no lazy life, with nothing to do. These dogs did not know any law exept the law of club and fang. Buck had never seen dogs fight as these wolf-like animals fought. Curly became the victim of the dogs. Her face had been torn open when she got to close to a dog who was half her size. Thirty of forty dogs watched when they fighted. When the other dog met Curlys jump with his breast, she fell to the ground. All the dogs attacked her and Curly was buried under the dogs bodies and teared apart. And then, all of a sudden, Francois came swinging an axe. Three men with clubs were helping him getting all the dogs of Curly, but it was too late. Even though it only took two minutes getting them off, Curly layes lifeless in the bloody snow, torn to pieces. The scene often came back in Buck''''s sleep. So he knew, once you''''re down, that was the end of you. Buck was sent to work, to get firewood on a sled. He did not like it, but he did his best and did what Francois told him to. In the afternoon, perrault returned with two new dogs, Billy and Joe. They were brothers, though they were as different as night and day. A few days later the continues up the north. On the night, a new dogs joins the group, which now is on a total of nine. It was a hard days run, up the Cañon, through Sheep Camp, across glaciers and loads of snow. Buck was always hungry, the one and a half of a pound fish he got seemed to be way too little. Yet the other dogs only got one pound, but they were also smaller than Buck. Buck began to steal food, and the other dogs were punished for what Buck had done. Buck did not steal for the joy of it, but because he was hungry. Buck changed quickly. His muscles became hard as iron. He could eat anything. Sight and smell became sharp, and his hearing so good that in his sleep he heard the smallest sound and knew if it meant danger or peace. On a night when Spitz and Buck was about to fight, one hundred dogs ran into the camp. They belonged to a Indian Village and had slowly crept in. The team dogs gathered together and ran to hide in the forest. When it all was over, they all were badly hurt. After two hours, Perrault had all the damages under control and they went off. The Thirty Mile River was wild open. The sled broke through once, and Dave and Buck almost drowned. At another time Spitz went through, pulling the whole team after and Buck had to pull backward with all his strenght. When they reached Hootalinqua and save ice, Buck was tired out. So were the other dogs, but Buck''''s feet was not so hard as the others dogs. He was so tired that he did not manage to get up and get his food. Francois rubbed Buck''''s feet for half of an hour every night after supper, and out of the tops of his own moccasins, he made four little moccasins for Buck. Later his feet grow hard and the moccasins were thrown away. Spitz and Buck gets into more fights, and in the end, Buck kills Spitz. The Thirty Mile Riverwas covered with ice, and it went really fast to travel there. Without stopping, They made sixty miles. It was a record run. Perrault and Francois were heroes in the town for three days. Buck got a hug from Francois, and that was the last Buck saw of Perrault and Francois. Another man took over Buck and his team, and he went back to Dawson. The sled was heavy, so there was no easy running now. All days looked just like eachother, and Buck did not like that is was a dull life he was living. But sometimes he got into fights, and three of them was against the wildest dogs so Buck became a master. Best of all, Buck loved to lie near the fire. He dreamed about the big Judge Miller''''s house back in Santa Clara Valley. They arrived to Dawson, but then leaves after three days. Thirty days from the time they left Dawson, Buck and his team arrived at Skaguay. They were dead tired. And there was reason for it. In less than five months they had travelled 2500 miles, and during the last 1800 miles they only had five days rest. When they had rested a few days, two men from USA came along and bought them. The men called eachother Charles and Hal. Hal was about forty years old and Charles might have been around twenty. When the dogs came to the owners'''' camp, Buck saw a woman. Mercedes was her name. She was Charles''''s wife and Hal''''s sister. When they were about to leave Skaguay, Hal and Charles loaded the sled way too heavy. The dogs tried hard, but could not move the sled. Hal started to whip them when a man stopped him and telled him that the runners were frozen fast. Hal broke out the runnes and the sled went off. Kind peolpe stopped the dogs when Hal fell of the sled, and said to Charles and Hal that they had to throw half of the load away and buy twice as many dogs if they ever wanted to come to Dawson. Charles and Hal went out on the evening and bought more dogs, so now the team was brought up to fourteen dogs. It did not look good for the dogs. There was a reason why fourteen dogs should not pull one sled, and that was that one sled could not carry the food for fourteen dogs. But Charles and Hal did not know this. The next morning, the dogs started dead tired. Buck felt that these two men and the woman were no good. They did not know how to do anything. They had no dicipline or rules, and could not pack the sled right. Some days they did not make ten miles, on other days they did not get started at all. And on no day did they make more than half of the distance they had planned. So Hal shot the six dogs he bought in Skaguay. The time went on, and they staggered into John Thornton''''s camp. When they stopped, the dogs fell down. Hal used the whip to get the tired dogs up, but Buck just couldn''''t stand up. The whip bit into him again and again, but he did not rise. Hal got pissed off and picked up the club. But Buck had made up his mind not to get up. He no longer felt anything, though he could hear the club striking his body. All of a sudden, John Thornton ran upon Hal. Hal was thrown backwards, and John Thornton said "If you ever strike that dog again, I''''ll kill you." Hal answered that it was his dog, got up on his feet, wiped the blood of his mouth and drew his long knife. Thornton knocked the knife out of Hal''''s hand. Hal took the other dogs and left. Buck heard them and raised his head to see his team go on without him. He saw the sled breaking through the ice, and all the dogs, Mercedes, Charles and Hal disappeared into a black hole of water. John Thornton started to take care of Buck. His firends had left him last year to rest while they were going up the river. Now he, Buck and Thornton''''s other dogs, Skeet and Nig, waited for Thornton''''s friends to come back and take them down to Dawson. Thornton showed Buck wat love really was. This man had saved his life, and while other men looked after dogs because it was their duty, Thornton looked after them like it was his own children. When Buck and Thornton were at Circle City one night, a man called Burton started a fight with another man. Thornton had step between, when Burton hit Thornton. Buck jumped on Burton directly, and that saved Thorntons life. One year later, at Dawson, Buck did something which made him famous all over Alaska. One man said his dog could start a sled with five hundred pounds and walk off with it. Thornton then said that Buck could start a thousand pounds, and walk off with it for a hundred yards. A man bet a thousand dollars that it was impossible. All the guests of the ...
