The young hunters lay concealed among the willows--each with his gun ready in his hand--determined to fire as soon as the unsuspecting creatures should come within range.
They had got nearly so--within two hundred yards, or less--when all at once the leader was seen to swerve suddenly to the right, and head away from the water! What could this movement mean?
On looking in the new direction, several hairy objects were perceived upon the ground.

They were odd-looking objects, of a reddish-brown colour, and might have passed for a number of foxes lying asleep.

But they were not foxes.
They were wolves--_prairie-wolves_--a sort of animals more cunning even than foxes themselves.

They were not asleep neither, though they pretended to be.

They were wide awake, as they lay squatted closely upon the grass, with their heads so completely hidden behind their bushy tails, that it would have been impossible to have told what they were, had not the boys known that they were the same wolves they had noticed but the moment before.