~^Si>ff8J MMH »» g &feSqfct^ '■■a^^»*»!^M.-;j^ii^iag*^^^B^E't-'mB^g'» ' 
 
QJarttell Hmucraity ffiihrary 
 
 lltl)are, Wmd fork 
 
 'i^'. A. Hammond 
 
 stA^Biti^ ^yl. 
 
 \"^»?" 
 
 RETURN TO 
 ALBERT R. MANN LIBRARY 
 
 ITHACA, N. Y. 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924002902199 
 
BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 THE HOUSE IN THE WATER 
 
 " stories of the backwoods and of a boy's life among hunters 
 and trappers, by a writer who loiows well how to weave a great 
 deal of knowledge of wild creatures and their ways into an 
 attractive narrative." — Birmingham Post. 
 
 " Under the faithful guidance of Mr. Roberts we have often 
 ventured among the wild beasts of land and sea ; and we hope 
 to do so many times in the future. It is an education not to 
 be missed by those who have the chance, and the chance is 
 every one's. Here, at any rate, is the latest guide-book to 
 the wilderness, in which the bears loom dimly in the starlight, 
 the elks toss their vast antlers, the wolves hang on the tracks 
 of the deer, and the beavers build their dwellings in the still 
 watches of the night. To Mr. Roberts these creatures of the 
 night are as human beings to other writers of fiction. He is 
 as earnest in painting them as other novelists are in depicting 
 human nature. Mr. Roberts loves his wild nature, and his 
 readers, both old and young, should love it with him." — Athe- 
 ntsum. 
 
 " A book that has given us a great deal of pleasure. Mr. 
 Roberts knows how to write about the backwoods that he seems 
 so familiar with, and the pictures in his book bring home to us 
 the feeling for wild life of which the book is full." — Literary 
 World. 
 
 KINGS IN EXILE 
 
 " Mr. Roberts is well and honourably known for his stories of 
 animal life, but we can promise his admirers that, greedily as they 
 may have devoured ' The House in the Water,' their eyes will, 
 if possible, be still more firmly riveted to the page when they 
 get into the thick of this fine book, with its most helpful illustra- 
 tions." — The Evening Standard. 
 
 " These sketches of wild animals are a delight. There is a 
 wholesome elemental tang in the blunt, clean words, and the 
 smell of fresh earth and the crisp rustle of forest leaves seem to 
 come to one's senses." — The World. 
 
THE BACKWOODSMEN 
 
 " The author displays keen powers of observation, and pos- 
 sesses an extensive knowledge of the creatures of the wild. His 
 pictures are drawn from nature with free, broad touches, and 
 are illuminated by imaginative vigour." — The Scotsman. 
 
 " Charles G. D. Roberts is well sampled in ' The Backwoods- 
 men.' He tells us much about men of the wild country. There 
 are arresting pictures of nature, there is more than a little of 
 humour, while pathetic touches are not lacking. There is room 
 for more of this brief and bracing style of story." — Sheffield 
 Independent. 
 
 " Mr. Roberts is a writer of great power, and his graphic 
 pictures of the strenuous life of the pioneer in the Wild West 
 are admirable pieces of work. The book is beautifully illus- 
 trated with about twenty plates, and is handsomely printed." — 
 Glasgow Weekly Herald. 
 
 " Few can better describe the wild life of the Canadian forest 
 than this well-known writer, who in a series of short stories of 
 river and lake, backwoodsmen and lumbermen, forest and hunt- 
 ing gives a vivid description of those phases of life in the back- 
 woods. The stories are full of incident and vigour, and will be 
 appreciated by readers who are acquainted with the previous 
 works of Mr. Roberts." — Royal Colonial Institute Journal. 
 
 NEIGHBOURS UNKNOWN 
 
 " We heartily commend ' Neighbours Unknown.' Mr. 
 Roberts is among the few masters of the art of teUing stories of 
 animal life. The whole is a delightful work." — Evening Standard. 
 
 " Mr. Roberts' stories of wild Hfe are always welcome. He 
 has so full a knowledge of his subject, so intimate an acquaintance 
 ■nith the wUd creatures, great and small, and pens their history 
 so cleverly, that it is impossible to drop his pages until the very 
 last one is reached. To be able thus to write is a great gift, 
 one that but few possess. Mr. Roberts is one of the fortunate 
 ones, and we can but thank him for the unadulterated pleasure 
 he has given us." — Western Morning News. 
 
 Neighbours Unknown,' by Charles G. D. Roberts, is a 
 valuable addition to this author's works on animal life. Mr. 
 Roberts is to be congratulated upon weaving most interesting 
 details around what to many people have hitherto been uninter- 
 esting creatures." — Bristol Times. 
 
MORE KINDRED OF THE 
 WILD 
 
QL 791.R645m"""'"""""'"^ 
 More kindred of the wild. 
 
 3 1924 002 902 199 
 
' Huddled together at the back of the den, they were whimpering 
 
 softly to themselves." {Page 52.) 
 
 ^fo^■l.• Kindral of Ihc \yi\d\ [Frontispiece 
 
MORE KINDRED OF 
 THE WILD 
 
 CHARLES G: nf ROBERTS 
 
 Author of " The Backwoodsmen," "Kings in Exile " 
 " Neighbours Unknown," etc 
 
 FULLY ILLUSTRATED 
 
 WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED 
 
 LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO 
 1911 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Tiger of the Sea ii 
 
 ishmael of the hemlocks • ... 37 
 
 The Keepers of the Nest .... 57 
 
 In the Year of No Rabbits .... 83 
 
 Puck o' the Dusk 105 
 
 A Harassed Householder .... 127 
 
 Mothers of the North 151 
 
 When the Colonel Cahe to Gallagher's . 167 
 
 The Gauntlet of Fire 193 
 
 The Moose that Knocked at the Door . 221 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 " Huddled together at the back of the den, 
 they were whimpering softly to themselves" 
 
 Frontispiece 
 
 "There was no fight . . . only a moment's 
 
 bhnd, frantic struggle in the foaming swirls " 15 
 
 " The leader and his mate had no great way to 
 
 go, for their place was already chosen " . 67 
 
 " The lynx let go her hold and shrank away with 
 
 a snarl " 97 
 
 " With a thin snarl he sprang upward half the 
 
 length of his body " 117 
 
 " For one moment he thrust his head high above 
 
 the water and eyed his enemy " . . . 137 
 
 "She hfted her long black-edged muzzle and 
 
 sniffed sharply " 157 
 
 " A huge moose, with antlers spreading farjbeyond 
 
 each doorpost, stood before her " . . 227 
 
The Tiger of the Sea 
 
 THROUGH the broad, indolent, green- 
 purple swells, ruffled and crisped along 
 their tops by a mild breeze, the cow orca went 
 wallowing contentedly, her calf swimming 
 close at her side. From time to time it 
 rubbed against her, as if apprehensive in face 
 of the vast and perilous spaces of the ocean, 
 and seeking covert behind her short powerful 
 flipper. And from time to time, being one 
 of the most devoted and assiduous of all the 
 mothers of the wild, she would gather it 
 caressingly to her side with that great flipper, 
 or, whirling half around, touch it inquiringly 
 with her enormous rounded snout. 
 
 She was a good nineteen or twenty feet in 
 length, the great orca — or " killer whale," 
 as she would have been dubbed by any sailor 
 or fisherman who might have chanced to cast 
 eyes upon her. She would have been recog- 
 nized at once, from all the other members of 
 
12 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 her whale-and-porpoise tribe, by the immense 
 dorsal fin, not far from five feet high, rising 
 erect from the broad and massive black curve 
 of her back, by the two conspicuous white 
 streaks on her black flank, and by the sharply 
 defined line of her cream-white belly as she 
 rolled lazily on the slope of a swell. All these 
 were danger signals, which the knowing would 
 have taken care to heed. 
 
 Little cause for apprehension had the calf 
 of the orca, as long as it kept near its mother. 
 For this most swift and savage of aU the 
 cetaceans feared nothing that swam, except 
 her giant cousin, the cachalot, or sperm- 
 whale. Though but twenty feet long, she 
 would attack and kill, through the sheer fero- 
 city of her fury, the great whalebone or " right" 
 whale, of fully four times her length and many 
 times her bulk. Man she might have feared, 
 had she ever learned his power ; but, being 
 poor in blubber, her tribe had never tempted 
 man to so difficult and perilous a hunting. 
 There were sharks, to be sure, that might equal 
 or surpass her in size, but none even to ap- 
 proach her in savagery, speed, or cunning. It 
 was in care-free content, therefore, that she 
 lazed onward through the bland, untroubled 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 13 
 
 sea, heedless alike of the surf on the yellow 
 cliffs to her right, and of the empty spaces of 
 ocean to her left. Such attention as she could 
 spare from the baby charms of her calf was 
 given to searching the transparent deeps 
 below her, where lurked the big squid and 
 sluggish, bottom-feeding fish on which she 
 habitually preyed. 
 
 Suddenly, with no sound but a vast suck- 
 ing gurgle as the waters closed above her, she 
 dived. Far down in the obscurity she had 
 caught sight of a pallid, sprawhng form. It 
 was an octopus, which had been so ill-advised 
 as to leave its customary home among the 
 rocks of the bottom and seek new feeding- 
 grounds. Before it had time even to attempt 
 escape, the great jaws of the " kiUer " engulfed 
 it. For one moment its eight long tentacles 
 writhed desperately, clutching at its captor's 
 lips. Then they vanished, sucked in and 
 swallowed at a gulp. Thereupon the orca 
 sailed leisurely back to the sunht surface, met 
 on her way up by her anxious calf, which had 
 not been quite quick enough to foUow its 
 mother's lightning descent. She had not 
 been two minutes absent, and never for an 
 instant out of sight, but the youngster's in- 
 
14 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 stinct warned it well that the mild blue ele- 
 ment in which it dwelt was full of dangers. 
 
 The octopus, though a large one, had been 
 but a mouthful for the great kiUer, a stimulus, 
 merely, to her vast appetite. She journeyed 
 now with a keener eye upon the depths. 
 Presently the deep blue-green of the water 
 began to change to a Hghter, beryl hue, where 
 a line of making reef came up to within some 
 thirty feet of the surface, and caught the sun. 
 Here, basking, lay a broad, flat, bat-like crea- 
 ture, with wing-fins a dozen feet across, and a 
 long whip-Hke tail. Its cold moveless eyes, 
 staring upward, caught sight of the killer's 
 body, slowly cleaving the surface. With an 
 almost imperceptible movement of the black 
 wings, it slid from the reef and plunged for 
 refuge in the depths. 
 
 But the giant ray had not been quick or 
 stealthy enough to evade its enemy's eye. 
 Again the orca dived, this time without heed 
 of silence, and so swiftly that her broad flukes, 
 rising straight into the air, came down upon 
 the water with a report that resounded aU the 
 way in to shore. Her descent was straight as 
 a plummet. The ray, seeing it, was seized with 
 panic. It darted to one side, and shot up- 
 
- PAl/i, ■ 5/VA'(5C»M - 
 
 ' There was no fight . . . only a moment's blind, frantic struggle 
 
 in the foaming swirls." 
 More Kindred of the Wildi 
 
 15 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 17 
 
 ward again, at a terrific pace, on a magnificent 
 sweeping curve. With the force of that uprush 
 it hurled its whole black, shuddering bulk 
 clear into the air, where it turned, and for 
 one instant hung flopping darkly, as if the 
 very madness of its terror had driven it to 
 the conquest of a new element. To the ner- 
 vous calf it was a prodigy of horror, blotting 
 out the sun. But this violent excursion into 
 the air was of only a second or two's duration, 
 and futile as it was brief. As the flat black 
 wings came down again, with an enormous 
 splash, the pursuing orca arose almost beneath 
 them, seized them, and dragged them under. 
 There was no fight, the ray being powerless 
 against its mighty adversary — only a moment's 
 blind, frantic struggle in the foaming swirls, 
 and then a spreading stain of red on the green 
 sea. 
 
 This, now, was a fully sufficing 'meal, even 
 for such an appetite as the orca's ; and many 
 neglected fragments of it went spreading and 
 sinking away to feed the innumerable scaveng- 
 ing crabs that lurked in the weeds and hollows 
 of the sunken reef. The orca, for the next 
 half-hour or so, remained where she was, 
 rolling contentedly in the bright water above 
 
i8 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 the reef, nursing and caressing her calf, and 
 digesting her meal. Then she slowly con- 
 tinued her journey, but slanting in toward 
 shore till she was not more than half a mile 
 from the chain of precipitous islets and broken 
 promontories which fringed this dangerous 
 coast. 
 
 It was now full noon, and the unclouded 
 sunlight, striking almost straight downward 
 upon the surface of the sea, revealed the 
 bottom at an amazing depth. Poised about 
 half way down the glimmering transparency, 
 a large squid, or cuttle-fish, was swimming 
 at leisure. His narrow, tapering body was 
 about six feet in length, and perhaps twelve 
 or fourteen inches in diameter at the broadest 
 part, which was the head. From this form- 
 less head, seeming to sprout from it as leaf- 
 stalks from a carrot, grew a bunch of tenta- 
 cles, ten in number, and of about the same 
 length as the body. Body and tentacles ahke 
 were of a pallid, dirty yellow-grey, with brown- 
 ish spots — a colour that made its wearer almost 
 invisible in that sun-penetrated sea. The 
 progress of the squid was backwards ; and he 
 achieved it, not by moving his tentacles, but 
 by sucking a volume of water into a great 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 19 
 
 muscular sac beneath the tentacles and forcibly 
 expelling it again. It looked as if he were 
 breathing water and using it to blow himself 
 .. along. 
 
 The orca was by no means hungry so soon 
 after the feast which she had made on the 
 giant ray, but the succulent morsel of the 
 squid was a temptation not to be resisted. 
 Tipping smoothly, her huge but finely-model- 
 led black-and-white form shot straight down- 
 ward through the shimmering flood. But 
 before she could reach him, the squid looked 
 up and saw her. On the instant his ten loose 
 tentacles tightened to a rigid bundle which 
 offered no obstruction to his progress ; his 
 pale sides contracted with a mighty convul- 
 sion, expelling a volume of water which shot 
 him along with the speed of a torpedo from 
 its tube ; and at the same time, from a gland 
 within the propulsion sac, he squirted forth a 
 jet of inky fluid, which spread at once into a 
 great cloud of black, veiling his flight. Be- 
 hind that concealment he changed his direc- 
 tion, and fled downward toward a deep crevice 
 in the rocky bottom, where he knew that the 
 jaws of his enemy would not be able to reach 
 him. 
 
20 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 The orca, undeterred, plunged straight on- 
 ward into the inky cloud. But once well 
 within that gloom she lost all track of her in- 
 tended prey. She also, for the moment, lost 
 herself. This way and that she darted, snap- 
 ping her vast jaws ravenously, but in vain. 
 They closed on nothing but the empty and 
 tainted water. At last, and quite unexpected- 
 ly, she emerged from the blackness into the 
 transparent green, and, glancing upward, saw 
 a sight which caused her to hurl herself madly 
 to the surface with a titanic sweep of her great 
 flanks. That furious stroke made the depths 
 boil like the thrust of a liner's propellers. 
 
 The calf, having started to follow its mother 
 into the depths, had been frightened by that 
 inky cloud into which it had seen her vanish. 
 Returning in a flurry to the surface, it was 
 swimming around aimlessly and anxiously, 
 when it caught the eye of a wandering shark. 
 
 The shark, knowing very well what it was, 
 looked around for the mother. He had no 
 desire to be uncivil to a mother orca ; but 
 there was no mother in sight. He did not 
 understand it ; but he was ragingly hungry, 
 and such an opportunity was quite irresistible. 
 He rose at the calf with a rush, and turned 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 21 
 
 over on his side, exposing his hvid-white belly, 
 to seize the prize. The calf, appalled at the 
 dark, triangular, many-toothed cavern which 
 gaped so suddenly before him, writhed away 
 just in time, and began swimming in a big 
 circle around the spot where its mother had 
 dived. 
 
 Again the shark rushed ; but he had to 
 turn on his side to bring his curious under- 
 set jaws into play, and the calf of the orca 
 had already the nimbleness of its tribe. Again 
 the attack failed. Before he could repeat it, 
 he caught sight of the mother shooting up from 
 the green depths. Though he was some 
 twenty-five feet in length — a good five feet 
 longer than the orca — he turned and fled for 
 his hfe. 
 
 One glance assured the mother that her 
 little one was unhurt. Then she darted after 
 the aggressor at a pace which made his flight 
 quite futile. He had not gone fifty yards when 
 she was upon him, open-jawed. Hurhng him- 
 self convulsively aside, he just succeeded in 
 evading that first resistless charge. With 
 the courage of desperation he twisted himself 
 about, turned half over, glided beneath his 
 adversary's belly, and caught at her with his 
 
22 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 triangular j aws. But she had already swerved, 
 and he failed to get a fair hold. He did, 
 indeed, rend out a mass of hide and blubber, 
 but he reached no vital point, and the raging 
 killer hardly felt the wound. Whirhng with a 
 violence that sent the foam and spray spurt- 
 ing into the air, she caught the base of the 
 shark's tail between her immense jaws. 
 
 As far as anything like a fight was con- 
 cerned, this was the end of it. For several 
 minutes the gigantic struggle went on, dash- 
 ing the discoloured water yards high ; but it 
 was all on one side, as the orca shook and 
 crushed and tore the life out of her beaten 
 opponent. At last she drew off, leaving a 
 mangled mass to sink slowly into the depths. 
 Then, having snuggled the excited calf under 
 her fin, and given him to nurse, she swam 
 slowly inland toward the deep channel which 
 here ran between the islands and the shore, 
 where she thought she might find some more 
 of those succulent squid to compensate her 
 for the one which had so inconsiderately 
 evaded her approaches. 
 
 The breeze, which up to now had been httle 
 but a succession of cat's-paws, now settled 
 into a steady draught, though not strong 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 23 
 
 enough to do more than darken the surface of 
 the sea to a heavy purple. Running free be- 
 fore it, up along the coast, between the cliffs 
 and the islands, came a small cat-boat, its one 
 sail sparkling white in the clear sunshine. 
 
 The tiny craft contained two passengers — 
 the man at the helm, smoking a big briar 
 pipe, and a silky brown retriever curled up 
 at the foot of the mast. It was a stern coast 
 and a dangerous water for such a cockleshell 
 to traverse ; but the man was a good amateur 
 navigator of smaU craft, and he knew that be- 
 tween the port which he had left, some fifteen 
 miles back down the coast, and the harbour 
 which he was making for, a dozen miles to the 
 north, there were plenty of refuges wherein he 
 could take shelter in case a sudden storm should 
 blow up out of the east. These waters were un- 
 famiUar to him, but he had a good chart ; 
 and this was his special delight — the coasting 
 of unknown shores, with no companionship 
 but that of his faithful and accommodating 
 dog, who always agreed with him as to the 
 most interesting places to visit. 
 
 But though Gardner was an expert yachts- 
 man, with an eye wise to aU signs of the 
 weather, and an instinct that could feel the 
 
24 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 pulse of the wind through tiller or taut sheet, 
 he knew something less of natural history than 
 was desirable for one who made his playground 
 on the peopled seas. His notions of cdl the 
 whale tribe and their varying characters were 
 based on what he had read of the great timor- 
 ous whalebone whale, and what he had seen of 
 the merry and harmless porpoise. When, 
 therefore, he caught sight of the arched black 
 back and formidable head of the orca, lazily 
 ploughing the swells, it never occurred to him 
 that now was the time for discretion. Had he 
 been an habitue of these waters, he would 
 have turned his prow promptly in another 
 direction, lest the orca should think he wanted 
 to intrude upon her privacy. As it was, how- 
 ever, he sailed nearer, to see what manner 
 of fish or beast it might be, this black-and-white 
 creature that treated his approach with such 
 indifference. 
 
 Passing at a distance of eighty or a hundred 
 yards, Gardner was seized with a fool idea. 
 This was a good chance for a shot. The un- 
 known beast would form an interesting trophy. 
 He did not stop to consider what he should do 
 with it if he bagged it. He did not stop to 
 consider that with his hght rifle he could not 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 25 
 
 hope to do more than inflict a painful wound 
 through the layers of blubber which would pro- 
 tect the vitals of this sea-monster. He did not 
 know, either, that a dead whale sinks to the 
 bottom, and that therefore the most successful 
 shot could bring him no reward. It was enough 
 that the instinct to kill something was upon 
 him. He flung a knee over the tiUer to keep 
 his course steady, snatched up the rifle, and 
 fired at a spot just behind the orca's big 
 flipper — somewhere about where he judged 
 the heart would lie. As he did so, the dog, 
 realizing that there was some excitement afoot, 
 sprang up, put his forepaws on the gunwale, 
 and barked furiously at the strange black 
 shape there rolling in the swell. 
 
 To Gardner's astonishment, the monster 
 itself made no immediate response to the shot, 
 but instantly, just under its flank, there began 
 a wild commotion. Something there fell to 
 threshing the water frantically, and the mon- 
 ster, swinging about, gazed at that something 
 with great and anxious concern. She stroked 
 it with her flipper, as if trying to calm it ; and 
 then Gardner saw that it was the young of the 
 monster that he had struck. At this he felt 
 fuU of remorse. Had he seen the calf, he would 
 
26 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 not have fired at either parent or little one. 
 He was not wantonly cruel, but only thought- 
 less. For a few seconds he stared irresolutely. 
 Then, judging from its actions that the calf had 
 received a mortal wound, he decided that he 
 ought to put it out of its misery. Taking very 
 carefill aim, he fired again. The report echoed 
 sharply from the cliff -face of an island not a 
 hundred feet away. 
 
 Gardner had made a good shot this time. 
 Before the echoes of the report had died out, 
 the calf lay still, and then very slowly began 
 to sink. There was stillness for a few seconds, 
 broken only by the excited barking of the 
 brown retriever. The orca swam slowly half 
 around the body of her young, and apparently 
 assured herself that it was dead. Then she 
 turned her small eyes upon the boat. It was 
 only for an instant, but in that instant Gardner 
 reaUzed that he had made a hideous mistake. 
 Instinctively he headed the boat for the rocky 
 islet. 
 
 As he jammed the tiller over, at the same 
 time hurriedly freeing his sheet, he saw the 
 water boil about the orca's black form. She 
 was a good hundred feet away, but so appal- 
 ling was her rush that she seemed to be upon 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 27 
 
 him in the same instant. With a yelp the dog 
 sprang far up into the bow. As the boat was 
 at that moment broadside on to the terrific 
 attack, Gardner kept his seat, and fired another 
 desperate shot full in the face of the oncoming 
 doom. He might as well have fired a pea- 
 shooter. 
 
 The gun dropped to his feet. In the same 
 moment it was as if an express train had struck 
 the boat. She was lifted bodily from the 
 water, and all one side crushed in, while 
 Gardner felt himself hurled clean over the 
 boom. As he came down, he heard a yelp from 
 the brown retriever. 
 
 In order to escape entanglement in the saU, 
 which slapped sousing over on top of him, 
 Gardner dived, and came up some fifteen feet 
 beyond. To this dive, and to the momentary 
 concealment afforded by the sail, he doubtless 
 owed his life. He was a crack swimmer, and 
 instantly started for the island at sprinting 
 speed, doing the " crawl " stroke, with head 
 most of the time under water. The orca at 
 first did not observe his escape. The unhappy 
 dog, by his barking, had caught her eye, and 
 him she had seized and crushed the instant he 
 was thrown into the water. Then, turning her 
 
28 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 fury upon the wreck of the boat, she had torn 
 it and smashed it to kindling wood, seizing it 
 in her huge jaws and shaking it as a terrier 
 shakes a rat. This done, she had turned to- 
 ward the island, and her deadly eyes had fallen 
 upon the form of the swimming man as he cleft 
 his way shoreward. 
 
 Her rush was Uke the rush of a torpedo ; 
 but Gardner was already laying his frantic 
 hands upon the ledge. The ledge — a shelf 
 not a dozen inches in width — was just awash. 
 He felt that it was no refuge. But at about 
 his own height above him was a niche in the 
 rock, whimsically gouged out as if to hold a 
 statue. With desperate agility he flung him- 
 self into the tiny retreat, whipping up his 
 legs behind him, and shrinking as flat as possi- 
 ble into the niche. At the same moment he 
 was deluged with foam and spray, as with a 
 dull crash the body of his pursuer struck the 
 rock just below his feet. 
 
 Gardner shuddered, and struggled gaspingly 
 to catch back his breath into his labouring 
 lungs. He had swum many races, but never 
 one like that. Turning cautiously, and keep- 
 ing himself still flattened hke a limpet to the 
 back of the niche, he stared down, trembhng 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 29 
 
 lest the avenger should essay another such mad 
 leap, and with better effect. 
 
 But the orca did not seem disposed to try 
 it again. The shock of her impact had been 
 terrific, and must have more or less driven 
 the breath from her body. She was now 
 swimming slowly to and fro before the rock, a 
 grim and dreadful gaoler. Gardner looked 
 down into her cold little eyes, and shivered at 
 the intelligent and implacable hate that flamed 
 in them. 
 
 When he found himself sufficiently recovered 
 to consider his situation, he was forced to 
 acknowledge it a rather desperate one. Reach- 
 ing outwards and upwards as far as he could, 
 his hands found no protuberance of the rock by 
 the aid of which he might hope to climb out of 
 his niche and so make his way to the top of the 
 cliff. He had no way of judging how long his 
 vengeful gaoler might remain on duty ; but 
 from the magnitude of the wrong he had done 
 her, the business-like method of her patrol, and 
 the effective fury which she had shown in her 
 attack, he had little reason to hope that she 
 would soon tire of her office. In those teem- 
 ing seas, as he knew, she could find plenty to 
 eat without forsaking her post. But if those 
 
30 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 seas were teeming with sea-life, he reflected 
 ruefully that they were at the same time rather 
 barren of ships. The coasting schooners were 
 apt to give that part of the coast a wide berth, 
 owing to its sunken reefs and awkward cur- 
 rents. His island, to be sure, was little more 
 than half a mile from shore — an easy enough 
 swim for him under ordinary circumstances. 
 But, even with his gaoler out of the way, he had 
 no rehsh for running the gauntlet of the giant 
 sharks which haunted the island channels. 
 Exposed as he was to the full glare of the sun — 
 the rock around him was uncomfortably hot 
 beneath his hands — he wondered how long it 
 would be before heat and thirst would so over- 
 come him that his legs would crumple under his 
 weight, and he would topple forward into the 
 jaws of his waiting foe. On this point, how- 
 ever, he was presently somewhat reassured, as 
 he noted that the sun would very soon pass over 
 the shoulder of the cliff and leave him in the 
 shade. As far as the heat was concerned, he 
 would be fairly secure until the next morning. 
 But then, if the weather should continue fine, 
 how would he endure the long intolerable blaze 
 of the forenoon, before the sun should again 
 go over the chff ? He began to pray for storm 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 31 
 
 and shrouded skies. But here he stopped him- 
 self, reaHzing his dilemma. If a storm should 
 come, it was likely at that season to come out of 
 the south-east ; and in such event the first 
 rising seas would lick him from his perch. 
 He decided hastUy that it was best to make his 
 prayer a general one, and hazard no dangerous 
 suggestions to Providence. 
 
 Fumbhng instinctively in his pocket, he 
 drew forth his soaked and sopping tobacco- 
 pouch and a box of wet matches. The latter 
 included some wax vestas, and he had a dim 
 hope that these, if carefully dried and properly 
 coaxed, might perhaps be induced to light. 
 He spread them out, with the tobacco, on the 
 hot rock between his feet. He had lost his 
 pipe in the catastrophe, but he had letters in 
 his pocket, and with these, when dried, he 
 planned to roll cigarettes. The enterprise 
 gave him something to do, helping him to pass 
 the weary afternoon. But in the end he found 
 that none of the matches would afford him so 
 much as a splutter. Angrily he threw their 
 futile remnants into the sea. 
 
 Night fell suddenly, as always in those lati- 
 tudes, and the moonhght enchanted the long 
 swells to the smoothness of glass. All night the 
 
32 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 orca swam backwards and forwards before the 
 rock, till the changeless monotony of her move- 
 ments began to hypnotize her prisoner, and 
 he turned his eyes to the cliff-face to escape its 
 influence. He was in deadly fear of dropping 
 to sleep in his weariness, and faUing out of the 
 niche. His legs were giving way beneath him, 
 and there was not room in the niche for him to 
 sit down, or even to crouch with any comfort. 
 At last, in desperation, he decided to take the 
 risk of letting his legs hang over the edge, where 
 his enemy could reach them if she should dare 
 another of her wild leaps into the air. The 
 moment he seated himself in this position she 
 swam nearer and eyed him with unutterable 
 malignancy. But she did not attempt to 
 repeat her flying rush. It was plain to Gard- 
 ner that she had no rehsh for such another 
 violent concussion with the rock. 
 
 At last the interminable night wore itself 
 away. The moon had long disappeared over 
 the cliff, when the velvet purple of the sky 
 began to thin and chill, the stars to pale and 
 fade. Then the measureless splendour of an 
 unclouded tropic dawn broke over the sea, and 
 the shining plane of the waters seemed to tilt 
 downward to meet the sun. Gardner gathered 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 33 
 
 all his weary strength to face the fiery ordeal 
 that he felt to be before him. 
 
 The better to fortify himself against it, he 
 took off his hght coat, and, by the aid of some 
 pieces of cord which he found in his pockets, 
 he lowered the garment and drenched it well in 
 the sea. The orca darted in to see what he 
 was doing, but he drew up the dripping coat 
 before she could seize it. He felt that this idea 
 was nothing less than an inspiration, for, by 
 keeping his head and body well drenched, he 
 would be able to endure almost any heat, and 
 might at the same time, by absorption, hope to 
 ward off for a time the extreme torments of his 
 thirst. 
 
 As the relenting Fates decreed, however, his 
 trial was presently to be ended. Along about 
 nine o'clock in the morning, from somewhere 
 behind the island came throbbing on the stiU 
 air a harsh, staccato chug — chug — chug — chug, 
 which was to Gardner's ears the divinest of 
 melodies. In an instant he had stripped his 
 light shirt over his head and was holding it in 
 eager hands. A moment more, and a powerful 
 forty-foot motor-launch came into view. She 
 was about a hundred and fifty yards away, and 
 making a lot of racket. But Gardner, yeUing 
 
34 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 widely and flapping his shirt in the air, suc- 
 ceeded in catching her attention. She turned 
 in toward the rock ; but in the next instant the 
 noise of the motor stopped, and she swerved 
 off again. The pilot had caught sight of Gard- 
 ner's gaoler. 
 
 There were three men in the launch. One of 
 them hailed the prisoner. 
 
 " What's up ? " he demanded concisely. 
 
 " I shot that brute's calf yesterday," an- 
 swered Gardner, " and she smashed up my boat 
 and chased me up here on to this rock." 
 
 There was silence for a moment on the 
 launch. Then the captain answered — 
 
 " Any feUow that's looking for trouble can 
 generally find it by starting in to fool with a 
 ' killer,' " said he. 
 
 " I've thought since that I had made a mis- 
 take," said Gardner dryly. " But that was 
 yesterday morning, and I'm pretty near aU in. 
 Come and take me off." 
 
 There was a brief consultation on the launch. 
 The orca, meanwhile, continued her patrol 
 before the rock, as if such things as forty-foot 
 motor-boats were not worth noticing. 
 
 " You'U have to hang on a bit longer," 
 shouted the captain, " while we run back to 
 
THE TIGER OF THE SEA 35 
 
 port and get a whale-gun. We've got a 
 heavy rifle here, but it's not safe to tackle her 
 with that, for, if,we didn't fix her first shot, she'd 
 make matchwood of this launch in about ten 
 seconds. We'll be back inside of an hour, so 
 don't fret." 
 
 " Thanks ! " said Gardner ; and, sweeping 
 off in a wide curve, the launch disappeared 
 behind the island. 
 
 It seemed to the imprisoned man a terribly 
 long hour, and he had occasion to bless the cool 
 dripping jacket before he again heard the chug — 
 chug — chug — chug of the motor-boat clamouring 
 behind his prison. This time, as soon as it came 
 in sight, it bore straight down upon the orca. 
 In its bow, as it sUd gracefully dipping over the 
 smooth swell, Gardner remarked a strange gun 
 — a sort of short big-bore rifle on a swivel. The 
 orca now took note of the fact that the launch 
 was heading straight for her. She paused in 
 her tireless patrolling, and eyed it defiantly, 
 hesitating as to whether she should attack it 
 or not. 
 
 The launch reversed propellers tiU her pro- 
 gress came to a stop, while her captain sighted 
 the weapon in her bow. There was a mighty 
 report. The monster flung herself halfway out 
 
36 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 of the water, and fell back with a gigantic splash. 
 For a moment she rushed madly around in a 
 half-circle, then crashed headlong into the cliff, 
 gave one violent shudder, and slowly sank to a 
 fringing reef about two fathoms down. 
 
 " Have you plenty of water right up to your 
 ledge ? " demanded the captain, as the launch 
 drew slowly in. 
 
 " Plenty," said Gardner, swinging down 
 stiffly from his niche and standing ready to 
 crawl abroad. 
 
Ishmael of the Hemlocks 
 
 AN Ishmael, indeed, his fangs and his 
 claws were against every other dweller 
 of the wilderness, great or small. And every 
 other dweller of the wilderness was against 
 him — ^the small and weak with an unsleeping 
 terror, and even the powerful with a hate that 
 was not unmixed with dread. The bear him- 
 self, serenely scornful of much larger foes, 
 condescended to regard him with a vigilant 
 animosity. Only the giant moose ignored him 
 utterly, and stalked through the forest uncon- 
 scious of his presence. 
 
 Yet this creature that was able to win him- 
 self the tribute of so much fear and so much 
 hate, this Ishmael of the hemlocks, was no 
 bigger than a bobcat or a fox. Among the 
 backwoodsmen and the trappers he was known 
 by various names. The most common of 
 these was " the fisher," though why he should 
 be so called was something of a mystery, his 
 prowess as a fisherman being much inferior 
 
 87 
 
38 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 even to that of the racoon, and, of course, in no 
 way to be compared with the skill of such ex- 
 perts as the mink or the otter. He was known 
 also as the " black cat," though he was not 
 black, and neither was he a cat. That he 
 should have been so inappropriately named, 
 however, is perhaps not so surprising as it 
 seems at first glance. His personality was not 
 one that lent itself to exact or intimate obser- 
 vation ; and such information as men were 
 able to pick up in regard to him was quite apt, 
 in the long run, to prove mistaken. 
 
 A member of the great and redoubtable 
 Mustela family, this Ishmael of the hemlock 
 glooms had all the lightning agility and fero- 
 cious courage of his little cousin, the weasel, 
 together with the merciless craft and much 
 of the astonishing muscular strength of his 
 bulkier kinsman, the hated wolverene, or 
 " Injun devil." Though hardly more than 
 three feet in length, from his sharp, cruel 
 muzzle to the tip of his handsome, bushy tail, 
 by reason of the incredible swiftness and 
 savagery of his attack he was more than a 
 match for the most powerful of foxes, or for 
 any dog of less than twice his size. The few 
 adversaries whom he was forced to recognize as 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 39 
 
 outclassing him in strength he could generally 
 manage to overreach by craft. 
 
 It was in a dark and tangled hemlock wood 
 that Ishmael had his retreat, where the sombre 
 evergreens shut out the sun in winter as in 
 summer, and fallen, decaying trunks made 
 the earth a labyrinth of tortuous runways 
 and unexpected hiding-places. This was his 
 chosen domain, for he climbed like a squirrel, 
 and it was all the same to him whether he 
 travelled on the ground or by way of the sway- 
 ing tree-tops. But, thanks to his all-too- 
 effective methods of hunting, game was no 
 longer very abundant in the hemlock wood, 
 and he was wont to forage far afield. Running 
 soundlessly as a mink and tirelessly as a wolf, 
 he would cover enormous distances between 
 the evening and the morning red. Being no 
 respecter of bounds, he poached impartially 
 on all preserves, challenging every other 
 marauder of the forest to the contest of either 
 strength or cunning. And all day, amid the 
 sombre green shadows of the hemlocks, he 
 would sleep, curled up like a peaceful tabby, 
 in the heart of a hollow trunk. He was fond of 
 sleep. His tremendous energies required a 
 lot of it. And this was fortunate for the 
 
40 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 other forest kindreds, who were thus enabled 
 to go all day freely hither through the hemlock 
 glooms, on their furtive affairs intent, without 
 fear of the dreaded sleeper in his tree. But, 
 when dusk feU, even the nimble wood-mice 
 were shy of the neighbourhood ; and the wild 
 rabbits, who were Ishmael's chief dependence 
 for his daily diet, fled to the more open hard- 
 wood ridges for their moonlight re veilings. 
 Even that implacable litter kUler, the weasel, 
 forbore to hunt in the hemlock wood. For 
 he knew that Ishmael would not only hunt 
 him — perhaps for sheer delight in the difficult 
 chase — but would even devour his rank and 
 stringy flesh, tough as whipcord, which none 
 of the other forest prowlers would touch 
 unless in the extremest pangs of hunger. 
 
 On a certain spring evening, when the light 
 of an early-rising moon silvered the hemlock 
 tops even before the last of the sunset had 
 faded from the sky, Ishmael awoke with an 
 unusual appetite. He came gliding forth 
 somewhat hurriedly, and took not his usual 
 time to stretch himself on the long, slanting 
 trunk which led down from his hole. On the 
 previous night he had fed exclusively on rabbit, 
 and rabbit meat has this peculiarity — that, 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 41 
 
 as the woodsmen say, it does not " stand by 
 one." After ever so hearty a meal of it, one 
 is soon hungry again ; so that they who feed 
 on that flesh must feed often, which is, perhaps, 
 a provision of Nature, that the proHfic family 
 of the rabbits shall not be allowed to overrun 
 the earth. 
 
 As Ishmael emerged upon his ladder, a 
 hollow, booming voice cried suddenly through 
 the tree-tops. It was a dreadful voice, and it 
 sounded very near, though with a vagueness 
 that made it impossible to say just where it 
 came from. Ishmael knew that menacing 
 voice very well ; but, paying no heed to it 
 whatever, he ran on down the sloping trunk. 
 The great horned owl, the terror of all the 
 lesser prowlers of the night, had no terrors for 
 him. 
 
 But this winged marauder, as it chanced, 
 was a new-comer — a migrant from those par- 
 tially-settled districts south of the Ottanoonsis 
 Valley, where the fishers, who loathe the 
 habitations and neighbourhood of man, never 
 ranged. He was unacquainted with Ishmael. 
 His wide, pale, staring eyes saw a furry shape 
 glide down the trunk. As the gUding shape 
 came out into a patch of moonlight, he half 
 
42 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 closed his downy wings above his back, and 
 swooped upon it soundlessly. Just as he did 
 so, Ishmael looked up with a wide-mouthed 
 snarl. There was something in that snarl so 
 terrible that the great owl realized he had made 
 a mistake. With a violent flap he veered 
 aside. But it was a close thing for him. 
 Ishmael's lithe neck shot out, and his fangs 
 sank into the owl's padded thigh. He got 
 no more, however, than a mouthful of very 
 downy feathers, and the discomfited bird, 
 flapping hastily away from so dangerous a 
 proximity, left him furiously pawing at his 
 mouth to rid himself of the clinging, exasper- 
 ating fluff. 
 
 Reaching the ground, Ishmael ran on in an 
 evil temper. He was not expecting game in 
 that neighbourhood, so he went in haste, 
 travelling in long, noiseless leaps, the very 
 embodiment of force and speed and precision. 
 But in order not to miss any opportunity which 
 the chances of the chase might throw in his 
 way, he went with his nose held high, alert to 
 catch any passing scent. 
 
 Emerging from the hemlock glooms, he 
 entered a region of young second growth, 
 where thickets of half -grown fir and spruce 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 43 
 
 intermingled with patches of birch, poplar, 
 maple, and cherry. Here, on a sudden, a 
 strong scent drew across his nostrils. He 
 stopped as if shot, and stiffened to instant 
 rigidity, half erect, muzzle held high, while 
 his keen nose questioned the air in every direc- 
 tion. The scent was that of a porcupine, and 
 it was so fresh, so insistent, that he knew the 
 prickly rodent must be close at hand. His 
 implacable eyes, sharp and close-set, peered 
 all about him. At last, glancing upwards 
 he caught sight of a dark ball swaying far out 
 on the slender bough of a tall birch tree. 
 
 Now the porcupine is a quarry which the 
 rest of the forest hunters are loath to meddle 
 with. His deadly quills, sharp as needles, 
 and so armed with tiny barbs that, once fixed, 
 they will work their way ever inwards inex- 
 orably till they reach, perhaps, a vital spot, 
 are a peril which only starvation itself will 
 drive the weasel, the fox, or the lynx to face. 
 But Ishmael had the secret of dealing with 
 porcupines, and he knew that the flesh beneath 
 that dangerous armour was strong and satis- 
 fying. He was up the birch tree and out upon 
 the swaying branch before the heavy-witted 
 porcupine had any suspicion of his approach. 
 
44 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Very cautiously now Ishmael crept out 
 along the slender branch, which bent low 
 under the increasing weight . Perhaps wonder- 
 ing why he had suddenly grown so much 
 heavier, the porcupine slowly turned, to climb 
 back to a less precarious support. Before he 
 was much more than half way around, he found 
 himself confronted, at a distance of a few 
 inches, by the silent, deadly face of Ishmael, 
 crouched low on the branch. 
 
 Instantly every quill of the porcupine's de- 
 fences stood erect ; but his position was one so 
 awkward that he could not immediately coil 
 himselfup into that ball of needle-points which 
 all his foes so dreaded. Convulsively he strove 
 to get his naked, unprotected face curled down 
 between his paws. But the doom before him 
 struck too quickly. Ishmael's head darted 
 forward, swift and straight as a rattler's, shot 
 in under the threatening frontlet of barbs, 
 and fixed inexorable fangs in the porcupine's 
 nose. 
 
 At the same instant, knowing aU the possible 
 dangers of the situation, Ishmael began to back 
 briskly up the branch. The porcupine strug- 
 gled to double upon himself, in order to strike 
 at his enemy with his armed and powerful 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 45 
 
 tail. He was being dragged along too rudely 
 for that. Digging in his claws and holding 
 back with all his strength, he struggled to re- 
 sist his captor and to wrench his bleeding 
 muzzle free. But he was jerked forward so 
 savagely that his scant wits all but forsook him. 
 
 The evening twilight, mysterious with its 
 mingling of sunset and moonrise, had hitherto 
 been voicelessly still, except for the occasional 
 solemn twanging note of a night-hawk, swoop- 
 ing across the violet dome of sky. Now, 
 however, the peace was broken by a hideous 
 confusion of sounds, 'suppressed but desperate. 
 Except to one immediately beneath the tree, 
 the struggle was unseen. But the fierce ratt- 
 ling of branches, the breathless, grunting 
 squeaks, the tearing of claws dragged remorse- 
 lessly from their hold on the bark, were elo- 
 quent of tragedy. 
 
 Reaching the crotch of the bough, Ishmael 
 braced his lithe hind-quarters securely upon 
 the main trunk, and with a sudden jerk 
 swung the porcupine clean off his feet, dashing 
 him violently against a branch below. Half 
 stunned and wholly bewildered, the wretched 
 victim laid back all his quills as he swung 
 there, and clawed frantically for a footing. 
 
46 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Ishmael allowed him almost to gain one, and 
 then, as he hung thus extended and defenceless, 
 loosed hold upon his nose and caught him by 
 the throat. The victim's struggles at once 
 grew feebler, and in a few moments ceased 
 altogether. When he hung quite limp, Ish- 
 mael let go, and the body dropped to the 
 ground. Following it with a rush, lest some 
 other hunter should forestall him, Ishmael 
 carefully turned it over upon its back — 
 knowing that all the under-parts were soft 
 and unprotected — and feU to his meal. 
 
 Having eaten all he could, with the confi- 
 dence of an ever-successful hunter, he left the 
 remnants indifferently for whoever might 
 come by, and betook himself to the high and 
 ample crotch of a neighbouring beech tree. 
 Here he proceeded to make a careful toilet, 
 cleansing his fine fur scrupulously till not a 
 trace of his late sanguinary adventure re- 
 mained. Then, as wide awake and as keen for 
 the chase as if he had had nothing to eat for 
 hours, he slipped down from the beech tree 
 and raced on through the moon-silvered still- 
 ness. 
 
 Presently across the stillness came the 
 light babble of running water. As if at the 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 47 
 
 sound a memory had flashed upon him, he 
 swerved sharply aside, and in a few seconds 
 came out upon a little grassy meadow on the 
 shores of a shallow brook which sang softly 
 over its pebbles. But Ishmael was not thirsty. 
 He paid no heed to the water, but went sniffing 
 about among the herbage, till presently he 
 found what he was looking for. Straightway 
 he fell to rolling himself over and over in it, 
 and biting at it in a sort of ecstasy. What 
 he had found was a bed of catnip, for which 
 herb he had all the semi-delirious passion of 
 the cats themselves. 
 
 Having satiated himself with this luxury, 
 Ishmael kept on up the stream, his nose held 
 high, as usual, but the keenness of his scent 
 somewhat blunted, for the moment, by the 
 pungency of the catnip. It was because of 
 this, perhaps, that, on whisking around a huge 
 half-rotten stump, he ran plump into a big 
 black bear which was grubbing for beetles in 
 the rich mould. The bear made a furious pass 
 at him with her gigantic paw, and Ishmael 
 flashed aside just in time to escape being 
 crushed. Startled and enraged, he darted 
 around the stump, and, reappearing suddenly 
 on the other side, snarled venomously and 
 
48 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 made as if to spring at the great beast's throat. 
 He was by no means insane, however ; and 
 when the bear lunged forward at him with a 
 grunt of hate, he shpped away like a snake 
 into the undergrowth. 
 
 Some five minutes later, while creeping 
 swiftly under the branches of a dense fir thicket, 
 he ran fuU upon something warm and aUve, 
 lying huddled up upon the ground. His 
 nose had not warned him — perhaps because 
 the young of the wild creatures seem, at times, 
 to have a protective lack of scent — and his 
 eyes had not warned him, because the motion- 
 less little form, both in colour and in outline, 
 seemed to melt into its surroundings. Never- 
 theless, Ishmael was not taken by surprise. 
 His practised jaws went instantly and un- 
 erringly to this new quarry's throat. There 
 was a sharp bleat of agony and terror, a pathe- 
 tically brief and feeble beating of awkward 
 limbs. Carefully as its anxious mother had 
 hidden it, the baby fawn too soon had met the 
 doom of the wild. 
 
 Ishmael liked venison — young venison — 
 even better than porcupine ; so, though he 
 was not exactly hungry, he drank the warm 
 blood greedily, and even managed to partake 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 49 
 
 of a little solid dessert. While thus pleasantly 
 occupied, however, he kept a sharp look-out for 
 the old doe, whose knife-edged hoofs and 
 mother rage would, as he knew, make her 
 dangerous even for him. Suddenly there 
 sounded a brusque swishing and crashing of 
 branches. But it was not the doe that came 
 bursting into the thicket. It was the great 
 black bear. She had followed him up, and 
 now she was come to rob him of his kill. 
 
 For a second or two Ishmael went aU but 
 blind with fury. He crouched upon his prey, 
 facing the intruder with so malignant a rage 
 that it almost seemed to efface the disparity of 
 their statures. The bear, however, cared no- 
 thing for his rage. She lumbered forward and 
 struck swiftly at the small brown beast that 
 was so presumptuous as to withstand her. 
 
 The blow, of course, fell on nothing ; Ish- 
 mael had vanished like a shadow. An instant 
 later the bear felt a piercing pang in the great 
 muscles just above her heel. She wheeled 
 and struck again like lightning. But Ishmael 
 was already gone. He crouched, snarling 
 softly, some dozen feet away, challenging her 
 to pursue. 
 
 But the bear, for all her rage, was not to be 
 
50 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 lured. The wound she had received was pain- 
 ful enough, to be sure, but it was not grave ; 
 her opponent's jaws were not wide enough to 
 inflict serious damage on her great furry limb. 
 She knew that in nimbleness she was no match 
 for the vicious little antagonist that taunted 
 her. And she was hungry. She had two 
 bright-eyed whimsical cubs in her den beneath 
 the rocky lip of the ridge, and their appe- 
 tites made a demand upon her breasts which 
 a diet of wood- grubs and wild tubers hardly 
 enabled her to satisfy. The flesh of the fawn 
 was a godsend to her. Mumbling indignant- 
 ly, she fell to her repast, but she kept the 
 while a wary eye on the foe. 
 
 Now, Ishmael, as it chanced, knew all about 
 that den on the ridge and its precious occu- 
 pants. From a safe distance he had surveyed 
 it, gnashing his teeth with malice, but not 
 quite liking to risk the perilous adventure of 
 invading it. Now, however, his rage blotted 
 out his always scant endowment of caution. 
 Even so, his cunning did not quite desert him. 
 He made a final threatening rush at his great 
 adversary, to make sure of attracting her 
 undivided attention, and then, as if daunted 
 at last by the fury of her counter-attack, he 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 51 
 
 darted away, not too swiftly, in a direction 
 exactly opposite to that which would lead him 
 to the den. Craftily he kept to the moonlit 
 patches of open, and the old bear's eyes fol- 
 lowed him suspiciously till he was lost in the 
 confusion of the shadows. 
 
 Satisfied at last that he was well beyond 
 eyeshot, he wheeled in his tracks, made a 
 short dHour, and sped straight for the crest 
 of the ridge. 
 
 The old bear had her den in a little cave 
 with a narrow entrance, just where the tilted 
 strata of slate which formed the extremity of 
 Blue Ridge broke off sharply and over-hung 
 a deep ravine. Up from the ravine, on the 
 windless air, came the light clamour of Blue 
 Ridge Brook, an unconsidered tributary of 
 the turbulent Ottanoonsis. For some fifteen 
 feet along the face of the steep ran a broken 
 ledge, which led to the entrance of the cave. 
 Full upon the entrance shone now the un- 
 clouded moonlight, washing whitely across 
 the straight spires of the fir trees in the valley 
 below. 
 
 It was obviously a perilous cul-de-sac, 
 with no back door to retreat by, but Ishmael 
 did not hesitate. He knew that the old bear 
 
52 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 was far away, down in the thickets on the 
 other side of the ridge, devouring her stolen 
 meal. He glided along the ledge, his dark, 
 lithe shape conspicuous for a moment in the 
 moonlight. Then he slipped into the cave. 
 
 The two glossy cubs, about the size of house 
 cats, were beginning to get hungry. Huddled 
 together at the back of the den, they were 
 whimpering softly to themselves, their small, 
 pointed ears cocked to listen for the shuffle 
 of their mother's returning footsteps, their 
 bright, droll little eyes fixed eagerly on the 
 patch of brightness that filled their doorway. 
 Suddenly they saw, not their mother's huge 
 form, which always blotted out the hght, but 
 a low, slender shape, which entered with a 
 graceful, leaping bound. They knew at once 
 that it was deadly, that leaping figure, whose 
 eyes fixed theirs with so steady and cruel a 
 glare; and both set up a shrUl, whimpering 
 call for help. 
 
 But the two cubs were very different in their 
 tempers, as often happens in the case of ani- 
 mals so variable and so highly individualized 
 as the bear. One of the two faced the peril 
 boldly, a baby paw uphfted to strike, and 
 the thin, black edges of his lips curled back 
 
ISHMAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 53 
 
 defiantly from his tiny teeth. The other, 
 appalled on the instant by the menace of those 
 approaching eyes, shivered violently and lost 
 aU power of motion. 
 
 It was this little unfortunate that first 
 caught Ishmael's eye. Darting straight at 
 its throat, he rolled it over on its back and be- 
 gan tearing it savagely. There was the joy of 
 satisfied vengeance in that kill, and Ishmael, 
 for the moment, forgot his cunning. 
 
 A few seconds later he was disturbed by a 
 feeble clawing and nipping at his hind-quarters. 
 The other cub, being of the mettle which 
 recks not of odds, had come valiantly to the 
 aid of his little bed-fellow. With dripping 
 jaws and a furious snarl, Ishmael whipped 
 about to rid himself of this ineffectual assailant. 
 But in that same instant his ears caught the 
 sound of a swift padding on the rocks outside. 
 With one lightning bound, as if his body were 
 aU steel springs, he reached the mouth of the 
 cave. 
 
 But in the same instant the mother bear, 
 breathless with haste, reached it also. Some 
 shock of instinctive fear had shaken her at 
 the very beginning of her feast, and she had 
 not hngered to think about it — she had come. 
 
54 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 One huge paw, with a sweeping stroke, met 
 Ishmael fuU in the face, crushing his head 
 back between his shoulders and pinning him 
 to the rock. Then the other descended like a 
 pile-driver upon his slender loins. Even in 
 his death-throe Ishmael's jaws worked, biting 
 madly and blindly. But in a second or two 
 it was all over. He lay without a quiver, a 
 shapeless mass of blood and fur beneath the 
 avenger's feet. 
 
 The old bear drew back and eyed the body 
 for a moment, then she hurried into the den, 
 whimpering with anxiety. The uninjured 
 cub came sprawling forward to meet her. 
 She gave him a hasty lick and sniff, assuring 
 herself that he was not hurt, and then turned 
 to the dead one. Whining, she sniffed at it, 
 and licked it^ and turned it over tenderly with 
 her paw. It was, perhaps, a full minute 
 before she could quite make up her mind that 
 it was dead. When she could no longer doubt 
 the truth, she stopped whining. Lifting the 
 Ump little body in her jaws, she carried it out- 
 side the cave and laid it down hngeringly on a 
 steep slope of rock. As if this were just what 
 she had planned for, it sUpped slowly from its 
 place and fell sprawlingly, rolling over and 
 
ISHFAEL OF THE HEMLOCKS 55 
 
 over, till it lodged and hung in the branches 
 of an aged spruce some fifty feet below. 
 
 The mother did not stay to watch it. Turn- 
 ing back abruptly, she threw herself once more 
 upon the carcase of Ishmael, beating it and 
 rending it with her claws till it resembled 
 nothing that had ever roamed the wilds. 
 Being a fastidious feeder in her way — a lover of 
 honey and fruits and delicate meat — she would 
 not condescend to eat this rank and fibrous 
 flesh. When she had fully wreaked her ven- 
 geance upon it, she flung it contemptuously far 
 over the ledge, and withdrew into the cave to 
 suckle her remaining little one. As for what 
 remained of Ishmael, it fell to the bottom of 
 the ravine, there to feed some ancient grudge 
 of fox or wild-cat, or, perhaps, more ignomini- 
 ously, to make long festival for the scavenger 
 beetles and the blow-flies. 
 
The Keepers of the Nest 
 
 UP from the south, and from the blue, 
 palm-fringed lagoons, the giant white 
 flock came beating, on wings that drove 
 them through the heights of air at something 
 like a mUe and a half a minute. Over the 
 rank, bright, mysterious solitudes and gold- 
 green reek of the everglades the shining 
 wedge of their flight cleft the air unswerv- 
 ingly. In the mighty, throbbing rhythm of 
 that flight, each vast white wing flashed 
 momently like snow against the intense blue, 
 struck by the level rays of a sun not yet an 
 hour above the horizon. 
 
 In that high-voyaging flight went fifteen 
 swans, those huge white, clarion-voiced birds 
 so inaptly known as the " whistling swans." 
 They flew in strict array, with usually four 
 in the shorter limb of the wedge, and eleven 
 in the longer one, the wisest and most domin- 
 ant of the flock, the undisputed leader, flying 
 
 S7 
 
58 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 at the apex. The first far summons of the 
 northern spring had come to him suddenly, 
 in the blue and gold of the Floridian lagoons, 
 and though he knew that spring was still 
 deep wrapped in ice, howled over by the 
 savage Arctic winds, he had lingered but a 
 day or two before following the caU. For a 
 day or two the flock had been greatly excited, 
 swimming this way and that, preening their 
 feathers nervously, and making the yeUow 
 shores re-echo with their harshly sonorous 
 cries. It was not an easy matter to tear them- 
 selves away from those milk-warm, teeming, 
 green-azure tides ; but at length, in the cool 
 of the dawn, a flock of wild geese had gone 
 musically honking overhead, bound for Hud- 
 son Bay. This was just the spur that he was 
 needing. As if he had merely been waiting 
 for these, his forerunners, to lead the way, he 
 sprang into the air, with a long trumpeting 
 call and a mighty beating of wings. The 
 flock rose after him, in a snowy, tempestuous 
 confusion of wings and cries. With much 
 jealous wrangling the wedge formed itself as 
 it rose, pounding upwards on a long slant, till 
 at last, having gained a cloudy height, it 
 swept northward on the trail of the geese. 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 59 
 
 Not far under five feet in length, and with 
 an enormous wing area, these " whisthng 
 swans " were the statehest birds that the 
 North American continent could boast. The 
 whiteness of their plumage, radiantly flawless, 
 save for a spot of yellow on each side of the 
 face, was set off in a formal fashion by jet- 
 black legs and bill. Their full-arched skulls 
 betrayed a high degree of intelligence, and 
 their wild eyes held a sort of aloof defiance. 
 
 Swerving rapidly inland, as if to avoid the 
 Atlantic coast, the swans swept toward the 
 Mississippi Valley. From time to time, with 
 tremendous splashings and a noise as of a 
 band of horns and bugles, they would come 
 down from their heights to rest and feed, 
 seeking always, for their halt, the loneliest 
 of lakes or marshy pools. The weight of 
 their great frames, and the fierce energy 
 expended in the terrific speed of their flight, 
 forced them to feed well and often. 
 
 From the altitude at which they journeyed 
 the swans looked down on all the other 
 migrant hosts, with the exception, perhaps, 
 of the geese, who flew at about the same level. 
 Above them, in the intense blue, they saw 
 only a majestically wheehng eagle now and 
 
6o MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 then, or the black, motionless wings of a soar- 
 ing vulture, or some high-hawking falcon 
 waiting to swoop upon her prey. But of 
 none of these had the swans any fear. The 
 harmless black vultures would not molest a 
 kitten. And neither the eagle nor the swift 
 gerfalcon, or goshawk, most blood-thirsty of 
 his race, would lightly risk a buffet that 
 might hurl him reeling to the earth. The 
 swans, indeed, gave small thought to any 
 possible enemies in their aeried path. 
 
 Yet, but for their confidence in their own 
 power and courage, even the giant white 
 swans might have had misgivings as the 
 goshawk came gliding, a beautiful and sinister 
 form, above the line of their flight. Flying 
 as they were at a rate of not much less than 
 a hundred miles an horn:, the measured beat 
 of their wings was a visible manifestation of 
 splendid and adequate effort. But the gos- 
 hawk swiftly overtook them, almost without 
 seeming to hasten the slow sweep of his long, 
 scythe-like pinions. Directly above the 
 leader his wings came to a stop, and he glided 
 motionless, with the wind of his speed hissing 
 in the stiff-set feathers, and his flat, cruel 
 head reaching downward as if he were about 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 6i 
 
 to strike. The longer limb of the wedge 
 shortened a little, as certain of the younger 
 birds at the rear nervously drew in closer to 
 their fellows. But the leader and the other 
 older birds paid no attention to the menace, 
 beyond turning upwards, as they flew, a 
 steady and watchful gaze. A few moments 
 later, and apparently without an effort, the 
 splendid marauder sailed on ahead. Two 
 minutes more, and he had overtaken the 
 journeying geese. Pouncing upon the hinder- 
 most, he gripped its outstretched neck with 
 his clutching talons and fairly tore out its 
 throat. But it was too heavy a bird for him 
 to bear up, so, after a moment or two of tre- 
 mendous flapping, he let it drop. It fell, 
 sprawlingly, turning over several times in 
 the air before it landed with a crash in the top 
 of a dense old cedar. The great hawk, with 
 half-folded wings, dropped after it straight as 
 a stone and caught it again securely [in his 
 talons just as it touched the branches. With 
 heavy flappings he guided it to a perch where 
 he could devour it in comfort ; and the 
 swans, as they beat their way above the 
 scene, stared down upon it with eyes of grave 
 indifference. 
 
62 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Soon passing beyond the zones of cane- 
 field, pine barren, and cypress swamp, they 
 crossed the harsh and forbidding ridges of the 
 Tennessee Mountains, running the gauntlet of 
 the rifles of the wild mountaineers. In this 
 perilous passage they lost three of their flock ; 
 but their leader swept them on ■without allow- 
 ing the array to become demoralized. For a 
 few seconds only was there some confusion, 
 as a strong bird near the head of the wedge, 
 having got his death wound, struggled blindly 
 to keep on. A moment more, however, and 
 he went plunging downward • and the line 
 closed up. 
 
 And now the skies they traversed were no 
 longer of so palpitating a blue, but more often 
 of a sullen grey or lowering with black and 
 wind-rent clouds. Gusts of icy rain burst 
 over them, and those wanton storms which 
 strive to buffet back the vanguards of the 
 diffident northern spring. The rivers that 
 now rolled swirling beneath them were cold 
 and swoUen floods, heavy with silt. The 
 broad plains that stretched to the horizon 
 and beyond began to be mottled uncouthly 
 with patches of grey and shrinking, snow'. 
 Soon the brown disappeared, and all was snow. 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 63 
 
 white and interminable, broken only by the 
 blue-black watercourses roUing along their 
 burden of logs and ice, or by dark green, ragged 
 belts of spruce forest. Such scattered cities 
 as passed beneath them they hardly heeded, 
 unless it chanced to be at night, and the city 
 one of importance. Then the wide-flung 
 glare always drew them, and there would be, 
 on the part of the younger birds, a tendency 
 to descend and investigate ; but the leader 
 always checked this inexorably, and swung 
 the flock sometimes to a higher level. 
 
 Voyaging thus day by day toward ever 
 more and more inhospitable lands and skies, 
 they came at last to those shelterless and 
 incredibly bleak expanses of the Barren 
 Grounds which stretch along the north-west 
 shores of Hudson Bay. In a blinding smother 
 of snow they arrived at a small lake, a few 
 miles inland from the sea, which had been the 
 leader's objective ever since leaving the sun- 
 drenched Floridian lagoons. But he had too 
 far outflown the advance of the sluggish spring, 
 and the little lake was not yet open. After 
 circling above it with loud, disappointed cries, 
 they flew off down the course of the shallow, 
 turbulent stream which came boiling from 
 
64 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 under the ice, and alighted amid the muddy 
 and wave-eaten floes which fringed the shores 
 of the bay. 
 
 For nearly three weeks the flock held to- 
 gether and kept to the tide- waters. Their 
 refuge was a narrow and shallow bay, its 
 beaches piled with ice-cakes which gave them 
 some shelter from the tearing winds. Here 
 food was abundant, so they were well enough 
 off, though restless and anxious to get about 
 their nesting. 
 
 As the wind was off shore, under the lee of 
 the ridged ice-cakes the water was compara- 
 tively still. And it was here they slept, rock- 
 ing softly on the backwash. Here, for the 
 most part, they were safe from aU enemies. 
 But one night, as they slept, shadowy, pale 
 shapes on the dimly-shadowed water, there 
 came another pallid shape, moving noiselessly 
 as a smoke, down to the water's edge, and 
 paused among the huddled ice-cakes. Motion- 
 less it eyed the sleeping swans. Then, warily 
 withdrawing, it entered the water some fifty 
 yards away, swam out perhaps another fifty 
 yards, and approached the sleepers from the 
 direction of the open sea, the direction from 
 which they least apprehended attack. Swim- 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 65 
 
 ming so deep in the water that only a sharp, 
 black muzzle appeared above the surface, the 
 prowling shape came suddenly and without 
 warning above the swans. Rearing half its 
 length above the surface, it seized one of the 
 sleepers by the neck and killed it with a single 
 savage shake. 
 
 Wide awake on the instant, the flock beat 
 up into the air with wild buglings of con- 
 sternation, as the great white bear went 
 splashing shoreward with his prize. The 
 flock flew out to sea, mounting to a great 
 height, and circled for nearly an hour in the 
 gUmmering twilight before they could recover 
 their composure. Then they came dropping 
 back in silence, every eye alert, and settled 
 once more upon the water a couple of hundred 
 yards from their old sleeping-place. For 
 perhaps another half-hour they floated with 
 heads all erect, searching every ice-cake, 
 every httle lapping wave-crest. And there- 
 after, so long as the flock remained together, 
 when they slept it was always with a sleepless 
 sentinel on guard. 
 
 It was nearly a week later when there came 
 a change — a change so sudden that all the 
 forces of the cold were routed in a night. 
 
66 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 The spring, so long held back, came with a 
 soft, delicious rush. No more shrieking of 
 winds and roar of waves along the outer ledges, 
 but, instead, bland airs that breathed of soak- 
 ing moss, and wide, still waters gleaming 
 under a desolate but tranquil sky. Through 
 long, unclouded days the sun poured down 
 lavishly, the snow fled like a lifting mist, and 
 the ice, collapsing with silvery crash and 
 tinkle, fell back into the floods that gave it 
 birth. A wave of green, high, thin, ineffably 
 tender, went washing in a day all across the 
 illimitable wastes of the muskeg. Another 
 day, and the green was starred with flowers. 
 
 The flock had scattered at once, flying off 
 in pairs to their secluded nesting-places. 
 The leader and his mate had no great way to 
 go, for their place was already chosen. For 
 several years they had held a tiny islet in the 
 near-by lake, whose shores were a morass 
 which gave them protection from most 
 enemies. Their nest, of course, was invariably 
 swept out of existence by the winter hurricanes, 
 but they had no objection to the task of nest- 
 building. 
 
 The islet was no more than a handful of 
 moss and wiUow scrub caught in a jumble of 
 
' The leader and his mate had no great way to go, for their place 
 was already chosen." 
 
 More Kindred of the Wilu] 
 
 67 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 69 
 
 uptilted rock, and it rose but a foot or so 
 above the lake level. The two swans, work- 
 ing together — the splendid male as diUgent 
 in the task as his mate — collected dead sticks 
 and brushwood from all around the shores of 
 the lake, dragging it out with their powerful 
 bills from where the storms had driven it into 
 the tangle of the muskeg. They wove its 
 foundations solidly, and reared it to a height 
 of something over two feet, that its precious 
 contents might be safe from any floods. 
 
 Almost before the nest was fairly finished, 
 the female began to lay, the ample cup of 
 the nest becoming lined with down as she 
 went on laying. The eggs were big, obscurely- 
 tinted affairs, a good twelve inches in the 
 greater circumference, and with a dull, suede- 
 like surface. She laid the full complement of 
 her kind, which is six, and then began to sit. 
 
 In this long and arduous labour the male 
 took no part. But this was not from any 
 lack of sympathy on his part. He was cease- 
 lessly on guard, and devoted in his attentions 
 to his utterly preoccupied mate ; and never 
 did he allow his foraging expeditions to lead 
 him any distance from the nest. When his 
 mate came off to feed, he stayed close beside 
 
70 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 the nest, watching over the eggs. And if any 
 inqu sitive saddleback or herring gull flew 
 over, peering down greedily at the coveted 
 spheres in the nest, he would lift his wings 
 threateningly and warn them off with a furi- 
 ous and strident hissing. 
 
 For a week or two, however, this assiduous 
 guardianship put no great tax on anything but 
 his patience. There was no serious danger in 
 sight. A pair of the great white and grey 
 Arctic hawk-owls, almost as big as eagles and 
 far more savage, were nesting off on the 
 muskeg, perhaps half a mile away. But these 
 fierce marauders were not interested, for the 
 present, in the nest of the swans. They had 
 not the gulls' taste for eggs, and only the 
 direst hunger could have driven them to try 
 conclusions with the mighty wings and bills 
 of the keepers of the nest on the islet. When 
 the young cygnets should come to be hatched 
 out, then might they begin to take an interest 
 in the swans' nest ; but for the present they 
 never came near enough even to ehcit a warn- 
 ing from the vigilant guardian. 
 
 Besides the hawk-owls, out there on the 
 muskeg were stoats and ermine, a few mink, 
 plenty of the little blue Arctic foxes, and a 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 71 
 
 few of the larger and far more dangerous red 
 species. But none of these could get to the 
 nest except by swimming, and the swans 
 knew that not one of these prowlers, unless, 
 perhaps, a very daring red fox, would care to 
 approach the islet as long as either one of its 
 keepers was by. There were no wolves to fear, 
 for they not only hated the half -floating edges 
 of the lake, but they had followed the trail of 
 the wandering caribou to some far-distant 
 ranges. To be sure, there was the great grey 
 lynx, seen picking his way stealthily, from 
 time to time, about the drier portions of the 
 muskeg, and sometimes stopping to glare 
 hungrily across the water at the stately white 
 guardian of the nest. But the swans knew 
 that at this time of year — the season of good 
 hunting — even the lynx was not ravenous 
 enough to wet his well-kept fur by swimming 
 out to the islet. 
 
 But one day there came gliding over the 
 muskeg, pausing and lurking behind the low 
 bushes, a beautiful, dark-brown, sinister- 
 looking stranger. He was long and low in 
 the body, sinuous as a snake, and with a cruel, 
 pointed head. He made his way down to the 
 edge of the water, and stood looking steadily 
 
72 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 across at the brooding mother on her nest. 
 
 The watchful sentinel had never before 
 seen a fisher, but he knew at once that this 
 was an enemy, and a dangerous one. Spread- 
 ing his vast wings, lowering and extending his 
 long neck on a level with the ground, and 
 hissing like an escape-pipe, he stalked around 
 tin he had put himself between his mate and 
 those deadly eyes. At the edge of the water 
 he stood poised, a splendid, gleaming, snowy 
 figure ; and for several seconds the two so 
 strangely-matched antagonists surveyed each 
 other across some twenty yards of clear 
 water. 
 
 The fisher was not just then particularly 
 hungry, but he was, as usual, in the mood for 
 killing. His pause was not because of any 
 hesitation, but simply because he had never 
 seen a swan before, and, like the cunning 
 tactician that he was, he took count of his 
 opponent's points before attacking. Presently 
 he slipped noiselessly into the water and came 
 swimming at great speed toward the islet. 
 
 Ordinarily, perhaps, the swan would have 
 chosen to await the attack on his own thresh- 
 old. But some swift insight warned him 
 now to join battle in that element where he 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 73 
 
 was most at home. He launched himself 
 smoothly as oil, and his powerful webs drove 
 him ghding over the surface, apparently with- 
 out effort, at a pace far beyond that of the 
 fisher. But he did not sail direct to meet the 
 foe. Rather it looked to the foe as if he were 
 going to shun the encounter. He swept off 
 on a curve, as if doubtful what to do in such 
 an emergency. 
 
 The fisher was almost abreast of him, when 
 he swerved like lightning, and, fairly lifting 
 himself from the water, hurled himself straight 
 at the swimmer's head. The swimmer dived ; 
 but, taken by surprise as he was, he was not 
 quick enough to escape a bewildering blow over 
 the right eye from the bird's powerful biU. 
 BUnded for the moment on that side, he was 
 at the same time filled with a very madness of 
 rage. That any mere thing in feathers should 
 dare to withstand him was unbelievable. He 
 rose to the surface again instantly, shooting 
 half his length out of water, and snapping 
 viciously with his long white fangs. But 
 he rose into an incomprehensible turmoil of 
 enormous, battering wings, and lashed foam, 
 and unheard-of hissings, and bhnding, rigid 
 white feathers ; and it was nothing but a few 
 
74^" MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 feathers that his deadly jaws succeeded in 
 grasping. Baffled and choking, he fell back 
 with his mouthful of feathers ; and as he dived 
 once more, with a view to coming up again at 
 some more convenient and satisfactory point 
 of attack — at, perhaps, a foot below the surface 
 — the back of his neck was clutched by a pair 
 of steel-like mandibles. The swan had darted 
 his long, snaky neck under water, as if to fish 
 for lily roots ; and now, having secured a 
 good grip, he was shaking his enemy as a 
 terrier would shake an old shoe. His neck 
 and bill were excellently fitted to this employ- 
 ment, for lily roots are tough and require a 
 lot of energetic persuasion. 
 
 On land, of course, those tactics would 
 have proved promptly fatal to the bird. The 
 fisher, with his hthe strength and swiftness, 
 would have writhed about and fixed his 
 teeth in his adversary's throat, and the fight 
 would have been over. But here, in the water, 
 he could get no leverage whereon to exert his 
 strength. He could do nothing but kick and 
 twist in futile fury. Moreover, not being 
 accustomed to exerting himself under water, 
 he involuntarily opened his mouth, and speed- 
 ily felt himself choking. In fact, had the 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 75 
 
 swan but understood the magnitude of his 
 present advantage, he might now have drowned 
 his assailant without further trouble, and rid 
 the wilderness of one of its bloodiest scourges. 
 But the indignant bird, having himself no 
 objection to keeping his head under water 
 several minutes at a time, little guessed that 
 such an experience might be fatal to his 
 enemy. He presently relaxed his terrible 
 grip, and, backing off lightly, waited to greet 
 the foe's reappearance at the surface with a 
 fresh buffeting of those great wing-elbows in 
 which he put his faith. 
 
 Ordinarily speaking, the fisher is the last 
 to cry quits or to lose heart under any punish- 
 ment. But this kind of punishment was some- 
 thing so mysterious, so undreamed of, that it 
 seemed for the moment to change his whole 
 nature. It is more than probable that a 
 good submersion would cool the battle lust 
 even of a rhinoceros. It certainly cooled the 
 fisher's. Though his lungs were bursting 
 and his brain saw sparks, the moment he was 
 freed from that grip on his neck, he had the 
 presence of mind to remain yet a few seconds 
 more under water, while he swam desperately 
 toward his own shore. When at last he was 
 
76 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 forced to lift his head above the surface, he 
 was within a few feet of the fringing bushes. 
 But his adversary was there. He was met, as 
 before, by a stupefying whirlwind of wings and 
 blows and terrific sounds. Gulping a fresh 
 lungful of the air he was agonizing for, he 
 dived again, this time as deep as he could, 
 escaping by a miracle a second darting clutch 
 of his vanquisher's bill. Not till he was actu- 
 ally within the screening roots and stems did 
 he come up again, and then it was to worm his 
 way through them unseen till he was a good 
 twenty paces or so from the water's edge. 
 Then he slunk off without pausing to digest 
 the situation — the most dispirited fisher that 
 ever roamed the muskeg. The swan, catch- 
 ing a ghmpse of his flight, filled the solitudes 
 with the sonorous trumpetings of his triumph, 
 and swam proudly back to the nest. 
 
 As the long five weeks of brooding, for the 
 patient mother on her nest, drew near an 
 end, there came to the Barren Grounds a time 
 of unprecedented drought. The innumerable 
 streams that drained the soaking muskeg ran 
 shallow as they had never run before within 
 the memory of the long-hved swans. Under 
 the long, unshadowed warmth the lake shrank 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 77 
 
 amazingly ; and at last, to the vexation of the 
 keepers of the nest, their islet ceased to be 
 perfectly an islet. The group of tilted strata 
 which formed it rose so far out of water that 
 a thin-topped ledge was revealed, connecting 
 them with the shore. It was no more than 
 a series of widely-separated and precarious 
 stepping-stones, awash in the smallest ripples, 
 but it was enough to allow a sufficiently nimble 
 wanderer to visit the islet dry-shod. The 
 swans eyed it with growing disquiet. 
 
 At last came the day when the patient 
 brooder heard stirrings, and tappings, and 
 thin little cries coming from the six precious 
 eggs beneath her breast. From time to time 
 she would lower her head among them to lis- 
 ten enraptured, or to answer with soft sounds 
 of encouragement in her throat. Her mate 
 drew close to the nest, forgetting to eat, but 
 never forgetting to keep a fiercely watchful 
 eye upon the ledge connecting with the shore. 
 
 Soon one of the baby cygnets, having di- 
 vided the shell into two halves by the ordered 
 strokes of his sharp-tipped bill, thrust up the 
 top portion as if it had been a hd, and sprawled 
 forth all wet against its mother's hot and 
 naked breast. The mother pushed one half 
 
78 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 of the shell within the other, that they might 
 take up less room, and then, a little later, 
 threw them out of the nest, lest they should 
 get fitted on over the end of another egg and 
 smother the occupant. 
 
 Presently two more eggs hatched almost 
 simultaneously. The ecstatic mother was 
 now half standing in the nest to give the 
 damp sprawlers room. It was at this time 
 that the old grey lynx, prowling down nearer 
 to the water's edge than was his wont, ob- 
 served the stepping-stones and decided to 
 come over. He had wanted those great white 
 birds for a long time. 
 
 Now, the most powerful of swans, under 
 usual circumstances and conditions, is no 
 match for the lynx, but a helpless quarry 
 merely for that fierce and powerful marauder. 
 But often, in defence of their young, the wild 
 creatures develop powers and heroisms un- 
 dreamed of at other times. At such a period 
 they become utterly reckless of odds ; and 
 such a temper may often accomplish the 
 impossible. Moreover, it is one thing to hold 
 a bridge, and another to fight in the open. 
 
 There was no uncertainty in the minds of 
 the two swans as to the deadliness of this peril. 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 79 
 
 They knew all about lynxes. The mother 
 bird stood up among her eggs and young, and 
 stepped dehcately from the nest, hissing and 
 beating her wings. Both birds knew better 
 than to attack this foe by water or by land. 
 With screams of hate they rose laboriously 
 into the air. 
 
 The lynx had reached the second stepping- 
 stone, a sharp and narrow one, and was balanc- 
 ing himself with the caution of a house cat 
 afraid of wetting her feet, before taking the 
 next leap. Just as he gathered himself to 
 spring, the male swan struck him heavily on 
 the side of the head, almost throwing him 
 from his foothold. His fore-paws, indeed, 
 and his whiskered muzzle went into the water, 
 but his great hind claws, firm based for the 
 spring, maintained their hold on the rock. 
 Spitting harshly in his amazement, he clawed 
 back to his position. But in the next instant 
 he was so ill-advised and over-confident as to 
 rise upon his hind legs, striking at his assail- 
 ant in the hope of bringing him down. At 
 the very moment when his balance was least 
 secure, the female, utterly reckless, launched 
 her whole buffeting weight against him. 
 HurUng him irresistibly from the ledge, she 
 
8o MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 fell with him and upon him, driving him 
 deep into the water. 
 
 For one bewildering second he clawed at 
 her, ripping off the strong white feathers, 
 and inflicting cruel wounds on breast and 
 thigh. But this was for a moment only. 
 Daunted and choking, he loosed his grip in 
 haste and pawed his way back to the surface. 
 As he scrambled out upon the ledge, both 
 birds were at him again instantly ; but he 
 had not an ounce of fight left in him. He 
 was not at all hungry, and he did not Uke 
 swans, and he wanted to get off to some quiet, 
 sunny place and dry himself. Spitting loudly, 
 head hunched down between his shoulders, 
 ears fiat, and stub of a tail pressed tight be- 
 tween his furry buttocks, he fled ignominiously 
 through a pandemonium of wings and beaks 
 and screams. When he was quite beyond 
 their reach, the two swans stretched them- 
 selves to their full height, spread their wings 
 as wide as possible, and trumpeted a raucous 
 warning to all trespassers. Then they hur- 
 ried back to the nest which they knew so well 
 how to guard. The female, apparently un- 
 conscious of her wounds, resumed eagerly her 
 brooding, with soft murmurs to the hatching 
 
THE KEEPERS OF THE NEST 8i 
 
 young ; while the male, as calm as if nothing 
 out of the ordinary had happened, or was 
 ever hkely to happen, set himself to preening 
 the ruffled snow of his plumage. 
 
In the Year of no Rabbits 
 
 IT was the hungry year — for all the flesh- 
 eating kindreds of the northern wilds 
 a year of ceaseless ambush, of strained 
 vigilance, of unprecedentedly savage feud. 
 In this year every truce was broken. 
 
 For it was the year of no rabbits. As 
 happens once in a while, mysteriously, the 
 swarming hordes of them had vanished as 
 if wiped out by a pestilence or exiled in a 
 mass, inexorably, by some caprice of the 
 unseen Powers. And so red anarchy in the 
 wild. For the rabbit is your great reconciler, 
 your great keeper of the peace. It is he 
 that keeps life more or less regulated for the 
 fiercely individual and ungovernable hunters 
 and prowlers. For to his inexhaustible fertil- 
 ity, and to the food supply afforded by his 
 myriads, are all their lives attuned. Their 
 wants satisfied by this facile chase, they can 
 afford to save themselves trouble by avoid- 
 
 83 
 
84 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 ing each other at times, by respecting, to a 
 certain extent, each other's ranges, and so 
 escaping the risk of dangerous and doubtful 
 encounters. Few of the wild creatures — 
 with the exception of certain males in the 
 mating season — care to fight for fighting's 
 sake, or to join battle, unless in defence of 
 their young, with an antagonist of anything 
 like equal powers. A victory too costly is 
 almost as bad for them as a defeat, for it 
 leaves them weakened, so that they fall a 
 prey to the next foe that chances along. 
 
 Under these circumstances, it is not strange 
 that there should be signs, among the greater 
 beasts, of something like a truce where their 
 helpless young are concerned. It is no matter 
 of good will, by any means, but of common 
 prudence merely. For when their young are 
 threatened, even the weak are dangerous, and 
 the strong become implacable in their ven- 
 geance. In general, therefore, among equals, 
 the raiding of nurseries is not regarded as good 
 hunting ; the peril is too great for the profit. 
 
 But when the rabbits were gone, all that 
 was changed. Then any hunting was good 
 hunting. 
 
 It is hard to realize that little, palpitating. 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 85 
 
 bulging-eyed bunny could exert so vast an 
 influence on the economy of the wilderness. 
 But there was none so strong or so haughty 
 as to rest indifferent to his going. Even 
 man himself was touched ; for the foxes and 
 the wild-cats drew in about the settlements 
 and harried the hen-roosts and the pastures of 
 the outlying farms. The great herb-eaters — 
 the red deer, the caribou, and the gigantic 
 moose himself — were not exempt from the 
 sudden anarchy ; for the moose and the cari- 
 bou had to guard their young with a vigilance 
 hitherto undreamed of, and the weaker deer 
 soon discovered that enemies whom he had 
 been wont to despise had aU at once grown 
 formidable. 
 
 Of all the wilderness dwellers, the bears, 
 perhaps, were least affected. They had never 
 taken more than a chance interest in quarry 
 so elusive as the nimble rabbit, and flesh 
 food was never essential to them so long as 
 roots and fruits and fungi, grubs and beetles, 
 ants and honey, were to be found in the forest. 
 And when the craving for flesh was not to be 
 denied, it was big game they hunted — deer, or 
 sheep, or some strayed heifer. But, for all 
 their independence, the bears were forced to 
 
86 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 take count of the departure of Master Rabbit. 
 They grew afraid to go far from their dens, 
 lest in their absence some greatly daring lynx 
 or fox or fisher should slip in and kill their 
 cubs. 
 
 It was, perhaps, the lynxes, on the other 
 hand, who suffered most. They and the 
 weasels were the most assiduous hunters of 
 the rabbit, and they lacked the weasels' 
 adaptability. They are set in their ways, 
 the lynxes ; and though more savage and 
 vastly more formidable than their smaller 
 cousins, the wild-cats, they are at the same 
 time far shyer of man and all his works. In- 
 stead of following the foxes and wild-cats into 
 the fringes of the settlements, they stayed 
 where they were, and went hungry or hunted 
 dangerous game. 
 
 Near the top of a steep and rocky knoll, 
 at the heart of a cedar swamp, a wise old 
 mother lynx had her lair. The knoll was an 
 upthrust of broken strata, a tangle of cleft 
 rocks and stunted birch and hemlock, and 
 in a narrow-mouthed cave, near the summit, 
 was the lair. Here the savage mother felt 
 that her litter was pretty well hidden. All 
 approaches to the den were narrow and difii- 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 87 
 
 cult, and it would be a bold enemy indeed who 
 would dare the perilous entrance unless very 
 sure of getting clear away before the mother's 
 return. She ventured, therefore, as few 
 mothers in that calamitous season could ven- 
 ture, to allow herself some freedom of range. 
 And this was well. For they were lusty and 
 hungry youngsters, those striped, velvety 
 kittens, whose baby whimperings had already 
 something harsh and fierce in them, though 
 they still sprawled blindly in their nest ; and to 
 keep her breasts supplied with milk for their 
 precious demands she had to have good 
 hunting. 
 
 Unlike some more fortunate mothers of the 
 wild, she had to care for her family alone. 
 To her ferocious mate she dared not let their 
 hiding-place be known, lest, in some unnatural 
 moment, he should make a meal of them. 
 Ordinarily, except in mating season, they saw 
 little of each other, this wild and sullen pair. 
 But in this season of scarcity they often met 
 for the purpose of hunting down together some 
 game too powerful for either to manage alone. 
 Together, if fortune favoured them, they would 
 perhaps pull down a buck. When they had 
 feasted full, and dragged the carcase into a 
 
88 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 thicket for safer hiding, the female would 
 start back in anxious haste for her den. The 
 male would make as if to follow her ; but she 
 would turn upon him in such a blaze of fury 
 that he would jump back, sit up on his great 
 haunches, lick his blood-stained chaps, and 
 gaze at her with an innocence as demure as of 
 any tabby that ever made away with the 
 canary. The prudent mother was not to be 
 deceived. Staring back over her shadowy 
 grey shoulder, she would growl and spit and 
 snarl tiU she was quite out of sight of that 
 dangerous figure, then she would wheel in her 
 tracks and flash off in quite another direction. 
 And her mate had far too much respect for 
 his hide to attempt to follow her. 
 
 One day, as she came racing back home 
 from one of these expeditions — now gliding 
 like a flicker of light, now bounding in great, 
 noiseless leaps — a sudden foreboding smote 
 her. She had been away, perhaps, a little 
 longer than usual. Lengthening herself out, 
 she shot forward and in among the huddled 
 rocks. As she arrived, a whiff of pungent 
 scent smote her nostrils. She saw a streak 
 of ruddy-yellow fur disappearing under a 
 bush. With one lightning spring, she came 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 89 
 
 down upon that bush. But there was nothing 
 there. She saw a large fox just whisking 
 around the next boulder. For one agonized 
 moment she hesitated, raging to pursue 
 and rip him to shreds with her terrific claws . 
 But the mother pull was too strong. She 
 raced on up to the den and darted in with an 
 anxious whimper of inquiry. 
 
 Her kittens were all there, undisturbed, 
 and noiselessly nosing for her teats, as they 
 felt her and smelt her bending over them. 
 But she had no time just then to gratify their 
 wants. She was too much concerned about 
 their enemies. Giving them a hurried lick of 
 reassurance, to their squalling indignation 
 she left them abruptly. 
 
 Sniffing carefully outside, she quickly satis- 
 fied herself that the fox had only come to 
 within some ten feet or so of the entrance ; 
 but that was more than enough for her 
 mother fears. The enemy had been recon- 
 noitring, and he had found the hiding-place 
 of her treasures. He was an enemy whom she 
 dreaded, because of his cunning, so much 
 superior to her own. Beside herself with rage 
 and fear, she searched every nook and crevice 
 of the knoll. But, of course, she found noth- 
 
go MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 ing of him except the musky smell which he 
 had left behind him so liberally. 
 
 As luck would have it, however, at the 
 foot of the knoll, almost directly beneath 
 the lair itself, she found another intruder. 
 Nosing for roots in the rich earth between 
 the rocks was a black bear. His presence 
 there was quite innocent ; his thoughts were 
 far from young lynxes. But to the eyes of 
 the anxious mother he was sniffing his way 
 to the hiding-place of her little ones. 
 
 Now, the most powerful of lynxes, of 
 course, is no match for a bear. But a mother's 
 a mother, and that makes all the difference 
 in the world. The bear was attentively turn- 
 ing over the moss and sod, unmindful of 
 danger, when a cyclone of claws and teeth 
 and screeches fell upon his neck. Taken so 
 completely by surprise, he fairly bleated, and 
 gave futile clutches over the shoulder with 
 his massive paws, which would have made 
 short work of his audacious assailant could 
 they have fairly reached her. But they 
 touched nothing save a little elusive fur ; 
 and the next moment, seized with panic, he 
 wheeled and fled wildly through the cedars. 
 The lynx clung to him, biting and clawing 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 91 
 
 tiU a low branch swept her off. Whereupon, 
 after pausing to free her teeth from the long 
 black hairs which they had been so diligently 
 collecting, she sped back to the den with her 
 feelings somewhat relieved. The bear ran 
 on, his panic gradually giving way to indig- 
 nation, till at last the latter conquered. Then 
 he turned and began slowly retracing his 
 steps. He would find his insolent assailant 
 and do her up. But when he reached the 
 knoU, he changed his mind once more. After 
 all, was it worth while going out of his way 
 to find her ? She seemed to be so elusive. 
 He passed around to the other side of the 
 knoll, and let off his resentment in rending 
 to pieces an old ant-log. 
 
 To the bear, though so ignominiously 
 routed by his small antagonist the affair was 
 of no great moment. His hurts were not 
 deep, and they soon were forgotten. But 
 to the mother lynx it was different. Her 
 security was gone. She felt that both the 
 fox and the bear were after her little ones. 
 She no longer dared to hunt at any distance 
 from home ; and near home, thanks to her 
 own reputation, it was bad hunting. All she 
 could do was to lie in wait, with infinite 
 
92 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 patience, for chickadees and wood-mice ; 
 while her hunger grew, and the supply of 
 precious milk in her breasts began to diminish, 
 and the little ones, whose eyes were now just 
 opening, became more and more insistent in 
 their demands. 
 
 About three days after the episodes of the 
 fox and the bear, there came to the knoll an 
 immense cow moose, seeking, as the lynx had 
 done, soUtude and security. To the other 
 side of the knoll she came, and had no sus- 
 picions of the presence of the lynx, who 
 glared down upon her unseen from a bush- 
 screened crevice near the summit. She was 
 black and grim and very formidable-looking, 
 the great moose, and could well have smashed 
 the Ufe out of the giant cat with one stroke 
 of her splayed fore-hoof. So the lynx had 
 no notion of interfering with her. But she 
 was interested in the errand which had brought 
 the dark tree-eater to this retreat, and she 
 licked hopefully her whiskered jaws. 
 
 About daybreak, on the soft moss at the 
 foot of the rock, the moose gave birth to a 
 long-legged, shuddering calf. Forgetful at 
 once of aU her suffering, she licked the new- 
 comer long and lovingly, till its soft coat was 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 93 
 
 dry and glossy dark ; and at last, along in 
 the warm of the day, it staggered feebly to 
 its feet and made its first effort to nurse. 
 It was grotesquely gaunt, and lank, and 
 big-headed, and loose- jointed, and its sprawling 
 legs were too weak to long support its weight. 
 In two or three minutes it sank down again 
 upon the moss, where it lay staring around 
 with mild, incurious eyes, while its mother 
 gazed upon it in a tender ecstasy. To her it 
 was the one thing of beauty that the whole 
 green forest held. 
 
 Suddenly a faint sound, other than that of 
 rustling leaf and twig, caught her vigilant 
 ear. She turned her head sharply. There 
 among the cedar trunks, not a hundred feet 
 away, was the bear, turning over and munch- 
 ing a cluster of bright yellow fungi. A bear ! 
 That was the most to be dreaded of all possi- 
 ble enemies. With a harsh cry, a sort of 
 coughing bellow, she rushed at him. 
 
 At sight of this black whirlwind sweeping 
 down upon him, the bear was surprised and 
 pained. He was not a very big bear, and she 
 was a very big moose. If capable of reflec- 
 tion — a point on which doctors differ with 
 some acrimony — he perhaps reflected that the 
 
94 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 knoll was not'a lucky neighbourhood for him — 
 too many mothers and hardly enough mush- 
 rooms. In any case, he decided to go away at 
 once. And he acted with such alertness 
 upon this wise decision that he managed to 
 keep a certain distance between his hind- 
 quarters and those furiously-pounding hoofs. 
 He felt that he had reason to congratulate 
 himself. 
 
 The lynx had been watching from her high 
 crevice when the moose made her mad charge 
 upon the bear. Her pale, round eyes flamed. 
 Soundlessly she dropped from her ambush. 
 There was no cry from the feeble victim. 
 The lynx was too expert and too wary a 
 hunter for that ; she wanted no struggle that 
 would attract the mother's attention from the 
 pursuit of the bear. So the unfortunate calf, 
 who had only just opened his eyes upon life, 
 went out of it without knowing what had 
 happened to him. Without an instant's 
 delay, the lynx began dragging the limp but 
 stiU quivering prey up the rock. Her only 
 chance was to get it speedily beyond the 
 mother's reach. 
 
 The lynx was marvellously strong for a 
 beast of her weight, which was not more than 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 95 
 
 forty odd pounds, and she was desperate with 
 determination. She knew that this prize 
 would keep her from the necessity of leaving 
 the den till her little ones should be past their 
 first helplessness. Nothing should be allowed 
 to snatch it from her. But, for all her furi- 
 ous efforts, so unmanageable was that limp 
 form, with its long, sprawling legs, that her 
 progress up the broken steep was dangerously 
 slow. 
 
 Suddenly the moose, realizing that she 
 could not catch the bear, stopped with a 
 wrathful snort. Ploughing up the dank moss 
 with her great outthrust fore-feet, she wheeled 
 about to return to her calf. She started back 
 at a shambling trot, suspecting no evil, and 
 satisfied with herself for having so well routed 
 the enemy. Then she marked that the little 
 one was no longer in his place. She gave 
 one mighty leap forward, her wild eyes sweep- 
 ing the whole base of the rock, and then, 
 looking upwards, she saw what had befallen. 
 
 As that black bulk of vengeance came thun- 
 dering towards her, the lynx strained desper- 
 ately to lift her prize beyond its reach. The 
 steep at this point was too abrupt for any 
 moose to climb, but the frantic mother hurled 
 
96 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 herself up it so far that her outstretched hoofs 
 struck the rock on either side of the calf's 
 hind-quarters. Daunted for the instant, the 
 lynx let go her hold and shrank away with 
 a snarl. But seeing how far short her 
 assailant had fallen, she sprang forward again 
 and sank her teeth into the victim's throat 
 with confident defiance. 
 
 From that wild leap the mother had fallen 
 back violently upon her haunches. Uncon- 
 scious of the shock, she drew back a few steps 
 and rushed again to the attack. This time 
 she came on less wildly, and the lynx, glaring 
 down upon her over the shoulder of the prey, 
 had no misgivings. But in reality it was now 
 that the wise old moose was most dangerous. 
 Having come triumphant through many sea- 
 sons, many vicissitudes, she knew how to 
 handle her powers to best advantage, and in 
 that first leap she had seen that her little one 
 was finished past all helping. Revenge was 
 all that she could strive for. As she charged 
 again, she gathered her gaunt legs beneath 
 her at the last of it, and launched herself up- 
 wards with a finely-calculated effort. Thor- 
 oughly deceived, the lynx clung obstinately 
 to her hold, with ears flattening back in angry 
 
-P/^uL-ftRA"- 
 
 " The lynx let go her hold and shrank aivaj- with a snarl.' 
 Mon Kindred of thu Wild] 
 
 97 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 99 
 
 scorn. But this time she had seriously mis- 
 calculated. In the next second one of those 
 huge, battering fore-hoofs smote down upon 
 her. It crushed her head right back between 
 her shoulders, and her tense body, suddenly 
 relaxed, slumped forward upon the neck of 
 her victim. 
 
 Falling back as before, because it was im- 
 possible for her to gain any foothold on that 
 steep, the moose charged once more and 
 repeated her wonderful leap. This time her 
 stroke brought both the bodies tumbling 
 over each other to the ground. The victor, 
 now sober and deliberate in her fury, pawed 
 them carefully apart and proceeded to stamp 
 the carcase of the lynx into the earth. When 
 this was accomplished to her satisfaction, she 
 went and nosed her little one tenderly for 
 several minutes, muttering thickly in her 
 shaggy throat. Then, with drooping head, 
 she stood over it motionless for hours, till the 
 last of the sunset had faded out, and ajl the 
 forest was in blackness. At last the moon got 
 up white above the tree-tops, and ran pale 
 fingers down the face of the rock till they un- 
 covered the grim scene at its base. The 
 moose, as if suddenly pulling herself together 
 
100 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 to accept the inevitable, lifted her great black 
 head, sniffed the night air with wide nostrUs, 
 and made off noiselessly through the cedars. 
 
 An hour or two later the bear came cauti- 
 ously prowling up. Unseen himself, he had 
 seen his late enemy go stalking by with an air 
 of no more concern in that part of the forest. 
 Much puzzled, he had come to seek a solution 
 of the mystery. He found the solution entire- 
 ly to his taste. He grunted contemptuously 
 over the pounded remnants of the lynx, and 
 then, well able to appreciate such a dainty, 
 made a hearty meal of young moose meat. 
 He sat down on his haunches and grumbled 
 happily over his repast, perhaps thinking how 
 favoured were the bears over all the other 
 dwellers of the wilderness. It would have 
 been a sound and true reflection, could he but 
 have made it, and no more than the due of the 
 Power which had been so generous to his kind. 
 
 Meanwhile, the baby lynxes in their den, 
 now hungry past all caution and mewing 
 harshly, might have been left to a lingering 
 and piteous death. But Nature is seldom 
 so cruel. Stealing through the black shadows, 
 and darting across the patches of moonlight, 
 came the fox, anxious to see if anything new 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS loi 
 
 had happened at the knoll. Peering from a 
 thicket, he marked the bear at his feast, and 
 soon made out to understand. Stealing about 
 to explore the knoll, he presently caught the 
 cries of the kittens. This was a phenomenon 
 not hard for him to interpret. After a pru- 
 dent investigation, he crept into the den. 
 There was some spitting, feeble but courage- 
 ous, and then the cries of loneliness and hunger 
 stopped. The fox was too businesslike to 
 play with and torment his victims, as one of 
 the cat family would do, but killed them at 
 once and made haste to carry them off to his 
 den. Though not without a healthy edge to 
 his own appetite, he thought first of his mate 
 and cubs, to whom he was untiringly devoted. 
 The knoU being now no longer occupied 
 by the terrible lynx mother, the lesser folk 
 of the forest began cautiously to revisit it, 
 though they made no long stay in that neigh- 
 bourhood, because they never knew when the 
 den at the summit might attract some danger- 
 ous occupant. Before long the bones of those 
 two bodies at the foot of the rock were pohshed 
 clean and white, and then the place feU de- 
 serted except for the chickadees and the wood- 
 peckers. 
 
102 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 As the summer drew to a close, and the 
 first ghmmers of autumn scarlet began to 
 tip the maples, scattering here and there 
 across the wilderness reappeared a few rab- 
 bits. Their enemies being now less numer- 
 ous, they multiplied with amazing rapidity, 
 as if thinking they had the earth to replenish ; 
 and soon again tall ears and bulging eyes were 
 flickering through the coverts, sensitive, cleft 
 nostrils questioning every air, and fluffy 
 white tails bobbing up out of the gold-brown 
 fern beds. The rabbits did not love the cedar 
 swamp, with its wet moss and black, half- 
 hidden pools, but a few of their more adven- 
 turous spirits roamed everywhere. 
 
 One fresh October morning, when the birch 
 trees were all gold among the grey rocks of the 
 knoU, a roving buck rabbit came to the foot 
 of it and stumbled upon that bunch of white 
 bones. At first he was much frightened, and 
 with two prodigious leaps took hiding in the 
 nearest thicket . But the bones made no hostile 
 move whatever, and presently be felt some- 
 what reassured. After he had stared at 
 them for some time, he concluded that they 
 were harmless. With uncomprehending curi- 
 osity he hopped all around them, and then 
 
IN THE YEAR OF NO RABBITS 103 
 
 sat up beside them on his haunches, his long 
 ears erect in foohsh inquiry. The last thing 
 he could guess was that he and his kind were 
 responsible for that pile of bleaching bones. 
 
Puck o' the Dusk 
 
 Bat, bat, come under my hat. 
 And I will give you a slice of bacon. 
 
 SO sings Mother Goose, with that airy 
 irrelevancy, that unblushing disregard 
 of probability, which make her so fascinating 
 a companion to the wise, but so dangerous, so 
 misleading a guide to the ardent young mind 
 in search of facts. There is nothing in the 
 context to show why the lady, unlike all other 
 ladies who have ever Uved, should invite the 
 bat to come under her hat, or even be able to 
 contemplate without shrieks the possibility 
 of a bat coming under her hat. It may be 
 but another instance of that wilfulness, that 
 indifference to convention, which she displays 
 in almost all her poems. Or it may be that she 
 wanted to show how much braver she was 
 than all other women. In either case, we may 
 be sure that she never intended the bat to 
 accept her invitation. The inducement which 
 
io6 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 she offered was one which no bat in the world 
 would give a " tinker's damn " for. And 
 being, for aU her eccentricities, a lady of wide 
 and varied knowledge, she doubtless knew that 
 about the last place in the world where any 
 bat would go was under a hat — any hat, no 
 matter how enchanting the face beneath it. 
 Perhaps, after all, she was merely poking a little 
 sly fun at her sisters of the Universal Feminine, 
 for their frantic delusion that a bat would like 
 to get into their hair. Mother Goose knew 
 very well that nothing but superior force, un- 
 scrupulously employed, would make a bat en- 
 tangle himself in any woman's hair, however 
 bewildering. 
 
 It was not of hats, or of hair, indeed, that 
 Puck o' the Dusk was thinking, as he zigzagged 
 through the purple twilight under the thick- 
 leaved, overhanging boughs. Gnats, for the 
 moment, were aU his thought. The long, still 
 hours of the golden summer day he had 
 slept away very pleasantly, hanging from 
 the edge of a warped board far up in the 
 shadowy peak of the old barn in the meadow. 
 Other brown bats had hung there beside him, 
 suspended, like him, by their long, hooked 
 nails, and demurely sheathed, like him, in the 
 
PUCK 0' THE, DUSK 107 
 
 silken dusky membrane of their folded wings. 
 It was a popular dormitory for the bats, up 
 there in the dim peak, for the edge of that 
 warped board gave a convenient place where- 
 on to attach themselves ; and, consequently, 
 there had been some crowding. From time 
 to time one or another, finding himself 
 squeezed, would wake up and squeak and prod 
 his neighbour with the bony elbow of his wing, 
 and chatter protestingly in a tiny voice — 
 very tiny, but thinly harsh and vibrant, hke 
 the winding of a dollar watch. Puck himself, 
 who chanced to hang on the very end of the 
 row, next to the wide crack in the gable which 
 gave exit to the outer air, had more than once 
 been almost crowded from his perch, so that 
 he had had to do rather more than his share 
 of waking up, elbowing, and watch- winding. 
 Once or twice, too, in this unwonted wakeful- 
 ness, he had been annoyed by the sight of a 
 large rat, prowling along a big beam far beneath 
 him and glaring up at him with cruel, beady 
 eyes. He loathed rats, but, knowing himself 
 securely out of this one's reach, he had not 
 been alarmed. He had folded himself up in 
 his wings and gone to sleep again, even while 
 the enemy was looking at him. So, on the 
 
io8 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 whole, the day had gone by pleasantly enough. 
 As the afternoon drew on, he had roused himself 
 several times to scramble flutteringly over to 
 the crack in the gable and take a glance out 
 at the weather, tiU. at last, when the sun had 
 fairly sunk behind the low hills on the other 
 side of the stream, he had sidled through the 
 crack and launched himself upon the gold-and- 
 violet dusk. Within ten minutes he had been 
 followed by all the other occupants of the dor- 
 mitory, and the peak of the old barn was left 
 empty. 
 
 He was a strange-looking creature, the little 
 brown bat — a mixture of bird and mouse and 
 gobUn, droll, yet sinister — an impish Puck who 
 drowsed away the hours of sun, and awoke at 
 dusk to whimsical and eccentric activities. 
 His insignificant body, covered with a short 
 brown fur of exquisite fineness, was hung 
 between two immense wings of sooty-dark 
 membrane. This membrane, more elastic 
 than the finest rubber, was stretched, like 
 sUk over an umbrella frame, upon the enor- 
 mously developed arm and finger-bones of the 
 fore-hmbs. The two wings were joined to- 
 gether at the tail, and connected with the frail 
 hind-legs as far down as the knees, which 
 
PUCK 0' THE DUSK 109 
 
 seemed to bend in the wrong direction. Be- 
 tween the powerful shoulder-blades was set a 
 curious little shapeless head, with a pug of a 
 nose, whimsically wide and crooked mouth, 
 big flat ears, and tiny, beadlike, impishly- 
 glittering black eyes. 
 
 Awkward and grotesque as he was when 
 swinging from his perch or scrambling up the 
 boarding, the moment he launched himself 
 upon the twilight air. Puck o' the Dusk pre- 
 sented a masterly, though still fantastic, figure. 
 With a combined spread and flexibility of 
 wing such as, weight for weight, no bird could 
 match, his evolutions in the air were of a 
 miraculous alertness. Fl5dng at top speed in a 
 straight hne, he could drop instantly like a 
 stone, or dart upwards at apparently right 
 angles to his course, as if shot from a catapult. 
 A dizzying and bewildering zigzag seemed to 
 be his natural flight, and he could dodge in a 
 fashion that would put even the sparrowhawk 
 to shame. And this, indeed, was well. For 
 the darting, dancing gnats and other swift 
 insects were Puck's prey, and the pouncing 
 owls his peculiar enemy. 
 
 To-night, as he swung along the scented 
 trees by the water, the windless air was full 
 
no MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 of insects- — gnats, early night-moths, and the 
 first blundering cockchafers. Being hungry, 
 he hawked ravenously at everything he saw. 
 But as the dusk gathered, and the edge passed 
 off his appetite, he grew more fastidious. He 
 would let many dainties, easily to be had, slip 
 from his very lips, and amuse himself by 
 flickering off in quest of the more nearly un- 
 attainable. Once, catching sight of a highfly- 
 ing moth far above the tree-tops, silhouetted, 
 to his keen vision, against the pale violet sky, 
 he shot upward swift as thought, snatched 
 the prize from the very beak of a swooping 
 night-jar, and was gone before the disap- 
 pointed bird could realize who had forestalled 
 her. Again, dropping headlong, he snapped 
 a cockchafer off a bending grass-head, just as it 
 was spreading its wings to fly, to the furious 
 indignation of a shrew which had been stalk- 
 ing the insect, and was on the very point of 
 springing up at it. It is probable that Puck's 
 eyes, to which the twilight was clear as crystal, 
 had marked the prowling shrew in the grass, 
 and that he took a whimsical delight in snatch- 
 ing the prize. Even the darting swifts 
 were sometimes befooled in this way, as 
 an elusive shadow would flicker past them 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK iii 
 
 and the all-but-captured moth mysteriously 
 vanish. 
 
 Soon, as the violet light paled from the sky, 
 Puck o' the Dusk deserted his meadow and 
 flew downstream, over field and hedge, to a 
 spacious garden, with lawns and flower-beds, 
 and a wide-verandahed house set in deep trees. 
 Here the bland summer night was drawing 
 forth an intoxication of perfume from the dew- 
 wet roses and stocks, the Japan lilies, and the 
 spicy-breathed carnations ; and hither, en- 
 ticed by the honey scents, the insects of the 
 night came in swarms. Up and down the wide 
 path at the foot of the garden, under the trees 
 by the water-side, a man and a girl were walk- 
 ing, the girl's white dress glimmering softly 
 in the shadows. 
 
 In this pleasant spot Puck was joined by 
 another little brown bat, a female, perhaps his 
 mate, assuredly his playmate. He has not 
 yet revealed enough of his intimacies and 
 domestic habits to enable one to speak confi- 
 dently on this point. For a little while the 
 two seemed to weave leisurely dances in the 
 air, circling around and over and beneath each 
 other, and from time to time swinging apart 
 on long, dizzying tangents, to meet again un- 
 
112 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 erringly at some aerial point of rendezvous. 
 The female flew less lightly, less erratically, 
 than Puck himself ; and if one could have 
 observed her at close quarters in a good light, 
 one would have seen that, however playful, she 
 was a most faithful and devoted little mother, 
 carrying her two babies with her through aU her 
 frivolling. The little ones managed, in some 
 strange way, to cling about her neck, so se- 
 curely that not her swiftest whirlings, her most 
 breathless swooping swings, ran any risk of 
 dislodging them. But it must have been a 
 lively experience for the infants, who were yet 
 too young to be left at home in the barn, 
 where a prowling mouse might find them. 
 
 In the midst of their play, from somewhere 
 out of space, a wide-winged, noiseless shape 
 swept down upon them. Two enormous eyes, 
 perfectly round, fixed, and palely luminous, 
 glared at them, and huge claws, clutching 
 hideously, snatched at them, this way and 
 that, in dreadful silence. Both Puck and the 
 little mother succeeded in escaping the grasp- 
 ing claws, so lightning swift was their evasion, 
 as if, indeed, they had been blown aside like 
 leaves by the owl's attack. Instantly they 
 vanished deep among the branches, and the dis- 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK 113 
 
 appointed owl winnowed onward to seek some 
 quarry less elusive. In a moment or two the 
 bats fluttered forth again. But, though un- 
 daunted, they felt the need of caution while 
 the enemy was still in the neighbourhood. So 
 they betook themselves for their play to the 
 lower end of the garden, where the man and 
 the girl were walking, and began circling and 
 dancing about their preoccupied heads. They 
 considered human beings harmless, and quite 
 useful to keep away owls. 
 
 Suddenly, to Puck's amazement, the girl 
 gave a tiny shriek, and hurriedly twisted her 
 light silken scarf about her fair head tiU she 
 looked hke a Pitti Madonna. 
 
 " Oh," she cried nervously, " there's another 
 of those dreadful bats trying to get into my 
 hair I " 
 
 The man laughed softly and drew her to him. 
 
 " Silly one," said he, " the bat couldn't be 
 persuaded to get into even your hair I He 
 would have the poor taste to consider it most 
 annoying." 
 
 " Oh, but he might blunder into it by mis- 
 take," persisted the girl, her wide eyes follow- 
 ing apprehensively, from the shelter of his arm, 
 the evolutions of the two dancing shadows. 
 
114 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 " You know they are almost blind. And 
 when I was a little girl, Nurse told me that if 
 ever a bat got into my hair, I'd have to have 
 it all cut off, because he would be so snarled 
 up in it there would be no such thing as getting 
 him out." 
 
 " Nurse knew a tremendous lot of things that 
 weren't so, I should imagine," rejoined the 
 man. " You will save yourself much anxiety, 
 sweet, on summer evenings, if you bear in mind 
 that bats are as far as possible from being 
 blind. They are marvellously keen-sighted, 
 and they never blunder, but fly and dodge with 
 an accuracy far beyond that of any bird. 
 Either of those little chaps fluttering around us 
 now could pick a gnat off the tip of your small, 
 delectable nose without so much as grazing 
 you with his wing." 
 
 " Oh ! " said the girl in a tone of relief. 
 " But I don't like them, anyhow. I wish 
 they would go away." 
 
 " Like all the world, they hasten to gratify 
 your slightest wish ! " responded the man, 
 laughing again. For, even at the girl's last 
 words, both Puck and his playmate had swung 
 away and vanished among the tree-tops. 
 
 It was not that they understood Enghsh, or 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK 115 
 
 had received upon their sensitive nerve centres 
 a telepathic message from the girl's aversion. 
 Not at aH. The fact was simply that the 
 little mother had grown tired, from the weight 
 of her babies hanging to her neck, and had 
 flown off to find a safe branch whereon to hide 
 then! for a few moments. 
 
 High up in the dark top of a pine tree, 
 the cup-like hollow of a forked bough received 
 the two young ones, who, at some injunction 
 from their mother, flattened their tiny forms 
 to the bark and clung fast to its roughness. 
 There could be no danger for them here, 
 thought the little mother. So she left them, to 
 rest her wings for a few minutes in unburdened 
 flight, and to sup again on a few more gnats 
 and moths. Puck had watched her deposit 
 her babies on the branch, and now flew off 
 with her light-heartedly to forage above the 
 flower-beds. 
 
 They had not been away for more than five 
 minutes, when the little mother suddenly got 
 it into her head that her babies wanted her. 
 On a swinging upward curve she sped in haste 
 back to the pine-top, and Puck, after a second's 
 hesitation, followed at her tiny heels. 
 
 Now, it chanced that a weasel, his cruel eyes 
 
ii6 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 red with rage and lust of blood, was hunting 
 in the pine tree. He had just lost the trail 
 of a squirrel, which he had been pursuing so 
 closely that he had counted it already his. 
 He had fairly imagined his teeth in the poor 
 chatterer's throat, when, by some miracle of 
 the night — and night among the wUd kindreds 
 is full of miracles — quarry and trail had 
 disappeared. It was in the pine tree it had 
 happened, and the furious hunter was quest- 
 ing all over the tree for the lost scent, deter- 
 mined that his mahgnancy should not be 
 baulked. In his search he ran, sinuous and 
 swift as a snake, out along that high branch 
 in one of whose outer forks the little bat had 
 left her babies. 
 
 Now, Puck o' the Dusk, in aU his short life, 
 had never had a real difference of opinion with 
 anything more formidable than a hawk-moth 
 or a cockchafer. He knew vaguely what an 
 irresistible and terrible monster was that long, 
 dark shape on the branch, yet he did not 
 hesitate. The weasel was astounded to feel 
 a hard wing-tip drawn sharply across his face. 
 With a thin snarl he sprang upward half the 
 length of his body, snapping at his audacious 
 insulter. But his long, white teeth closed on 
 
' With a thin snarl he sprang upward half theUength of his body." 
 
 More Kindred of the Wild] 
 
 117 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK 119 
 
 empty air, and he nearly lost his balance on the 
 branch. As he recovered himself, bursting 
 with fury, he saw behind him, almost within 
 reach, a dark little fluttering shadow appar- 
 ently sprawling on the branch, Hke a wounded 
 night-jar. DoubUng on himself as lithely as 
 an eel, he darted like a jet of flame upon the 
 insolent little shadow. But even as he did so, 
 it was gone ; and a few feet below the branch 
 he saw Puck o' the Dusk flitting leisurely to 
 and fro. His narrow-set eyes blazed hke live 
 coals, and he gnashed his long white fangs at 
 the indignity of having been so flouted by a 
 paltry bat. But while he glared down at his 
 small challenger, the httle mother had safely 
 gathered her droll babies to her neck and 
 sailed off with them through the gloom. For 
 the moment, after such an experience, she 
 had had enough of frivolling. She thought 
 only of getting her babies back into their safe 
 cranny in the roof of the barn, where she could 
 nurse them, and lick their silky fur, and clean 
 the dainty membranes of their dehcate Httle 
 wings by passing them carefully between her 
 lips. 
 
 Left once more to himself. Puck o' the Dusk, 
 perhaps excited and over-daring from his sue- 
 
120 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 cessful adventure with the weasel, promptly 
 fell foul of another novel experience. Close 
 in front of the house he chased a big moth, 
 which was flying with unwonted swiftness. 
 Hard pressed, it flew straight into the dark- 
 ness of a wide-open window. Puck followed 
 audaciously. He caught the fugitive as it 
 bumped up against the ceiling. In the same 
 instant a maid shut the window. Then, with- 
 out noticing the intruder, she went out and 
 shut the door. 
 
 Puck, thinking to go out as easily as he had 
 come in, flew hard against the pale glimmer of 
 the glass. He was a little dazed, and very 
 much astonished. Again, and yet once again, 
 he tried to penetrate the hard, invisible barrier, 
 but not blindly, or in panic violence, as a bird 
 would have done. He kept his head even in 
 this startling and unprecedented emergency. 
 His keen vision, after the first shock of sur- 
 prise, differentiated the glass from the airy 
 space beyond, and he coolly gave up essaying 
 the impossible. Then he devoted himself to a 
 minute examination of every hole and corner 
 in the room ; yet so accurate was he in sight 
 and flight alike, that though the room was 
 full of dainty bibelots and fragile knick-knacks, 
 
PUCK 0' THE DUSK 121 
 
 the beating of his wings disturbed nothing. 
 He went under every piece of furniture, behind 
 every picture, and investigated persistently 
 the screen which closed the fireplace for the 
 summer. In the course of this minute ex- 
 ploration he routed out an unexpected variety 
 of insects, and he was by no means too per- 
 turbed to devour all such dainties that fell 
 to his lot. 
 
 The night passed in this way, with some 
 anxiety, indeed, but without monotony. 
 When dawn came grey through the window, 
 and the colour began to return to the glowing 
 geranium-beds, then Puck relinquished his 
 vain quest, but not in despair, by any means. 
 Day for him was the time to go to bed. Hang- 
 ing himself up comfortably in a fold of the 
 heavy fortihes at one end of the room, he 
 went to sleep with as philosophical a compo- 
 sure as if he had been on his board under the 
 peak of the old barn. 
 
 A few hours later two housemaids came 
 into the room and fell to cleaning it. In the 
 course of this operation they took down the 
 portihes. They shook them in a hap-hazard 
 way, preparatory to folding them up. To 
 their consternation, out fell Puck o' the Dusk. 
 
122 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Their screams at the sight of this monster, 
 nearly four inches long, brought in the man who 
 had been walking in the garden with the girl 
 the night before. He was in riding-breeches 
 and gloves. Puck, only half awake, and very 
 angry at having been so rudely disturbed, 
 sat up on the rug with wings half outspread 
 and tiny black eyes sparkling. The expres- 
 sion of his opinions to the housemaids was as 
 vehement as he could make it, and sounded 
 something like the winding of a very large and 
 very insufficiently oiled dollar watch. 
 
 " Good Heavens, Jane," exclaimed the 
 man, " I thought that you and Grace must 
 have unearthed at least a hippopotamus, from 
 the row you're making ! Do you think that 
 this poor little bat is going to eat you ? " 
 
 He stooped to pick Puck up, but the little 
 fellow sputtered at him shrilly, and snapped 
 at him with such defiance that the man was 
 glad of his thick gloves. The maids tittered. 
 
 " See there, sir ! " said Jane audaciously. 
 " He'd eat us if he could, he's that savage ! " 
 
 " He certainly is a plucky little devil," said 
 the man, as he lifted him gently in his gloved 
 hands and carried him to the window. 
 
 Puck was very wide awake now, and his 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK 123 
 
 watch-winding was shrill with indignation 
 over his imprisonment in the man's hands. 
 At the window the man released him. The 
 glare of f\all daylight dazzled him, but, shutting 
 his eyes to a hair-like slit, almost invisible, he 
 could make out the landscape quite clearly. 
 In an instant he had launched himself, and in 
 the next he was fluttering among the nearest 
 branches. Keeping as far as possible among 
 the trees, he made for the water's edge, and so 
 along the meadows to the old barn. A minute 
 or two later he was hanging himself up, un- 
 ruffled, beside his sleeping comrades in the 
 warm brown gloom of the peak. 
 
 In the ordinary course of events, Puck 
 would now have settled himself to sleep away 
 the rest of the daylight. But this twenty- 
 four hours was destined to be a crowded time 
 for him. On the narrow, topmost rafter, 
 just a few feet below him, he observed his play- 
 mate of the previous evening, the httle mother 
 with her two babies. She had deposited them 
 on the smooth surface of the beam, whUe she 
 herself was occupied with her toilet — a matter 
 which is of as much concern to a bat as it is to 
 the daintiest of cats. With amazing expert- 
 ness she would scratch herself behind the ears 
 
124 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 with the clawed tips of her wing-elbows, and 
 comb the fur on apparently inaccessible por- 
 tions of her body. Then she would take her 
 wing membranes, first one, then the other, 
 and stretch them, examine them, pass them 
 between her teeth, and lick them, till there 
 could be no question as to their immaculate- 
 ness. 
 
 While she was thus occupied, one of the 
 swallows from the mud nests under the eaves 
 darted hastily up into the peak in pursuit of a 
 big purple bee. The desperate insect, just 
 evading its pursuer in the peak, boomed down- 
 wards close over the rafter, almost grazing 
 the baby bats as he passed. The swallow, 
 dashing after him recklessly, more than grazed 
 the little sprawlers. He brushed them so 
 rudely that they were swept clean off the 
 rafter. Untaught as yet to fly, they never- 
 theless spread instinctively their fragile wings, 
 and fell flutteringly, like two dead oak leaves, 
 to the floor below. 
 
 The barn floor, fortunately, was httered thick 
 with the seeds and tips and refuse of last 
 year's hay, so the babies landed softly and 
 were not hurt. But they landed far apart, 
 as two whirling leaves might have done. The 
 
PUCK O' THE DUSK 125 
 
 mother, who at the moment of the accident 
 was fairly enveloped in the folds of her wings, 
 disengaged herself frantically and swooped 
 downwards after them. Then Puck, grown 
 enterprising from his late adventures, came 
 zigzagging down in her wake to see if there 
 was anything he could do. 
 
 There was, and that instantly. The big 
 rat who lived under the barn floor was just 
 coming out of his hole. He thought he had 
 seen something fall, and though he did not 
 know what it was, he came scuttling forward 
 with high hopes. It might, he thought, be a 
 young swallow dropped or crowded out of its 
 nest, and he hked young swallows, for variety. 
 
 Suddenly his attention was distracted by a 
 hght blow on his head. It was a bat, which 
 had apparently almost dropped upon his back. 
 He was not angry — quite the contrary— he 
 was immensely interested. He had never 
 eaten a bat, though he had often wanted to ; 
 and here, seemingly, was his chance, for this 
 bat appeared to be hurt or sick. He jumped 
 up at it. He missed it, to be sure, but not by 
 so very much ; and the bat was still fluttering 
 feebly almost within his reach. Again and 
 again he sprang, his long, white teeth snapping 
 
126 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 together with a horrid dick, but catching 
 nothing, till presently he found himself once 
 more over by the hole in the corner whence he 
 had just emerged. Then, to his disgust, the 
 feebly fluttering shape which had seemed just 
 within his clutch went darting off on strong 
 wings to the roof, while another bat rose 
 whirling from the middle of the floor, with 
 two little ones clinging to her neck. 
 
 Baffled and sullen, the rat crept out into the 
 grass to console himself with'easy grass-hoppers ; 
 while Puck o' the Dusk, swelling with triumph, 
 swung back to his high perch. What with owls 
 and weasels, moths and men and rats, he felt 
 far from his customary drowsiness ; so he set 
 himself to a toilet elaborate and minute, as be- 
 fitted a brown bat of his achievements. 
 
A Harassed Householder 
 
 ALTHOUGH he had never had the advan- 
 tage of reading a bargain sale adver- 
 tisement, the big fur seal needed no exhorta- 
 tion to come early and avoid the rush. This 
 was his second season as a full-grown bull, 
 the responsible freeholder of a patch of naked 
 rock-ledge on the skirts of an island in Bering 
 Sea. 
 
 The preceding season he had been late in 
 coming north ; and so, for all his wrath and 
 his battle prowess, he had fared poorly, as 
 to both location and wives. He had been 
 forced to content himself with a mean and 
 exposed shelf of rock far back from the water, 
 and with a paltry harem of three mild-eyed 
 but more or less dilapidated little mates. 
 These three, captured, after ferocious battles, 
 from two of the neighbouring buUs, had suf- 
 fered much mishandling in the contest over 
 their submissive charms, and their usually 
 
 187 
 
128 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 sleek coats showed a wear and tear that would 
 have daunted the cleverest furrier of the Rue 
 de la Paix. 
 
 Remembering, therefore, all the price he 
 had paid for being late, this bull of the fur 
 seals had early grown restless in the purple 
 southern seas, and turned his face northward 
 betimes. Up along the steep and thundering 
 coasts of California and Oregon, through the 
 tremendous Pacific rollers, he swam stead- 
 fastly, now darting like a fish, now gliding at 
 terrific speed with a sinuous, oily succession 
 of fine curves, as if making of his whole pliant 
 body a mighty screw to propel him through 
 the water. For the most part, intent upon 
 his journey, he swam at some little distance 
 below the surface, thrusting up his whiskered 
 muzzle from time to time to breathe, and 
 catching as he went, in those teeming seas, 
 fish enough to satisfy even his unsleeping 
 appetite for fish. But every now and then he 
 and his feUow-voyagers — for he had the com- 
 pany of other wise bulls on his northward 
 quest — would stop and spend some precious 
 time in basking or lazy play under the seduc- 
 tive spring sun, as if, for the moment, a wave of 
 oblivion had swept over their brains, and they 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 129 
 
 had forgotten the urgency of their pur- 
 pose. 
 
 In the main it was a care-free journey, this 
 migration of the advance-guard of the seal. 
 All full-grown bulls, fierce and agile, their 
 bodies, some six feet or more in length, one 
 mass of lithe and corded muscle, they had 
 few enemies to fear even in those dangerous 
 southern waters. No shark could catch them 
 unless through carelessness of their own ; 
 and with his superior speed and his marvellous 
 suppleness in dodging, a great bull seal was 
 capable of making things more or less un- 
 pleasant for the clumsy shark. He dreaded, 
 however, that lightning-swift and merciless 
 assassin, the sword-fish, flashing up out of the 
 deeps without warning. And he was always 
 keenly on the watch for that black-and-white 
 shape of doom, the dreadful orca, or " killer " 
 whale. The worst enemies of the northward- 
 moving seals, however — those unscrupulous 
 marauders, the poaching pelagic sealers — left 
 him and his fellows severely alone, because his 
 fur, coarse and battle-scarred, was valueless. 
 These rascals were far behind, waiting for the 
 sleek young cows and for the rich-furred two- 
 year-old and three-year-old young bulls — the 
 
130 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 " bachelors," as they are called by the hunters 
 of the seal. 
 
 But though no pirate poachers approached 
 to harass his journey, before he had passed 
 beyond the long stretch of the British Colum- 
 bian coast, the big seal got one serious fright. 
 Somewhere off the Queen Charlotte Islands a 
 Canadian Government cutter, little, but busy 
 and keen as a terrier after rats, steamed in 
 among the herd. The big buU dived deep, 
 straight down into the dim green glimmer, 
 terrified by the darting black bulk and the 
 fiercely churning screw, and the rest of the 
 herd scattered in panic. But not before the 
 Canadian commander had had time to satisfy 
 himself that this was but the advance-guard of 
 old bulls, and that he must seek his quarry, 
 the poaching sealers, further to the south. 
 
 After this, the big seal swerved far to the 
 westward, following the vast sweep of the 
 Alaskan coast. In his growing eagerness, he 
 kept to the very forefront of the vanguard, 
 and so, rounding the tip of Alaska, he passed 
 through the chain of the Aleutian Islands, 
 where they stretch out like stepping-stones 
 toward the neighbour continent, and came into 
 the shallow tides of Bering Sea. Hitherto, 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 131 
 
 his journey had been singularly uneventful ; 
 but just here he ran into an adventure that 
 came near bringing his career to an abrupt, 
 inglorious end. 
 
 In the estuary of a bleak Arctic stream he 
 encountered a vast shoal of salmon heading up 
 for the spawning-beds. It was one of those 
 occasions when the most self-contained of seals 
 might be pardoned for a flurry of excitement. 
 The whole herd went wild. It was the Feast 
 of the Salmon. Through the packed, silvery 
 shoal the great, lithe, black, glistening bodies 
 darted hither and thither, killing, in a sort of 
 delirium, many times more than they could 
 devour, till the paUid, murky flood was stained 
 in wide patches to a watery pink. Here and 
 there a narrow black head, fiercely whiskered, 
 and surmounting a long, massive neck of tre- 
 mendous power, would thrust itself high above 
 the seething waters, gripping a fat, convulsive 
 salmon in its jaws. As if in sheer wantonness 
 of destruction, the shining fish would be bitten 
 clean in two, one mouthful gulped, and the 
 bleeding fragments dropped into the water. 
 Then the riotous fisherman would plunge for a 
 new prey. It was a bad hour for the salmon. 
 Along the nearer shore of the estuary prowled 
 
132 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 certain leisurely white bears, who would plunge 
 into the thronged tide, pick out their prizes, 
 and carry them ashore to be devoured at ease. 
 But the hordes of salmon, urged on by an in- 
 exorable desire, never swerved or halted, and 
 their numbers were so incalculable that not all 
 the assaults of seal and bear combined seemed 
 to diminish them in the least. 
 
 In the exuberance of his play with the sal- 
 mon, the big seal chanced to trespass on the 
 none too amiable repose of a strange-looking 
 sea-creature which was rolling sluggishly from 
 side to side on the muddy bottom. This 
 beast, of a pale, corpse-like colour, and some 
 twelve feet in length, suggested some past 
 mesalliance between a unicorn and a porpoise. 
 From the middle of its huge, blunt snout pro- 
 truded, to a length of fully six feet, a massive, 
 keenly-pointed, curiously- twisted tusk of hard- 
 est ivory. Its cold, little, pig-like eyes re- 
 garded indifferently the myriads of the salmon 
 passing above it, because, for the time, its 
 giant appetite was sated with salmon. 
 
 The water of the estuary, at this point, 
 was not more than ten or twelve feet deep ; 
 and it chanced that the big seal, in one of his 
 reckless plunges, slapped the narwhal rudely 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 133 
 
 across the snout with his hind flippers. Possi- 
 bly the narwhal, at that moment, was suffer- 
 ing from incipient indigestion. His temper 
 was certainly Ught on the trigger. In a 
 sudden fury he darted upwards. The seal, 
 out of the corner of his eye, saw the rise of 
 that pale bulk, though it was almost imper- 
 ceptible in the turbid water. He writhed 
 aside, doubling upon himself hke an eel ; and 
 he was barely in time. That fine lance of 
 ivory missed, indeed, his vitals, but it ploughed 
 a red gash up his side, just behind the fore- 
 flipper. 
 
 With the ferocity of his rush, the narwhal 
 shot his tusk and half his body out of the water. 
 The seal, in a rage at the attack, darted at him 
 as he came down, and slashed him savagely 
 across the pig-hke eye. Then, realizing, per- 
 haps, that his assailant's armour of blubber 
 was too thick for his teeth to do much with, 
 he glided off and was lost among the salmon 
 while the narwhal sank back heavily to his 
 interrupted digestion on the mud. 
 
 It was an almost windless morning, under a 
 pale, low sun, when the big seal came to that 
 particular island of the Pribilov group which 
 he had been holding in his mind's eye all 
 
134 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 through the northward journey. The coast — 
 nay, the whole island — was barren and bleak 
 beyond depiction, but the point where the seal 
 floundered ashore and pre-empted his claim 
 had certain advantages which his kind was 
 quick to appreciate. Not half a mile off shore 
 lay another flat island, long and narrow, which 
 served as a breakwater against the heavy seas 
 of the open. Moreover, in the channel between 
 there were always plenty of fish, and the water 
 came deep right up to the lip of the ledge on 
 ' which he had established himself. 
 
 As he landed, he was followed at once, all 
 along the wide curve of the ledge, by the 
 throngs of his feUow-traveUers. And in- 
 stantly the Polar stillness, which had been 
 breathless as death, was shattered with harsh, 
 barking roars and grunting yells as the new 
 arrivals wrangled savagely over their holdings. 
 
 Here the big buU made himself immediately 
 at home, his roof the sky, his house walls the 
 four winds, his floor a gently-sloping space of 
 rock that not the maddest Arctic storm would 
 be able to j ar . How desirable a holding he had 
 taken up was promptly proved to him. He 
 had not been five minutes in possession before 
 he had to fight for it. Another bull, even 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 135 
 
 bigger than himself, grizzled about the muzzle, 
 and with the welt of an old wound white across 
 his face, flounced up the ledge and flung him- 
 self in fury upon the householder. From the 
 indignant confidence of the attack, it was, 
 perhaps, the previous season's tenant, strong 
 in imagined rights. But, on those wild 
 ledges, no rights hold but those which might 
 can prove. With a roar, the householder 
 elongated and reared aloft his curious, loose- 
 knit frame, and came down upon the intruder 
 with demoralizing force. 
 
 The householder had the advantage of 
 position, being the higher on the slope. His 
 hind flippers, broad, short, and powerful, and 
 turned forward, like the hind limbs of a land 
 quadruped, instead of helplessly backward, 
 like those of the eastern seals, gave him a 
 secure base for his attack. He slashed his 
 opponent mercilessly at the first stroke, and 
 bore him back to the very lip of the ledge. 
 The intruder was bulky and powerful, how- 
 ever, and made good his foothold. And here, 
 for some minutes, the battle hung in doubt. 
 The weU-matched adversaries roared their 
 angry defiance as they fought, while their 
 nearest neighbours clamoured in sympathy. 
 
136 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Their mighty necks, ghstening in the level 
 sunbeams, twisted this way and that, their 
 heads darting almost too swiftly for the eye 
 to foUow, as they slashed at each other's 
 throats and parried the deadly strokes with 
 wide-open j aws. At last that superior fire and 
 energy which had enabled the householder 
 to be first of all the herd to arrive began to 
 overmaster his foe's superior weight. The 
 intruder was suffering heavily, and all at 
 once, either losing his nerve for a moment, 
 or weakened by his wounds, he was overbal- 
 anced and hurled into the water. Leaning 
 from the ledge, and waving his head sinuously, 
 the householder waited for the battle to be re- 
 newed. But the intruder had had enough. 
 For one moment he thrust his head high above 
 the water and eyed his enemy. Then, diving, 
 he swam off in dejection, and took up a place 
 on the exposed outskirts of the settlement. ^ 
 Within the next four-and-twenty hours the 
 householder had four more battles to fight in 
 order to make good his title to his holding. 
 But none of these later contests were equal to 
 the first in severity. Then, fortunately for his 
 
 1 The settlement of the fur seals on their breeding- 
 grounds is called a "rookery." 
 
Wrr 
 
 ' For one moment he thrust his head high above the water and eyed 
 his enemy." 
 
 More Kiyulred of the W^ld] 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 139 
 
 bleeding flanks, life became less strenuous as 
 the rookery settled down. 
 
 Nevertheless, though the big seal now got a 
 chance to rest and recover his breath, the price 
 of his repose was eternal vigilance. Late- 
 comers kept arriving, swimming up to the 
 ledge and threatening to challenge his occu- 
 pancy of the choice location. But, sprawling 
 close to the lip of the rock, his bleeding bulk in 
 plain view, his mighty neck swaying alertly, 
 his big, intelligent eyes agleam with savage 
 watchfulness, he presented so formidable and 
 prepared a front that his would-be challengers 
 usually reconsidered, and swam on to look 
 for an easier venture. If any did try to land, 
 the householder was down upon them before 
 they could gain a footing, and they got away 
 with their gashes as best they might. Then 
 there were his immediate neighbours, two 
 big, aggressive bulls, to guard against. They 
 had secured good locations of their own, but 
 they were always threatening to encroach on 
 the boundaries which he had established for 
 himself. These boundaries were, indeed, per- 
 haps a bit over-ample, but the householder 
 was planning for a large household, to make 
 up for his failure of the previous season. And 
 
140 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 with vehement barking and roaring he warned 
 back every attempt at encroachment. 
 
 A curious part of the situation was that the 
 ceaselessly-harassed householder had now no 
 time to eat. Had he left his post for a moment, 
 he would have found it occupied on his return, 
 and been compelled to fight a doubtful battle 
 for its recapture. Not a dozen paces from 
 his nose there was plenty to eat — fat fish 
 swarming in the icy, green sea — but he could 
 not go and catch them. In this, to be sure, 
 he was no worse off than his fellows and rivals. 
 Every bull who had secured a decent place 
 had to give all his time and attention to the 
 guarding of it. 
 
 It was now about the first of May, and for 
 five or six weeks, through the long, pale glare 
 of the interminable Arctic day, with the low 
 sun swinging around the horizon and hardly 
 more than dipping beneath it, the householder 
 never broke his fast. He hardly dared to sleep, 
 even, lest some audacious young new-comer 
 should steal a march on him. Fortunately, 
 he was fat, from his winter of good feeding 
 and easy living, and the store of firm blubber 
 beneath his hide kept his vital forces well 
 nourished. 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 141 
 
 About the end of the month began to arrive 
 the sleek and amiable hordes of the " half- 
 bulls " and the " bachelors," too young as yet 
 to mate, or even to aspire to such a responsi- 
 bility. With them came a host of the little, 
 mUd-eyed, yearling cows, playful children of 
 the sea. To all these thronging innocents the 
 old bulls paid no attention whatever. They 
 swarmed ashore on the outskirts of the rook- 
 ery, pleased with whatever quarters they could 
 get, and passed their heedless hours — when 
 not engrossed with the business of fishing — in 
 gambolling as joyously as a lot of children just 
 let out from school. 
 
 And then, at last, in the first week of June, 
 came the long-looked-for event for which all 
 this householding and watching and fighting 
 and fasting were but the preparation — the 
 arrival of the full-grown cows. 
 
 They arrived in ever-increasing detach- 
 ments, crowding upon each other's flippers. 
 
 As the cows are full-grown at two years old, 
 and the bulls not tiU the age of seven, and as 
 the females, moreover, are born in greater 
 numbers than the males, they outnumber the 
 adult bulls by ten or twelve to one. Never- 
 theless, there was not a bull in the herd but 
 
142 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 was quite sure there would never be enough to 
 "go around." 
 
 The first two cows to arrive came swimming, 
 one a foot or two behind the other, straight for 
 the ledge of our harassed but triumphant 
 householder, who awaited them with agitated 
 head reaching and darting as far as possible out 
 over the water. The cow of the fur seal is far 
 smaller than her polygamous and domineering 
 lord, soft-eyed and mild-mannered. As the 
 leading swimmer reached the ledge, before she 
 had time to scramble up of her own accord, 
 the householder grabbed her unceremoniously 
 by the scruff of the neck, and helped her ashore 
 with more vigour than tact. That uncom- 
 promising grip of his teeth upon her neck must 
 have been painful, but the little cow seemed 
 to take it as evidence of devotion, for she made 
 no complaint. Her sudden spouse, however, 
 took no time to court, or even to admire, his 
 glistening bride. Thrusting her behind him, 
 he wheeled hke a flash to extend the same 
 gallant attention to her sister-voyager. But 
 he was too late. His energetic neighbour on 
 the right had forestalled him just in time, and 
 successfully dragged off the unreluctant fair to 
 grace his own hearth. 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 143 
 
 Roaring with disappointment and jealousy, 
 the householder floundered over his boundary 
 to reclaim what he counted his own. But, 
 as he did so, a backward glance showed his 
 neighbour on the left coming to steal the bride 
 whom he had already secured. For an in- 
 stant he wavered, in an agony of indecision. 
 But the faithless Uttle cow, making no effort to 
 follow him, seemed shamelessly indifferent to 
 the prospect of a sudden change of lords. So 
 he flounced furiously back to her side, and 
 stood guard above her with gaping jaws ; and 
 the would-be thief, who had already more 
 than once tasted the householder's mettle, had 
 the discretion to back off. 
 
 By this time the cows were arriving in such 
 numbers that every big seal had enough to 
 do in capturing those which came within his 
 reach, without trying to rob his neighbours. 
 The householder, alert and untiring, succeeded, 
 during the next forty-eight hours or so, in 
 grabbing and installing no fewer than a score 
 and half of nuld-eyed little mates, who huddled 
 meekly on the ledge behind him, and watched 
 admiringly his herculean efforts to add to their 
 number. They were not troubled by j ealousy . 
 Most of them, perhaps, were proud to belong to 
 
144 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 a weU-stocked harem, whose numbers attested 
 the fighting powers of their lord. Two, to 
 be sure, did allow themselves to be lured off — 
 while the householder was busy helping new 
 arrivals ashore — ^by an improvident young buU 
 in the rear ranks, who had hitherto been un- 
 able to secure a mate. But, for the most part, 
 there was a something in the grip of the house- 
 holder's jaws on their necks which they could 
 not forget. It proved him a masterful lover, 
 and subdued any impulse to stray. 
 
 For some days the belated companies of 
 the cows kept straggling in, and the house- 
 holder, his good fortune in the way of oppor- 
 tunity never failing him, presently found him- 
 self at the head of a harem of over forty mem- 
 bers. For his great heart and broad ambitions 
 it was none too many, but it made him a centre 
 of bitterest enmity. Even his strenuous neigh- 
 bours on either side of him had no such com- 
 pany on their ledges, and to the rear was a 
 scattered line of young buUs who had come 
 late, and were ever on the look-out for a chance 
 to poach. The householder was so harassed 
 by his honours that he had no time to snatch 
 a wink of sleep ; and as for eating, that was 
 an indulgence he had not allowed himself for 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 145 
 
 so long that he had almost forgotten what it 
 was like. Forty wives — and aU waiting to be 
 stolen by any stronger or more crafty suitor 
 who might come along ! It was something 
 even for the harassed householder to keep them 
 aU counted. He kept floundering vigilantly 
 around the huddled throng ; and if any one, 
 feeling herself neglected or overlooked, tried 
 to slip off and join some forlorn-looking suitor 
 in the back row, she speedily found that she 
 was not so much forgotten as she had thought. 
 She would be grabbed by the neck, shaken into 
 abject penitence, and thrust back into the 
 centre of the harem. All this, of course, was not 
 accomplished without continual skirmishes, 
 as this or that disappointed trespasser would 
 take courage to show fight. But the house- 
 holder was so much too strong and clever a 
 fighter for the inexperienced young bulls of 
 the back line, that such skirmishes were 
 always quickly ended. 
 
 Within a few days of the arrival of the cows, 
 the woolly, little, baby-faced " pups " began 
 to be born. As the births increased, the 
 troubles of the householder began to diminish 
 a little. As soon as a pup was born in his 
 harem, the mother was safe not to stray. But 
 
146 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 trespassers continued to be as dangerous as 
 ever, for those gallant robbers were no shirkers 
 of responsibility, and were always ready to 
 steal mother and pup together. As soon as 
 the young were over their first abject help- 
 lessness, the mothers were permitted to leave 
 the harem, strictly by the front door, in order 
 to catch fish and keep up their supply of milk 
 for the little ones, for the householder knew 
 that no cow would now fail to come back. 
 But for himself there was still neither rest nor 
 food. There was nothing for him to do but 
 stay at home, keep awake, watch the little 
 ones of forty wives, and fight off persistent 
 rivals. It was a wearing existence. He was 
 by this time no longer a sleek and well-fed 
 gallant, but a gaunt hideful of bones adorned 
 with unlovely though honourable scars. All 
 his strength and fire, however, remained to 
 him unimpaired, and no rival challenged him 
 without being made to repent it. 
 
 But one day there came an enemy whom 
 even the householder's prowess could not defy. 
 The seal-hunters arrived at the rookery. They 
 were not those indiscriminate slaughterers, 
 the poachers, but the legitimate hunters, who 
 came to kill with discretion. They did not 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 147 
 
 interfere with the old bulls and their breeding 
 households, though the buUs all roared at 
 them dauntlessly. They invaded the play- 
 grounds of the unmated youth, and, sparing 
 the little females, made awful havoc among 
 the half-bulls and the bachelors, till the once 
 happy playground was hideous^with the blood 
 and the dead. Yet they were careful to spare 
 a good percentage of even the unhappy bache- 
 lors, in order that the profitable tribe of the fur 
 seals might not be kOled out. 
 
 Among the seal-hunters came a thoughtful 
 man, whose purpose was not to kill, but to 
 observe. He did not like the killing. His 
 inquiring nose wrinkled with aversion as he 
 eyed the slaughter for a moment to see just 
 how it was done. Then he turned away in 
 some haste to study the rest of the rookery, to 
 shoot at it with his camera, and to find out how 
 the fur seal conducted itself when more in- 
 terestingly employed than in being killed. 
 Slowly he made his way along behind the 
 rookery, heedless of threats and roars and 
 snapping jaws, and halting at every other step 
 to level his lens and click his shutter. At last, 
 filled with enthusiasm and facts, he came 
 behind the ledge where the war-worn 
 
148 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 householder guarded his harem of forty fair. 
 
 This immense family and its towering 
 guardian caught the observer's eye. Here, 
 indeed, was a household to be made a note of. 
 First he snapped it from a distance. Then 
 he determined to invade its crowded privacy 
 and study its home arrangements. Avoiding, 
 without much heed, the angry bulls of the rear 
 line, with their meagre harems, he made his 
 way fearlessly right in among the shrinking 
 cows and the round-eyed, trusting pups of the 
 householder's family. He had been seeing so 
 many seals killed, and so easily, that he had 
 acquired a mistaken idea of that creature's 
 courage. Ignoring the harsh warning of the 
 householder, he stooped down to examine and 
 fondle one of the pups, which gazed up at him 
 fearlessly with eyes of pathetic depth and 
 softness. 
 
 Now, the householder knew very well what 
 this stranger was — the invincible Man, sub- 
 jugator of all beasts, able to kill instantly and 
 invisibly or with darting flame. But he had 
 no hesitation ; he took no account of risks in 
 defending his hearth. An awkward but 
 dangerous figure, he came lunging valiantly 
 to the attack. 
 
A HARASSED HOUSEHOLDER 149 
 
 Just in the nick of time the man looked up, 
 to see the ragged bulk descending upon him. 
 He leapt wildly, dropping his camera, and 
 escaped the fatal slash of his assailant's jaws. 
 But one great flipper struck him, and he fell 
 headlong, half stunned, over the back of a 
 protesting cow. Fortunately for him, the 
 householder paused to crush the camera, 
 and the man, shaking his head in a half-dazed 
 way, had time to recover himself sufficiently 
 to meet the next floundering assault. The 
 only weapon he carried was a heavy knotted 
 stick, which served him both as walking-stick 
 and club. As he sprang aside, he caught his 
 adversary a stiff blow on the nose — the most 
 vulnerable point of a seal — and the house- 
 holder collapsed Hke a punctured tyre. 
 
 The man looked down with compunction 
 on his fallen foe, picked up the wreck of his 
 camera, patted a pup that would not get out 
 of his way, and withdrew. When he had 
 passed the rear line of buUs, he looked back, 
 and saw, to his infinite satisfaction, that his 
 stroke had been less effective than he had 
 feared. The householder, slowly recovering, 
 was hf ting up his dauntless head, scanning his 
 family to see that none were stolen, and once 
 
150 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 more, though still somewhat faintly, roaring his 
 defiance to all comers. When, a few days 
 later, the satisfied hunters left the island, the 
 householder could not but feel that he himself 
 had been the cause of their departure. As 
 there was no one to dispute his theory, it is 
 not strange that he found it satisfying. 
 
 Some six weeks later, toward the end of 
 July, the pups being by this time strong enough 
 to travel, and the pangs of his prolonged fast 
 having grown unbearable, the householder 
 and all his rivals came suddenly to the con- 
 clusion that it was not worth while striving 
 at such cost to hold their harems together. 
 They remembered that next year they might 
 hope to gather others just as interesting. And 
 aU at once, their fiercest feuds forgotten, 
 they plumped into the water and began hun- 
 grily chasing fish. Presently aU turned their 
 faces southward, and soon the bleak ledges 
 were left solitary once more to confront the 
 storm and cold of the oncoming Arctic night. 
 
Mothers of the North 
 
 IT was in the first full, ardent rush of the 
 Arctic spring. 
 Thrilling to the heat of the long, long days 
 of unobstructed sun, beneath the southward- 
 facing walls of the glaciers, the thin soil cloth- 
 ing the eternal ice burst into green and flower- 
 ing life. In the sunward valleys brooks 
 awoke, with a sudden filming of grass along 
 their borders, a sudden passionate unfolding 
 of starlike blooms, white, yellow, and blue. 
 As if summoned from sleep by the impetuous 
 blossoms, eager to be fertilized, came the 
 small northern butterflies in swarms, with 
 little wasp-like flies and beetles innumerable. 
 Along the inaccessible ledges of the cliffs the 
 auks and gulls, in crowded ranks, screamed 
 and quarrelled over their untidy nests, or 
 fiUed the air with wings as they flocked out 
 over the grey-green, tranquil sea. The world 
 of the north was trying to forget for a little 
 
152 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 the implacable savagery, the deathly cold 
 and dark, of its winter's torment. 
 
 The great, unwieldy, grunting walruses 
 felt it, too, and responded to it — this ardour 
 of the lonely Arctic spring, astray in the 
 wastes. On the ledges of a rocky islet, just 
 off shore, the members of a little herd were 
 sunning themselves. There were two old 
 bulls and four cows with their sprawling 
 lumps of calves. All were in a good humour 
 with each other, lying with heads or fore- 
 flippers flung amicably across each other's 
 grotesque bodies, and grunting, groaning, 
 grumbling in various tones of content as the 
 pungent sunlight tickled their coarse hides. 
 All seemed without a care beneath the sky, 
 except one of the old bulls. He, being on 
 watch, held his great tusked and bewhiskered 
 head high above his wallowing fellows, and 
 kept eyes, ears, and nose alert for the ap- 
 proach of any peril. One of the unshapely, 
 helpless-looking calves, with its mother, lay 
 in a hollow of the rock, perhaps twenty feet 
 back from the water's edge — a snug spot, 
 sheltered from aU winds of north and east. 
 The rest of the herd were grouped so close 
 to the water's edge that from time to time a 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH 153 
 
 lazy, leaden-green swell would come lipping 
 up and splash them. The cubs had a ten- 
 dency to flounder away out of reach of these 
 chill douches ; but their mothers were very 
 resolute about keeping them close to the 
 water. 
 
 Presently the little groups were enlarged 
 by one. Another old bull, who had been 
 foraging at the sea-bottom, grubbing up 
 clams, star-fish, and oysters with his tusks, 
 and crushing them in the massive mill of his 
 grinders, suddenly shot his ferocious-looking 
 head above the surface. For all his gross 
 bulk, in the water he moved with almost 
 the speed and grace of a seal. In a second he 
 was at the rock's edge. Hooking his immense 
 tusks over it, he drew himself up by the force 
 of his mighty neck, flung forward a broad 
 flipper, dragged himself out of the water, and 
 flopped down among his fellows with an explo- 
 sive grunt of satisfaction. 
 
 They were not, it must be confessed, a 
 very attractive company, these uncouth sea- 
 cattle. The adults were from ten to eleven 
 feet in length, round and swollen-looking as 
 hogsheads, quite lacking the adornment of 
 tails, and in colour of a dirty yeUow-brown. 
 
154 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Sparse bristles, scattered over their hides in 
 rusty patches, gave them a disreputable, 
 moth-eaten look. Their short but powerful 
 flippers were ludicrously splayed. They had 
 the upper half of the head small, flat-skulled, 
 and earless ; while the lower half, or muzzle, 
 was enormously developed to support the 
 massive, downward-growing tusks, twelve 
 to fifteen inches in length. This grotesque 
 enlargement of the upper jaw was further 
 emphasized by the bristling growth of long 
 stiff whiskers which decorated it, giving the 
 wearer an air of blustering irascibility. As 
 for the calves, their podgy little forms had 
 the same overblown look as those of their 
 parents, but their clean young hides were not 
 so wrinkled, nor were they anywhere dis- 
 figured by lumps and scars. They were 
 without tusks, of course, but the huge develop- 
 ment of their muzzles, in preparation for the 
 sprouting of the tusks, gave them a truculent 
 air that was ludicrously belied by the mild- 
 ness of their baby eyes. They rolled and 
 snuggled against the mountainous flanks of 
 their mothers, who watched them with vigilant 
 devotion. The calf that lay furthest inland, 
 apart from the rest, was in some pain, and 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH 155 
 
 whimpering. That morning it had got a 
 nasty prod in the shoulder from the horn of 
 a passing narwhal, and the anxious mother 
 was trying to comfort it, gathering it clumsUy 
 but tenderly against her side and coaxing 
 it to nurse. The rest of the herd, for the 
 moment, was utterly content with life ; but 
 the troubled mother was too much engrossed 
 with her little one's complaints to notice how 
 caressing was the spring sun. 
 
 Meanwhile, not far away was another 
 mother who, in spite of the spring', was 
 equally iU-content. Down to the shore of 
 the mainland, behind the island, came prowl- 
 ing a lean white bear with a cub close at her 
 heels. The narrow bay between island and 
 mainland was ftJ.1 of huge ice-cakes swung in 
 by an eddy of the tides. Many of these wave- 
 eaten and muddied floes were piled up on the 
 shore along tide-mark, and as their worn 
 edges softened under the downpour of the 
 sun, they crumbled and fell with small 
 glassy crashes. Hither and thither among 
 them stole the brave mother, hoping to find 
 some dead fish or other edible drift of the 
 sea. She had had bad hunting of late — the 
 shoals of the salmon had been inexplicably 
 
156 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 delaying their appearance on the coast — and 
 she was feehng the pangs of famine. To be 
 sure, she was filling her stomach, after a 
 fashion, with the young shoots of rushes and 
 other green stuff, but this was not the diet 
 which Nature had framed her for. And in 
 her lack of right nourishment she was pour- 
 ing her very life itself into her breasts, in the 
 effort to feed her httle one. He, too, was 
 suffering, so scanty was the supply of mother's 
 milk. Even now, as the great bear stopped 
 to nose a mass of seaweed, the cub crowded 
 under her flank, and began to nurse, whimper- 
 ing with disappointment at the too thin stream 
 he drew. Her fierce eyes filmed, and she 
 turned her head far round in order to lick 
 him tenderly. 
 
 The stranded ice-floes yielded nothing that 
 a bear could eat, and she was ranging on 
 down the shore, disconsolately, when aU 
 at once a waft of air drew in from seaward. 
 It came direct from the island, and it brought 
 the scent of walrus. She lifted her long black- 
 edged muzzle and sniffed sharply, then stood 
 as rigid as one of the ice-cakes, and search- 
 ingly scrutinized the island. The cub, either 
 imitating his mother or obeying some under- 
 
" She lifted her long black-edged muzzle and sniffed sharply."' 
 
 More Kindred of the Wild] 
 
 157 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH 159 
 
 stood signal, stood moveless also. One of 
 the earliest lessons learned by the youngsters 
 of the wild is to keep still. 
 
 There was not a walrus in sight, but the 
 bear's nostrils could not deceive her. She 
 knew the huge sea-beasts were there, on the 
 other side of the island, and she knew they 
 would be very much at ease on such a day as 
 this, basking in the sun. Walruses were not 
 the quarry she would have chosen. The 
 great bulls, courageous and hot-tempered, 
 the powerful cows, dauntless as herself in 
 defence of their young — she knew them for 
 antagonists to be avoided whenever possible. 
 But just now she had no choice. Her cub 
 was not getting food enough. To her there 
 was nothing else in the world so important 
 as that small, troublesome, droll-eyed, hungry 
 cub. 
 
 Keeping herself now well out of sight 
 behind the ice-floes, with the cub close at her 
 heels, she stole down to the edge of the 
 retreating tide. The bay was too crowded 
 with slowly-moving floes to be quite as safe 
 for the cub as she would have had it, but she 
 could not leave him behind. She kept him 
 close at her side as she swam. He was a good 
 
i6o MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 swimmer, diving fearlessly when she dived, 
 his little black nose cutting the grey-green 
 water bravely and swiftly. In everything 
 he imitated her stealth, her speed, her vigil- 
 ance, for he knew there was big game in this 
 hunting. 
 
 The island was a ridge of some elevation, 
 shelving down by ledges to the sea. The 
 white bear knew better than to climb the 
 ridge and try to steal down upon the walruses. 
 She was well aware that they would be 
 keenly on the watch against any approach 
 from the landward side. From that direc- 
 tion came all they feared. When she arrived 
 at the island, she swam along, close under 
 shelter of the shore, till she reached the 
 extremity. Then, behind the shelter of a 
 stranded floe, she drew herself out, at the 
 same time flattening herself to the rock till 
 she seemed a part of it. Every movement 
 the cub copied assiduously. But when she 
 rose upon her haunches, and laid her narrow 
 head in a cleft of the ice-floe to peer over, he 
 kept himself in the background and watched 
 her with his head cocked anxiously to one 
 side. 
 
 The walruses were in full view, not fifty 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH i6r 
 
 yards away. For all the pangs of her hunger, 
 the mother bear never stirred, but remained 
 for long minutes watching them, studying the 
 approaches, whUe the scent of them came on 
 the light breeze to her nostrils. She saw that 
 the herd itself was inaccessible, being well 
 guarded and close to the water. If she should 
 try to rush them, they would escape at the first 
 alarm ; or if she should succeed in catching 
 one of the cubs in the water, she would be 
 overwhelmed in a moment — caught by those 
 mighty tusks, dragged to the bottom, drowned 
 and crushed shapeless. But with gleaming 
 eyes she noted the cow and calf lying further 
 up the slope. Here was her chance — a danger- 
 ous one enough, but still a chance. She 
 dropped down at last to all fours, crouched 
 flat, and began worming her way upward 
 among the rocks, making a covert of the 
 smallest hummock or projection. The cub 
 still followed her. 
 
 It was miraculous how small the great 
 white beast managed to make herself as she 
 slowly crept up upon her quarry. Her 
 • movements were as noiseless as a cat's. They 
 had need to be, indeed, for the hearing of the 
 walrus is keen. There was not a sound upon 
 
i62 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 the air but the heavy breathings and grunt- 
 ings of the herd, and the occasional hght 
 tinkle and crash of crumbhng ice. 
 
 At a distance of not more than twenty paces 
 from the prey, the old bear stopped and 
 gave a quick backward glance at her cub. 
 Instantly the latter stopped also, and crouched 
 warily behind a rock. Then his mother crept 
 on alone. She knew that he was quite agile 
 enough to avoid the floundering rush of any 
 walrus, but with him she would take no 
 risks. 
 
 Suddenly, as if some premonition of peril 
 had smitten her, the mother walrus lifted her 
 head and stared about her anxiously. There 
 was no danger in sight, but she had grown 
 uneasy. She lowered her head against her 
 calf's plump flank, and started to push him 
 down the slope toward the rest of the 
 herd. 
 
 Not a dozen feet away, an enormous form, 
 white and terrible, arose as if by magic out 
 of the bare rocks. A bellow of warning came 
 from the vigilant old bull down below. But 
 in the same instant that white mass fell upon 
 the cringing calf, and smashed its neck before 
 it knew what was happening. 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH 163 
 
 With a roar the mother walrus reared her- 
 self and launched her huge bulk straight for- 
 ward upon the enemy. She was swift in 
 her attack — amazingly so — but the white 
 bear was swifter. With astonishing strength 
 and deftness, even in the moment of deliver- 
 ing that fatal blow, she had pushed the body 
 of her prey aside, several feet up the slope. 
 At the same time, bending her long back like 
 a bow, she^succeeded in evading the full force 
 of the mother's assault, which otherwise 
 would have pinned her down and crushed 
 her. She caught, however, upon one haunch, 
 a glancing blow from those descending tusks, 
 which came down like pile-drivers, and a long 
 red mark leapt into view upon her white fur. 
 The next moment she had dragged the prey 
 beyond reach of the frantic mother's next 
 plunging charge. 
 
 The rocky slope was now in an uproar. 
 The other cows had instantly rolled their 
 startled young into the sea and were tumb- 
 ling in after them with terrific splashing. The 
 three bulls, grunting furiously, were flounder- 
 ing in great loose plunges up the slope, eager 
 to get into the fray. The bereaved mother 
 was gasping and snorting with her prodigious 
 
i64 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 eJEforts, as she hurled herself in huge sprawling 
 lunges after the slayer of her young. So 
 agile was she proving herself, indeed, that the 
 bear had enough to do in keeping out of her 
 reach, while half hfting, half dragging the 
 prize up the incline. 
 
 At last the body of the calf caught in a 
 crevice, and the bear had to pause to wrench 
 it free. It was for a moment only, but that 
 moment came very near being her last. She 
 felt rather than saw the impending mass of 
 the cow as it reared itself above her. Like a 
 spring suddenly loosed, she bounded aside, 
 and those two straight tusks came down, just 
 where she had stood, with the force of a ton 
 of bone and muscle behind them. 
 
 Wheehng in a flash to follow up her advan- 
 tage, the desperate cow reared again. But 
 this time she was caught at a disadvantage. 
 Her far more intelligent adversary had slipped 
 around behind her, and now, as she reared, 
 struck her a tremendous buffet on the side of 
 the neck. Caught off her balance, the cow 
 rolled down the slope, turning clean over 
 before she could recover her footing. The 
 three buUs, in the midst of their floundering 
 charge up the hill, checked themselves for a 
 
MOTHERS OF THE NORTH 165 
 
 moment to see how she had fared. And in 
 that moment the bear succeeded in dragging 
 her prize up a steep where the walruses could 
 not hope to follow. A few yards more, and 
 she had gained a spacious ledge some twenty 
 feet above the raging walruses. A second or 
 two later, in answer to her summons, the 
 cub joined her there, scrambling nimbly over 
 the rocks at a safe distance from the 
 foe. 
 
 Realizing now that the marauder had quite 
 escaped their vengeance, the three bulls at 
 length turned away, and went floundering 
 and snorting back to the sea. The mother, 
 however, inconsolable in her rage and grief, 
 kept rearing herself against the face of the 
 rock, clawing at it impotently with her great 
 flippers, and striking it with her tusks tUl it 
 seemed as if they must give way beneath the 
 blows. Again and again she feU back, only 
 to renew her futile and pathetic efforts the 
 moment she could recover her breath. And 
 from time to time the old bear, nursing the 
 cub, would glance down upon her with placid 
 unconcern. At last, coming in some sort to 
 her senses, the unhappy cow turned away and 
 crawled heavily, with a slow, jerky motion, 
 
i66 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 down the slope. Slowly, and with a mighty 
 splash, she launched herself into the sea, and 
 swam off to join the rest of the herd a mile 
 out from shore. 
 
when the Colonel came to Gallagher's 
 
 THE gang at Gallagher's Camp was a 
 small one — eight " hands " only, be- 
 sides the boss and the cook. 
 
 It was a remote and restricted timber area 
 which they were chopping over — the little 
 valley where the wild Ottanoonsis stream 
 takes its rise in a pond which the lumbermen, 
 inscrutably, have named Two Lakes. On 
 this day, the day before Christmas, there had 
 been grumbUng in the camp, which big Tim 
 Gallagher, the good-humoured boss, could 
 not pacify ; which even Jimmy Dillihunt, 
 the resourceful cook, covild not charm away, 
 with all his eloquent depictions of the plum- 
 pudding he would evolve for them on the 
 morrow, rich with raisins and reeking with 
 hot, spiced sauce. 
 
 What the boys wanted was fresh meat. 
 Their souls were sick of the routine of salt 
 pork, salt beef, salt pork. They had counted 
 on goose, and plenty of it, for Christmas. 
 
 167 
 
i68 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 If not goose, then fresh roast beef, red with 
 juice, and brown gravy so abundant that 
 their potatoes would fatly swim in it. 
 
 And now it was going to be pork ! 
 
 There was apparently no escape from it. 
 Little Pat Nolan voiced the sentiments of the 
 gang when he growled — 
 
 " 'Tain't me religious scruples 'at makes 
 me hate the pig, but bekase Oi've et 'im till 
 I squeal in me slape ! " 
 
 The trouble had arisen through no fault 
 of the boss's, nor yet of Jimmy Dillihunt's. 
 An utterly unprecedented snowfall, storm on 
 storm, bhzzard upon bhzzard, had heaped 
 the long forest trail to such a depth that no 
 fresh supphes could be got in from the far-off 
 settlements. Just when such supplies — 
 those fresh meats and vegetables which 
 guard the health and temper of the lumber 
 camps — might be expected to arrive, no one 
 could foretell. 
 
 To make matters worse, the big lake trout 
 which had formerly swarmed in Two Lakes 
 Pond had been cleaned out the previous 
 season by a band of dynamite poachers. 
 And, on the top of aU this, the moose and 
 caribou were apparently absorbed in affairs 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 169 
 
 which kept them somewhere else. For the 
 past four or five days there had been always 
 two of the men off on the anxious hunt for 
 caribou or moose, or for the buried den of 
 some winter-sleeping bear. But they had 
 bagged not so much as one lean rabbit. 
 
 This afternoon aU hands had knocked off 
 early, the more properly to observe Christmas 
 Eve, and the more comfortably to indulge 
 their righteous growl. Gathered about the 
 glowing stove, or reclining luxuriously in 
 their bunks, they could devote their best wits 
 to nagging the boss, Tim Gallagher ; or to the 
 baiting of busy and bothered Jimmy DiUihunt. 
 
 This latter occupation was some reUef to 
 their feelings. It was a real diversion to see 
 Jimmy get excited over his breadmaking, 
 till he would hft a flour-dabbed face and heap 
 gross insult on their ancestry, or, with both 
 dough-filled fists clenched above his head, 
 jump up and down and challenge each tor- 
 mentor to bloody combat. As Jimmy was 
 not only a first-class fighter, but a super-first- 
 class cook, these combats were always staved 
 off by eleventh-hour apologies, for such a 
 cook could not be allowed to run any risk of 
 damage. 
 
170 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 The boss, on his part, never got angry, for 
 two very good reasons. In the first place, he 
 was indulgent, and hked the " b'ys " to have 
 their " little fun," even at his expense ; in 
 the second place, no one wanted him to get 
 angry. There was a conviction, widespread 
 and deep-rooted, that if Tim Gallagher should 
 really lose his temper it woiild be most un- 
 pleasant for some one, and that some one 
 would not be Tim. 
 
 So whenever (which was not often) the 
 boys' nagging began to bore him, the broad, 
 weather-beaten, craggy face of the boss 
 would grow serious ; and forthwith even the 
 caustic wit of Long Eph Babcock, the logger 
 from Androscoggin, would discreetly divest 
 itself of aU its sting. No matter how Tim 
 Gallagher's authority might seem to totter, 
 that he should merely look serious was enough 
 to re-estabUsh it promptly. 
 
 This afternoon of Christmas Eve, though 
 the men had returned to camp to grumble, 
 they presently found that even grumbling 
 and Jimmy-baiting had lost their savour. 
 Long Eph and Evan Morgan, the hunters of 
 the day, had come back empty-handed. And 
 every one dropped into a melancholy. They 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 171 
 
 fell to talking of what they'd like to have, if 
 Tim Gallagher hadn't played them so low 
 down, and if they had a cook that could tell 
 his head from a dough-ball. 
 
 " To h-U with yer puddin's, Jimmy ! " 
 said Long Eph, mindfiil of the fact that 
 Jimmy DiUihunt was of French extraction. 
 " Give us some of yer ' patty dee foy grass,' 
 an' a ' ragowt ' o' frogs." 
 
 " It's a swat in the gob ye'll git ! " retorted 
 Jimmy concisely, in Enghsh that was perfectly 
 free from taint of foreign accent. 
 
 " I mind me," murmured Pat Nolan, in a 
 tone of wistful reminiscence, " av a bUed 
 turkey stuffed wid inyuns an' eysters, what 
 we had oncet down to Flaherty's, in Frederic- 
 ton. I'm thinkin' I'U niver taste the Joike 
 ag'in." 
 
 At this picture every one groaned with the 
 agonies of Tantalus. And even the boss 
 growled — 
 
 " Oh, cut it out, Pat ! " 
 
 " Boys," droned Evan Morgan, with a rapt 
 look in his eyes, such as his Welsh ancestors 
 may have worn when they hung listening to 
 the harp beneath the towers of Harlech — 
 " boys, have ye ever, any of youse, et a good, 
 
172 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 juicy b'ar-steak — a b'ar that's fatted up on 
 blueberries ? " 
 
 " Hain't I, jest ? " snarled Sam Oulton from 
 his bunk, in a voice rendered vicious by the 
 torments of memory. 
 
 " Well, be good, Sammy ! " drawled the 
 long Androscogginer. " An' hang up yer 
 little sock to-night; If it ain't too dirty, 
 maybe Sandy Claws'U come along an' drop 
 a bit o' b'ar into it fer ye." 
 
 The huge bulk of the boss, lounging in- 
 differently along a bench behind the stove, 
 suddenly sat bolt upright. Gallagher had a 
 quick ear, and he was not listening to the 
 chaff of his men. 
 
 " Hark to that, b'ys ! " said he. " Some- 
 body comin' ! " 
 
 A heavy step, but shuffling and vague, 
 crunched the snow just outside the door. 
 
 It was unheard of that a single visitor, a 
 lone footfarer, should find his way at this 
 season to so remote and isolated a camp as 
 Gallagher's. The lumbermen are, for the 
 most part, superstitious. They thought in- 
 stantly of " loup-garous," or of the dreadful 
 " Walker-of-the-Snow." The skin crept on 
 their rough cheeks ; the camp feU dead silent. 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 173 
 
 But Eph Babcock, the Maine man, was 
 chiefly curious. Not without superstition, 
 he was nevertheless ready to welcome Beelze- 
 bub himself, as a diversion. He strode to 
 the door. Pat Nolan had it on his lips to 
 cry " Go aisy ! " but restrained himself. 
 
 Eph flung wide the door. 
 
 The next moment he jumped back with a 
 startled oath, and ran for his gun, which 
 stood against his bunk, just behind where 
 the boss was sitting. 
 
 Straight forward into the room, blinking 
 in the lamphght, and undaunted by the array 
 of human faces, came shambling an immense 
 black bear. 
 
 Reaching the end of the long camp-table, 
 the astounding visitor rose upon his hind- 
 quarters, and stood there, a shape as tower- 
 ing as Tim Gallagher himself, with his huge 
 furry paws folded demurely over his vast 
 breast. He peered about him deprecatingly, 
 then began sniffing as loud as a donkey-engine, 
 as his nostrils caught a number of mysterious 
 but altogether delectable aromas on the 
 steamy air. 
 
 Jimmy DiUihunt had snatched up his carv- 
 ing-knife, and whisked nimbly around behind 
 
174 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 his oven. He felt that cooks were precious. 
 The rest of the hands — not frightened, of 
 course not, but embarrassed by the sudden 
 appearance of a perfect stranger in their 
 midst ! — ^had more or less effaced themselves 
 for the moment, by sHpping modestly into 
 their bunks. All but Evan Morgan. His 
 bunk was not handy, so he stood up, very 
 erect and respectful and unobtrusive, in the 
 nearest corner — i.e., the corner nearest to 
 him, not to the bear. The axes were aU out- 
 side. And the one other gun besides Eph 
 Babcock's stood beside the door, immediately 
 behind the bear. Evan Morgan eyed it 
 wistfuUy, but it looked very far away to him. 
 Only the boss seemed unperturbed. He kept 
 his seat, and coolly studied the visitor. 
 
 For about ten seconds the bear stood there 
 motionless, looking bigger than an elephant 
 to that circle of excited eyes. The silence 
 was so tense that the rustle of a mouse in the 
 roof sounded startlingly loud. For a moment 
 the bear looked puzzled. Then his eyes fell 
 upon a big tin basin, close by him on the 
 table. The basin had been full, two minutes 
 earlier, of smoking and molasses-drenched 
 baked beans, which Jimmy Dillihunt had 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 175 
 
 just emptied into another receptacle. A 
 seductive savour, together with several beans, 
 still clung to its sticky interior. 
 
 Eagerly, yet with a certain diffidence, the 
 bear stretched forth a mighty paw, drew the 
 basin towards him, and began hungrily Uck- 
 ing the inside, making a most unmannerly 
 noise about it. Eph Babcock, by this time, 
 had reached his gun, swung round, and raised 
 it to his shoulder. But before he could pull 
 the trigger a weighty hand feU upon his arm. 
 
 " Stop ! Wait ! " commanded the boss, in 
 low but very positive tones. He felt that 
 the confined space of the room would be a 
 bad place for a life-and-death mix up. 
 
 Babcock stopped and waited, though he 
 thought that was a fool thing for the boss to 
 say. He lowered the gun, glanced into the 
 breech, and grinned sheepishly. 
 
 " 'Tain't loaded, anyhow ! " he muttered, 
 as if apologizing, but whether to the bear or 
 the boss he did not say. 
 
 " This ain't no time to risk us losin' that 
 nice, fat, juicy b'ar-steak Evan was talkin' 
 about, Tim ! " protested the rasping voice 
 of Sam Oulton from the retirement of his 
 bunk. But a discreetly muffled groan went 
 
176 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 up from the range of bunks as all realized the 
 predicament of Eph Babcock. He had no 
 cartridges. And every one could see where 
 the cartridges were. The two belts, well 
 filled, were hanging on a peg by the door. 
 
 To Oulton's protest the boss made no 
 reply. He was evidently too interested in 
 the bear to pay any attention to Sam. Most 
 of the fellows in their bunks were just burst- 
 ing with suggestions as to how some other 
 fellow might get those cartridges, and pass 
 them back to Eph Babcock. But none of 
 these suggestions, no doubt excellent, were 
 ever advanced ; for just at this point the 
 conduct of the visitor became so remarkable 
 that every one forgot what he had intended 
 to say. 
 
 Having licked the basin clean, the bear 
 looked up and whined. It was plain that he 
 liked beans, and wanted more. He seemed 
 to have simple, homely tastes, and several of 
 the watchers in the bunks drew long breaths 
 of relief. 
 
 The bear shuffled uneasily from one great 
 foot to the other ; and then, clutching up the 
 basin in both f orepaws, he turned and marched 
 straight over toward Jimmy Dillihunt with 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 177 
 
 it. It was a touching appeal, but, as for 
 Jimmy, he did not seem to understand it at 
 all. Brandishing his carving-knife in frantic 
 protest against being thus singled out from 
 his fellows, he darted from behind the oven, 
 and with one flying leap gained the companion- 
 ship of Evan Morgan in the corner. Evan, who 
 was beginning to recover his self-possession, 
 grunted unsympathetically : " What's yer 
 hurry, Jimmy ? " But Jimmy vouchsafed 
 no reply. 
 
 Disappointed at the sudden departure of 
 one from whom he had apparently expected 
 so much, the bear dropped his all-too-empty 
 basin on the stove. The loud clatter startled 
 him, and he side-stepped nimbly with a hop, 
 like a girl who has just been about to step 
 into a puddle. At the same moment he 
 caugjit sight of the big pot of beans on the 
 front of the stove, where Jimmy had put 
 them to get heated up. How good they 
 smelt ! With a windy woof of satisfaction he 
 grabbed a mouthful. 
 
 Npw the beans, exemplary vegetables that 
 they were, had been attending to business. 
 They had been getting heated up. The bear 
 was surprised and pained to find how hot 
 
178 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 they were. Shutting his eyes tight, and work- 
 ing his jaws very fast, he tried to hold on to 
 them. But they were too much for him. 
 With a loud wah, he spat them out upon the 
 floor ; and then, plaintively rubbing his nose, 
 first with one great paw and then the other, 
 he cast a piteous look around the room. 
 That look caught Pat Nolan's eye. To the 
 warmhearted Uttle Irishman it seemed full 
 of reproach. 
 
 " Sure, an' it wasn't me ez done it, me 
 bh'y ! " murmured Pat, in a tone of tender 
 consideration. " It was a low-down thrick 
 o' Jimmy's. He'd ought ter 'ave wharned 
 ye in time." 
 
 Something in Pat's voice seemed to suggest 
 to the bear that here he might find that sym- 
 pathy which, so far, had been conspicuously 
 lacking in his reception. Doubtfully, but 
 not without hope, he waddled slowly across 
 the room toward Nolan's bunk. 
 
 " Didn't I tell ye it wasn't me ! " protested 
 Nolan passionately. " Mother av Moses, can't 
 some of yez bh'ys do somethin' to divart his 
 attention ? " 
 
 " Fire me up that gun, Eph ! " snapped 
 Sam Oulton, who had been rummaging frantic- 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 179 
 
 ally at the back of his bunk. " I've found 
 some ca'tridges." 
 
 The boss was about to interfere, and Evan 
 Morgan also, who knew more about bears 
 than the rest of the lumbermen, but Eph 
 Babcock had already handed up the gun, 
 and desperate hands were passing it along 
 to Oulton's bunk. But the bear had caught 
 sight of it, and lunged forward swiftly amid 
 a chorus of startled oaths. Just as the gun 
 arrived at Oulton's bunk, and Oulton reached 
 out to grab it, the bear arrived also. He was 
 quicker than Oulton. He shot out a huge 
 black paw and snatched the gun. Oulton 
 vanished back into his bunk like a mud- turtle's 
 head into its shell. The bear, with an air 
 of triumph, slanted the gun over his shoulder, 
 and fell to solemnly marking time ! 
 
 " Good thing ye didn't have time to git 
 her loaded up, Sammy ! " piped the shrill 
 falsetto of Shorty Johnson, from the bunk 
 nearest the door. " The Colonel 'd 'ave 
 cleaned out the camp with it." 
 
 The boss and Evan Morgan — and also Uttle 
 Pat Nolan, who had begun to reaUze that 
 there was something unusual about this bear — 
 permitted themselves to laugh. But the rest 
 
i8o MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 looked with added consternation at this amaz- 
 ing performance of their terrible visitor. It 
 was to them merely proof of a supernatural, 
 and therefore, of course, malign, intelligence. 
 They would not have been surprised to see 
 him stride to the door, take down the cartridge- 
 belt, and load up the weapon which he carried 
 so handily on his shoulder. But as he con- 
 tinued to mark time, with his back to the 
 door, and some distance from it, they began 
 to recover their wits. Sam Oulton, in parti- 
 cular, again rose to the emergency. Not 
 observing the grins of the boss and Evan 
 Morgan, he stuck out his head once more, and 
 cried — 
 
 " Now, Jimmy ! Now's yer chance ! 
 Jump, man, an' set the pot o' beans outside 
 in the snow. He'll go arter it. Then we kin 
 kill him 'thout messin' up the camp." 
 
 But Jimmy was not anxious to step into 
 the breach, even though the beans did seem 
 to belong in his department. 
 
 " You go an' set the pot out. Shorty," he 
 suggested, from behind the boss. " You're 
 nearest." 
 
 " Be aisy there, now, Sammy," interrupted 
 Pat Nolan. " What for would ye be wantin' 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME i8i 
 
 to kill a friendly baste like that, now ? See 
 how enter tainin' he's tryin' to be." 
 
 " Entertainin' to h-U ! Thar's fresh meat 
 on 'im to do us a month ! " snarled Sam. 
 
 From more than one of the bunks came 
 murmurs of protest against Oulton's blood- 
 thirsty utterance, so suddenly does sentiment 
 veer in the camps. And from Evan Morgan 
 came a two-edged retort. 
 
 " Can't ye never think o' nawthin' but that 
 
 ■ belly of yourn ? " he 
 
 demanded. 
 
 Sam Oulton was getting sore. 
 
 " What you fellers wants is nur sin' -bottles ! " 
 he sneered. " Ef this 'ere camp's growed to 
 
 be a d ^n kindergarten, I reckon I'U hev to 
 
 kill the critter all by meself ! " And he 
 began to emerge, not too briskly, from the 
 seclusion of the bunk. 
 
 At this point, the boss, who had now sized 
 up the situation fully, thought it time to 
 intervene. The bear, with the gun across 
 his shoulder, was still ponderously marking 
 time. But he looked as if he were waiting 
 for something. 
 
 " March ! " said the boss, in a sharp voice. 
 
 Instantly the bear marched forward, with 
 
i82 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 awkward but solemn strides, straight down 
 the room, toward the group formed by the 
 boss, Evan Morgan, Eph Babcock, and 
 Jimmy DiUihunt. The boss awaited him 
 calmly, as did Evan. But Eph and Jimmy 
 began to sidle away nervously around the 
 table. 
 
 " Halt ! " commanded the boss — before the 
 bear got too near. 
 
 The bear halted. And every one drew a 
 long breath. 
 
 " Now, Sammy," began the boss, in oracu- 
 lar tones, " you stow that talk o' yourn 
 about killin' ! Ain't ye got no eyes in yer 
 head ? He's a tame bear, he is. An' right 
 glad to be back amongst friends after loafin' 
 round them lonesome winter woods. Watch 
 'im now ! It's a right smart sojer he is. 
 'Tenshun ! " 
 
 At the sudden sharp word of command the 
 bear came to attention. But he tried to do 
 it too quickly. The gun slipped from his big, 
 furry paw and clattered to the floor. He 
 ducked nervously and shut his eyes tight, as 
 if expecting a blow. 
 
 Clearly Tim Gallagher was right. It was 
 a trained bear that had come to claim their 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 183 
 
 hospitality. Pleased as children, the men 
 began dropping from their bunks with varied 
 comments. 
 
 " The Colonel's aU right ! Don't swat 'im 
 fer droppin' his gun, Tim ! " cried Shorty 
 Johnson, slipping down the other side of the 
 table. 
 
 " Mebbe, Sammy 'Id like to try a wrastle 
 with 'im ! " suggested Eph Babcock. " Make 
 an interestin' show fer Christmas Eve." 
 
 Oulton crawled back sourly into the depths 
 of his bunk, and bit off an extra chew of black- 
 jack to help him bridle his tongue. He per- 
 ceived himself to be in a very chilly minority. 
 
 Jimmy DiUihunt, meanwhile, suddenly 
 repentant of his suspicions, had slipped into 
 his den. Now he came forward boldly, 
 bearing in his hand a long generous strip of 
 smoked bacon-rind. The bear smelled it 
 and opened his eyes. He began to realize 
 that he was not going to be struck for drop- 
 ping his gun. He gazed at the tit-bit, then 
 at Jimmy's dark face, and stretched out a 
 hopeful, but diffident, paw. But as Jimmy 
 made no response to this appeal, the bear 
 seemed to conclude that he must do some- 
 thing to earn the prize — something difficult 
 
i84 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 and distinguished. With a whimper he sank 
 down, put his nose between his legs, slowly 
 and gruntingly heaved up his vast hind- 
 quarters, and stood fairly and squarely on 
 his head. For several seconds he balanced 
 himself there ; and then, slowly and grunt- 
 ingly again, he came down, resumed his up- 
 right attitude, and turned coaxingly to 
 Jimmy. 
 
 The camp fairly yelled with dehght. 
 
 " Give it to him, Jimmy ! " " Ye couldn't 
 'a' done better yerself ! " " He's arned it, 
 sure ! " " Look smart, Jimmy, er he'll think 
 ye're cheatin', an' swat ye ! " " Good old 
 Colonel ! " came the shouts of approval from 
 every one but Sam Oulton. 
 
 Jimmy held out the bacon-rind, and the 
 bear took it delicately with his great, armed 
 paw. 
 
 " Light ez a lady's little hand ! " cried Pat 
 Nolan, in his enthusiasm. 
 
 From this point on the evening resolved 
 itself into a species of reception. Gallagher's 
 Camp, in fact, was giving an At Home to 
 the Colonel, for Shorty Johnson's epithet 
 had hit and stuck. The Colonel was a bear of 
 vast and varied accomplishments, and, withal. 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 185 
 
 of a simple faith in humanity. His childlike 
 confidence in every one's goodwill touched 
 the big-hearted and quickly sentimental lum- 
 bermen till they were as extravagant over 
 him as a bunch of children with a baby. It 
 became a reproach to Eph Babcock that 
 in the first moment of undiscriminating sur- 
 prise he had run for his gun. 
 
 " Eph," said Pat Nolan, " had ye har-rmed 
 a hair o' his inganious and confidin' head, 
 I'd 'uv been under the painful necessity o' 
 rippin' out yer gizzard wid me own fair hand." 
 
 " An' I allow 'twould 'a' been no more than 
 I deserved, Paddy," drawled the Androscog- 
 giner amiably. Every one was hilarious but 
 Oulton. He, injured and scornful, maintained 
 a superior silence throughout the evening ; 
 and he would hardly deign to glance at the 
 bear's most entertaining feats. But the whole 
 camp knew he was interested, aU the same. 
 
 It was a great night that for Gallagher's 
 Camp. The Colonel was the first to tire of the 
 excitement. This, as every one allowed, was 
 but natural, he having been the whole show. 
 Now, fuU fed and happy, he wanted to go to 
 sleep, a fact which he manifested by poking 
 around in the corners for a place to he down. 
 
i86 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 On the thick fur of his neck was a worn spot 
 showing where a collar had once been. With 
 a bit of heavy harness-strap the boss made 
 him a new one, and led him, unresisting and 
 bland, to the long walled shed which served 
 the camp as a smithy. A big armful of straw 
 was brought from the barn, and the Colonel, 
 eagerly clawing it about him, settled himself 
 down with the air of the prodigal who has 
 got home, and is glad of it. 
 
 On the following day the boss prudently 
 decreed that the Colonel should not be al- 
 lowed in the house till dinner-time. His deep 
 design was thereby to preserve a certain 
 freshness of interest for the festivity, that the 
 men might be the more diverted, and the 
 less likely to grumble over the absence of 
 fresh meat. Throughout the morning, as 
 usual on Sundays and holidays, the men 
 busied themselves lazily about the camp, 
 washing, mending, smoking, whittling within 
 doors, or skylarking outside in the snow. 
 
 When the Colonel was let out, just after 
 breakfast, there was none of this skylarking 
 going on, or he would no doubt have stayed 
 at home to play with his new friends. As it 
 was, finding himself denied admittance to the 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 187 
 
 house, he carefully explored the premises, 
 alarmed the horses by sniffing loudly at the 
 stable-door, and then lumbered off into the 
 woods. 
 
 " He'll be back all right afore long," said 
 Gallagher. " The Colonel knows a good 
 thing when he's stumbled on to it." 
 
 And Gallagher was right. He understood 
 men and Colonels. Along about half-past 
 ten in the morning, as Eph Babcock and 
 Shorty Johnson were " wrastling " just out- 
 side the camp door, they caught sight of the 
 bear emerging from the woods at the far side 
 of the clearing. There was nothing singular 
 about that, but there was something so singu- 
 lar about his movements that the two panting 
 combatants broke grip by simultaneous con- 
 sent, and stood gaping. Their exclamations 
 brought out the whole camp to see what was 
 up. 
 
 " 'Pears to be havin' heaps o' fun with him- 
 self," droned Evan Morgan from the door- 
 sill. 
 
 " 'Tain't with himself, exactly," corrected 
 the boss. 
 
 " No, I'll be gol-durned if 'tain't a big 
 porkypine he's got thar," drawled Babcock. 
 
i88 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 " An' it's a-chasin' him, begorr' ! " cried 
 Pat Nolan in amazement. 
 
 Which was true enough, in a sense. 
 
 The Colonel was prancing and cavorting 
 ludicrously from side to side, like a gigantic 
 but very youthful puppy, before the indignant 
 porcupine, which came on steadily, with every 
 quill bristling, till he looked as big as a bushel- 
 basket. The Colonel was backing toward the 
 camp, as if he wanted his friends to share his 
 new plaything, this strange, ill-tempered little 
 beast which he had come across in the woods. 
 
 "He'll go gittin' himself stuck full o' 
 quills," said Shorty Johnson ; " an' ye'U have 
 one h-U of a job gittin' 'em out, Tim. I'm 
 glad he's your b'ar, not mine." 
 
 Sam Oulton looked as if the prospect thus 
 opened up were not unpleasing to him. 
 
 " Don't you fret, Shorty," retorted the 
 boss. " That bear ain't nobody's fool. He 
 knows a thing or two about porkypines." 
 
 As a matter of fact, the Colonel was taking 
 good care not to go too near those dangerous 
 quills. He would reach out first one paw, 
 playfully and teasingly, then the other, and 
 pat at the angry little animal, but he knew 
 better than to touch it. 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 189 
 
 As for the porcupine, it was evidently in a 
 towering rage with its tormentor. A porcu- 
 pine is not only very fearless, it is also very 
 stupid ; and when it makes up what stands 
 for its mind to go in any particular direction, 
 only death, or something to eat, can divert 
 it. 
 
 In the present case this porcupine had made 
 up its mind to go in the direction of the 
 Colonel, hoping, no doubt, in the face of all 
 appearances, to overtake him and fill him 
 full of quills. As the Colonel was retreating 
 toward the camp, toward the camp also came 
 the porcupine, indifferent to odds. For a 
 scrap of weU-salted fish-box, an old porcupine, 
 who has been more or less crossed in life, 
 would charge an army entrenched. 
 
 The peril was averted, however, by the 
 prompt intervention of Jimmy Dillihunt. 
 The Colonel's retreat had brought the porcu- 
 pine already within fifty feet of the camp, 
 when suddenly, with a piercing " hoo-ee," 
 Jimmy Dillihunt sprang to the front, armed 
 with the poker. Pushing the astonished 
 Colonel aside, he struck the procupine accur- 
 ately on the tip of its blunt nose. The forest 
 of rampant quUls collapsed. With a twitch- 
 
 H 
 
igo MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 ing of its short, sturdy legs the porcupine 
 rolled over, stone dead. 
 
 The Colonel sat up on his haunches and 
 gazed admiringly at Jimmy. The rest of the 
 spectators yelled approval in assorted but 
 more or less unpublishable terms. Jimmy 
 picked up the limp form of the porcupine 
 gingerly, by its unarmoured forepaws, and 
 carried it in. 
 
 " Mighty good eatin', porkypine, when he's 
 cooked right ! " said he, with a triumphant 
 grin, as he vanished into his sanctum. 
 
 4c * * 4: )|e 
 
 He was only one porcupine, to be sure, but 
 he was an extra large and fat one, and Jimmy 
 DiUihunt knew how to make him go a long 
 way. He made him into a stew, with plenty 
 of dumplings, and also, it must be confessed, 
 with a very great deal of salt pork, cut small. 
 As it takes little porcupine to give much 
 flavour, all the pork in the stew tasted like 
 porcupine, and no one had cause to com- 
 plain. The dinner was an unqualified success. 
 
 The Colonel, wandering up and down 
 behind the banqueters, kept presenting him- 
 self persuasively to each in turn for the tit- 
 bits which each was eager to give him. At 
 
WHEN THE COLONEL CAME 19T 
 
 length he came to Sam Oulton, whom he had ' 
 hitherto avoided for lack of encouragement. 
 There was a lull, every one wondering what 
 Sammy, the irreconcilable, would do. 
 
 Oulton looked down at the Colonel's huge, 
 confiding head thrust in beside his elbow. He 
 hesitated, grinned amiably but sheepishly ; 
 then drew his sleeve across his shining mouth, 
 hfted his big tin of coffee, and rose resolutely 
 to his feet. 
 
 " Mr. B'ar — I mean Colonel," said he, 
 " here's a right Merry Christmas to ye, an' 
 many of 'em ! Ye're the only parfict gentle- 
 man in this 'ere camp, for ye're the only one 
 of the crowd ez has had the kind thoughtfulness 
 to hand out a Christmas present to his friends." 
 
 And he gave the Colonel the wish-bone ! 
 
The Gauntlet of Fire 
 
 IN a way they knew each other pretty well 
 these two, the man and the bear. For 
 nearly two years they had been acknowledged 
 adversaries. 
 
 The man had actually seen the bear but 
 once, and then for a swift glimpse only — a. 
 flash of shrewd, fierce, inquisitive eyes from 
 a spruce thicket, and a portentous black 
 shadow sinking away noiselessly into the 
 chequered gloom. But he knew well those 
 great tracks — a third as large again as those 
 of the average black bear of Eastern Canada — 
 which drew their menacing trail all about his 
 cabin. He knew those claw-marks on the 
 deep-scarred stretching-trees, where the owner 
 of the claws set his signature almost as high 
 as a grizzly might have set it. 
 
 And he had studied sundry massive stumps, 
 only half decayed, which those redoubtable 
 claws had ripped open like punk in the search 
 
 103 
 
194 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 for ants and grubs. From all this it was not 
 difficult to infer that he had here a formidable 
 rival for the sovereignty of this wilderness 
 domain which he had just pre-empted — a rival 
 who would probably, by and bye, when the 
 little farm came to be stocked, levy severe 
 tax on his sheep and cattle. 
 
 Moreover, he realized that this rival must 
 be clothed in a pelt of special magnificence, 
 which would command a special price in the 
 fur-market. In the intervals of his chopping 
 and clearing, his potato-planting and his 
 sowing of buckwheat, his barn- building and 
 his brush-burning, he went about to set traps 
 for this dangerous antagonist, who, as he 
 rightly inferred, would be too crafty to come 
 within reach of his gun. 
 
 The bear, on the other hand, knew the man 
 much better than the man knew him. From 
 the man's first arrival on the banks of the wild 
 South Fork, the great black beast had 
 shadowed him — with some hostility, of course, 
 as a stranger, and a disturber of the solitudes, 
 but more with a keen curiosity. For all his 
 giant bulk, he could move, when he chose, as 
 noiselessly as a mink or a snake. Motionless 
 as one of the ancient stumps left by forgotten 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 195 
 
 lumbermen, he had watched the flash and the 
 swing of the man's axe, the crashing fall of 
 birch and fir and ash, as the clearing widened 
 and let in the sunlight upon the tangled 
 forest floor. 
 
 With wonder he had seen the two powerful 
 red oxen, obedient to the man's sharp word 
 of command, drag the trimmed logs into one 
 place ; and then had marked the cabin grow 
 into shape, a surprising shape, beneath the 
 man's skilled hands. At first he had been 
 amazed that the two great oxen should be so 
 subservient, instead of turning upon the man 
 and piercing him with their long horns or 
 trampling him beneath their cleft hoofs. 
 
 But soon he had grown to appreciate an 
 inexplicable mastery in the man's voice, in his 
 unconscious indifference to whatever eyes 
 might be watching him from the dark, sur- 
 rounding coverts. It was plain that the man 
 had no fear. Then, of a certainty he must 
 be very strong. So the bear began to fear, 
 though he could perceive, at first, no cause of 
 fear, except that mysterious something in the 
 man's voice, which seemed to make the oxen 
 obey and toil with grunting patience. 
 
 And then, one day after the cabin was built, 
 
196 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 when, the man was out of sight within, and 
 the heat hummed with gnats and flies all 
 round the sun-steeped clearing, and the red 
 oxen lay in the shade chewing their cud lazily 
 and heaving great windy breaths, he had seen 
 a tall buck wander out from among the trees 
 and stand staring at the cabin. 
 
 The man had stepped forth from the cabin 
 door, and raised to his shoulder what looked 
 like a long, brown stick. Instantly a jet of 
 white flame had leapt from the tip of the 
 stick, with a short, biting roar. And the 
 buck, far away at the other side of the 
 clearing, had leapt into the air and fallen 
 forward on his muzzle, dead. A chiU had 
 shuddered across the bear's nerves at this 
 sight, and he had sunk back further into the 
 thickets. 
 
 No wonder the big, red oxen, for all their 
 savage-looking horns, obeyed this being, who, 
 simply by pointing a little stick and making a 
 sharp noise, could kill from very far off. 
 Thereafter the bear was still more wary in his 
 observation of the terrible intruder, but this 
 dread and hostility only made him the more 
 watchful. Clearly he could not afford to lose 
 sight of the man for any length of time, lest 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 197 
 
 unguessed and unheard-of things should 
 happen. 
 
 In this way it came about that when the 
 man, having got his first seeding and planting 
 over, and his cabin weather-tight, set about 
 the enterprise of trapping the bear, the bear 
 knew something about it. Of all the unseen, 
 inquisitive spectators whose shy, wild eyes 
 watched the work — squirrels, partridge, hares, 
 raccoons, rain-birds, wood-mice, deer, foxes, 
 and owls — the bear was by far the most 
 interested and the most comprehending. 
 
 When the first trap — a massive dead-fall — 
 was built, baited, and set, and the man had 
 gone away to leave it free to do its cruel 
 work, the bear had subjected it to a most 
 sagacious scrutiny. Though no one had ever 
 told him how Troy fell, he had been gifted by 
 Nature with that rudimentary sagacity in 
 which the men of Troy seem to have been so 
 unhappily deficient ; and he feared the man, 
 even bearing gifts. He smelt the bait — a 
 lump of savoury fat pork — at a discreet dis- 
 tance ; and decided to have nothing to do 
 with it. Not for any good purpose, he 
 thought, could such a delicacy be left to 
 the first chance comer. 
 
198 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 While he was watching and pondering, 
 hidden in a clump of fir-seedlings whose 
 aromatic fragrance disguised his scent, a 
 bob-tailed wild-cat came prowling by. She 
 saw the glistening white bait, held up to her 
 so temptingly on the prong of the deadfall. 
 Her round, pale eyes gleamed greedily, 
 though her ears flattened in angry apprehen- 
 sion at the strong man-smell of the tracks 
 surrounding it. She was not intelligent, the 
 bob-cat. She knew enough, merely, to know 
 that the delectable morsel belonged to the 
 man. Well, he was nowhere in sight. Even 
 now, she could hear his far-off voice shouting 
 to those stupid oxen. Crouching low, she ran 
 forward with swift stealth, and pounced, 
 with a low growl of exultation, upon the prize. 
 Something seemed to give way. With startled 
 eyes the bear saw those three massive logs, 
 which formed a roof above the bait, come 
 crashing down upon it. With an ear-splitting 
 screech, cut short almost ere it had begun, 
 the unhappy bob-cat was flattened out beneath 
 them. 
 
 A red squirrel, which had been watching 
 the whole thing from a near-by branch, burst 
 forth into hysterical chatterings. And a crow, 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 199 
 
 dropping on black wings from the tree- 
 tops, alighted delicately on one of the logs, 
 and with head cocked knowingly, as if to say 
 " I told you so," peered down with hard, 
 bright eyes at the dead wild-cat. He held 
 that all wild-cats should be dead. It was the 
 only way he hked them. But the manner in 
 which this one's destruction had been brought 
 about struck him as most mysterious. 
 
 From that day all the man's possessions 
 seemed to the bear to partake of the nature of 
 traps — to be studied with dreadful interest, 
 but on no account to be touched. So it came 
 about that when, in course of time, the man 
 brought a cow and a calf to the expanding 
 clearing, and a pig, and then sheep, and half 
 a dozen fussy hens, the bear never laid a paw 
 on one of them. His mouth watered over 
 the sheep in particular, but they looked too 
 suspiciously easy. They were surely traps. 
 If he should seize one, the sky, perhaps, would 
 fail upon him and crush him as fiat as the 
 wild-cat. The man, instead of appreciating 
 this forbearance, took it as a matter of course, 
 and gave it never a thought. But he grew 
 furious at last at the faUure of all his trapping 
 devices, and swore to have the bear's pelt 
 before another winter. 
 
200 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Late that summer came a time of scorching 
 drought. The South Fork stream, a turbu- 
 lent torrent always, and fed by unfailing 
 spring lakes in the upper barrens, shrank but 
 little. The main Ottanoonsis, however, re- 
 vealed parched bars and hoary ledges which 
 the oldest woodsmen in three counties had 
 never before seen dry. Many a forest brook 
 vanished altogether, its memory surviving 
 only in chains of stiU, black water-holes 
 lurking under the giant roots in the cedar and 
 hackmatack swamps. And many a wilderness 
 lake left its lilies to die on a stinking stretch 
 of raw, root-cumbered mud. The man, 
 however, was not greatly troubled, for hardly 
 three hundred yards away, beyond the foot 
 of his clearing, flowed the South Fork, defiant 
 of all droughts. His buckwheat and potatoes 
 were too well advanced to be quite spoiled by 
 lack of rain. And his stock were sure of 
 water. 
 
 The South Fork, at this point, and for 
 perhaps half a mile each way above and below 
 the clearing, ran not so wildly but that the 
 man could navigate it in comfort and fish it 
 from his big " dug-out " canoe. Lower down, 
 the rapids became almost impassable, for a 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 201 
 
 distance of some twelve or fifteen miles, tiU at 
 last the mad stream calmed itself in a low- 
 shored, shallow lake, fringed with blue- 
 berry plains. 
 
 Under the hfeless air and dry, stagnant 
 heat the forest seemed to gasp heavily, wait- 
 ing for the rain. Presently, instead of the 
 longed-for clouds, greycool, and fragrant with 
 shower, across the hard blue came a dun- 
 coloured haze, through which the sun took on 
 the look of a disk of hot copper. The balsamy 
 odours of the forest gave way to faint, acrid 
 breaths which made the eyes smart and the 
 nostrUs burn. The eagles, hawks, crows, 
 and all strong-fl5dng birds, disappeared. All 
 the four-footed prowlers of the forest coverts 
 grew uneasy, apprehending dangers which they 
 knew not how to combat or to flee from. 
 The great black bear, after snif&ng anxiously 
 with muzzle high in air, toward every point 
 of the compass, lost all interest in the man 
 and his works, and took himself whimpering 
 away to a point about five miles downstream, 
 where a deep inlet of dead-water jutted off 
 from the tumbling current of South Fork. 
 
 A little later the man, who had been work- 
 ing in a dispirited way among his sickly- 
 
202 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 looking potatoes, leaned upon his hoe and 
 eyed the changing sky with apprehension. 
 
 " Fire," he muttered, " somewheres round, 
 an' mebbe not far off ! Hope there don't 
 blow up no wind ! " 
 
 Then, throwing down the hoe, he yoked the 
 oxen to the drag, and prepared to haul up two 
 or three barrels of water from the river to 
 the cabin. In case of chance sparks blowing 
 across the clearing, he thought, it might be 
 weU to have water on hand. 
 
 He went about this task rather listlessly, 
 weighed down by the dead air and by a vague 
 sense of foreboding. But when he halted his 
 slow team by the riverside he saw across the 
 current a sight which shocked him into 
 activity. The oxen saw it, too, and woke up, 
 and began to snort and strain uneasUy at the 
 yoke. Beyond the fringe of tree-tops oppo- 
 site, clouds of smoke were rolling up, with here 
 and there a tongue of red flame flickering 
 along their bases. 
 
 The man became a demon of energy. Leap- 
 ing backwards and forwards with his bucket 
 between the waterside and the barrel on the 
 drag, and shouting furiously to the oxen to 
 stand still, he speedily had the barrel fuU to 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 203 
 
 the brim. On the journey back to the cabin, 
 however, he could not hurry. The track was 
 none too smooth, and he had to steady the 
 barrel laboriously lest its precious contents 
 should spill. But the oxen needed no urging, 
 and, after a perspiring struggle with the barrel 
 through the hot and narrow trail, he came out 
 upon the cleared knoll behind the cabin. 
 There he stopped short in consternation. 
 
 Beyond the clearing, along the southward 
 horizon, again those ominous clouds uprolhng, 
 again those thin, red tongues upleaping 
 viciously and disappearing. From opposite 
 sides the fire was closing in upon him. And 
 only now did he realize the appalling peril. 
 Water-barrels, indeed ! With a bitter laugh 
 and a curse at the futility of his efforts, a 
 groan of rage over the ruin of all his hopes, he 
 loosed the oxen from their yoke, and raced 
 with long strides down the slope to set free 
 the rest of the stock. He would give them aU 
 a fair chance for their lives, an even chance 
 with his own. Then, snatching up his lean 
 leather wallet and a blanket from his bunk, 
 he raced for the river. 
 
 The bear, meanwhile, had reached the little 
 inlet — or " bogan," as the Indians call it — 
 
204 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 five miles below. He found it already 
 thronged with sUent, trembling refugees. For 
 already, both to north and south, the sky was 
 filled with smoke-clouds which volleyed up in 
 dark, roUing masses, and winged flames were 
 leaping ravenously from tree-top to tree-top. 
 To eastward the two conflagrations were 
 drawing rapidly together under the draught 
 of a rising east wind. They were converging 
 with monstrous speed upon the river, which 
 just at this point made a turn and went roar- 
 ing off to south-westward, over a series of 
 broken ledges. The clamour of the rapids 
 was beginning to be dominated by a more 
 awful sound — that of the hissing rush and 
 mutter of the conflagration. Smoke-blasts, 
 pungent and stifling, came belching erratically 
 through the branches and swooping down 
 upon the water, where they thinned and 
 spread, and seemed to be absorbed in the 
 momently discoloured foam. Here and there 
 along the close-drawn skyline a towering, 
 solitary pine-top would burst into flame and 
 flare like a gigantic signal torch. And pre- 
 sently, hurled rocketing through the air as if 
 from unseen explosions, came blazing, spark- 
 ing brands, starting scout-fires, so to speak, in 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 205 
 
 advance, or dropping into the water with a 
 harsh and terrifying hiss. 
 
 All around the shores of the narrow bogan 
 crowded the beasts, watching with wide, 
 fascinated eyes the flight and fall of these 
 disastrous missiles. Several wild-cats, and 
 one huge grey Canada lynx, crouched at the 
 water's edge, or on out-thrust stumps and 
 branches. As a brand fell near them their 
 ears flattened to their skulls, and they shrank 
 back, spitting wildly.- Their ferocious hunting 
 hunger was clean wiped out by fear, and they 
 paid no heed whatever to the shuddering 
 hares, gibbering squirrels, and stoical, indig- 
 nant woodchucks which crowded about them. 
 Even the bloodthirsty weasels for once for- 
 got to kill, gliding nervously hither and thither 
 among the trembling ranks. A red fox, self- 
 possessed and game in the face of any doom, 
 sat upon his haunches on the tip of a stranded 
 log and eyed the tree-tops, searching in his 
 deep, sagacious mind for some device that 
 might outwit this awful adversary. 
 
 The surface of the bogan was aUve with 
 swimming mink, musquash, and water-rat, 
 daunted by the catastrophe which was about 
 to overwhelm the world, yet confident in the 
 
2o6 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 power of the cold element they loved to pro- 
 tect them. Standing belly-deep in the water, 
 and from time to time wallowing in it to cool 
 themselves, were a black moose buU with two 
 cows, and half a score of red deer. As for 
 bears, there were none in the strange con- 
 course except the great, black bear himself, 
 he having jealously driven aU rivals from his 
 range. 
 
 Now, after a brief survey of the situation, 
 the bear waded into the water. He plunged 
 his head beneath the surface to ease the smart 
 of burning eyes and nostrils. At the point 
 where he had entered it the bogan was 
 shallow, yet with a soft, sticky bottom which 
 was distasteful to his feet. As he stood Uft- 
 ing one foot after the other, uneasily, out of 
 the gathering smoke-pall came whirling down 
 a huge brand, red-hot, and struck a wild-cat 
 crouching on a near-by branch. With a 
 screech the cat bounced into the air, and, 
 finding herself about to fall into the water, 
 which she loathed, squirmed sideways, and 
 succeeded in clutching the bear's capacious 
 back. Her claws sank deep, and, with a growl 
 of pain, he tried to shake her off. Mad with 
 terror, and appearing to regard him as nothing 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 207 
 
 more than an animated log, she clung and 
 clawed the more tenaciously. At any other 
 time he would have wrenched her from her 
 place and torn her to pieces. But now it 
 never occurred to him to be enraged. The 
 matter was quite impersonal. He only real- 
 ized that something on his back was hurting 
 him, and he wanted to get rid of it. Throw- 
 ing himself down, he rolled over in the water, 
 burying the cat in the ooze. 
 
 When he got up again his objectionable 
 burden was gone. But he was dissatisfied 
 with his place in the bogan. The water was 
 not deep enough to suit him. And, more- 
 over, he felt hke a rat in a corner. He 
 wanted more space, more air, more view, 
 even if there were nothing but horrors for the 
 view to reveal. Shouldering aside a couple of 
 red bucks, who hardly noticed him with their 
 great, soft eyes of terror, he waded out to the 
 entrance of the bogan. Here, where he could 
 feel the pioll of the eddy trying to drag him 
 out into the rapids, he took his place in a depth 
 of water that came about his shoulders. An 
 ungainly cow-moose stood close beside him, 
 flapping her big ears despondently, and star- 
 ing, not at the flames, but at the discoloured 
 
2o8 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 waves and whipped foam racing by. Then 
 past his nose came swimming leisurely a big 
 brown otter. Lifting head and shoulders 
 high above the surface, like a watchful seal, 
 the swimmer surveyed the rapids, and then 
 plunged straight into them, heading fearlessly 
 downstream. He had evidently made up his 
 mind that not much longer would the Httle 
 bogan serve for a refuge. The bear eyed his 
 departure wistfully, and pondered it, but had 
 no heart to dare the lashed waves and roaring 
 ledges. 
 
 But by this time the roar of the ledges was 
 unheard for the wide, ravening tumult of the 
 flames. As they leapt and swooped they 
 almost seemed to scream, and it was as if the 
 smoke-clouds themselves found voice and 
 thundered. The heat grew suffocating, in- 
 tolerable ; and sparks and brands fell so 
 thick about the bogan that some of the beasts, 
 with fur suddenly shrivelling, went mad and 
 raced off into the furnace, while others simply 
 toppled into the water and were drowned 
 forthwith. The beasts who knew the water 
 sank themselves as deeply into it as they 
 could, and shudderingly awaited their doom, 
 but the wise fox, swimming cautiously around 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 209 
 
 the edges of the bogan and investigating it, 
 found at last a hollow under the bank, with 
 drenched roots screening the entrance. This 
 admirable little retreat was already packed 
 with muskrats and a few mink, but he 
 crowded himself in without ceremony, thrust- 
 ing others out to shift for themselves. And 
 as the dim annals of his race record that he 
 lived to hunt hare and partridge, in later 
 years, about the scarred stumps of the man's 
 abandoned clearing, it is evident that the 
 retreat proved a safe one. 
 
 The bear, meanwhile, as the fiery doom 
 closed in upon him, began to tremble. Ex- 
 cept for the wise fox, he was the only beast in 
 aU that wretched company with intelligence 
 enough to think and to realize the full horrors 
 of their fate. There was no hole under the 
 bank big enough to shelter his huge bulk. 
 He whimpered miserably, and turned his eyes 
 with longing down the wild channel by which 
 the other had fled. But he could not dare the 
 path. It seemed an equally sure destruction. 
 And already it was but a seething, darkened 
 avenue of violence between two walls of 
 smoke and flame. 
 
 And the bogan, too, was now a place of 
 
210 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 horrors. Its surface was covered with the 
 survivors of the smaller beasts, a wild-cat 
 or two, innumerable squirrels, with weasels, 
 martens, woodchucks, mice, raccoons, and 
 even a few hares whom the hour of supreme 
 despair had taught to swim. The rest were 
 dead. Several of the deer, too, had gone 
 under, in the bedlam struggle that now 
 milled blindly in the centre of the pool. 
 Besides the bear, only the sombre and stoic 
 moose held themselves aloof from that fatal 
 vortex, Ijdng down in the water, and lifting 
 their muzzles from time to time to draw a 
 scorching and suffocating breath. 
 
 Suddenly, chancing to turn his despairing 
 eyes upstream, the bear saw a wUd shape 
 dashing downward towards him through the 
 spray and smoke. In another moment he 
 recognized it. It was the man, crouched low 
 in the stern of his log canoe, and steering it, 
 with frantic paddle, between the rocks and 
 leaping surges. He had a blanket partly 
 twisted about his head ; and one corner of 
 it, streaming out behind him, smoked and 
 smouldered. He headed the canoe into the 
 bogan, and just saved himself from upsetting 
 as he ran slantingly against the submerged 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 211 
 
 back of one of the moose. He came to a stop 
 within arm's-length of the bear, and the latter 
 saw that he was curiously changed in appeal - 
 ance. His great, sinewy hands and gaunt 
 face were blackened and drawn, and his eyes 
 stared terribly from sockets whence eyebrows 
 and lashes had been scorched away. Never- 
 theless, to the bear his coming brought a sense 
 of security. Here, he felt, was a master 
 spirit, such as even the monsters of the fire 
 would not overcome. He whined and drew 
 nearer to the canoe, a dim hope rising in his 
 heart. The man noticed him, and even in that 
 moment of desperation recognized him, with 
 distorted grin, as the antagonist who had so 
 long eluded his snares. 
 
 " The both of us has got it in the neck, this 
 time, old pard, I reckon ! " he muttered 
 thickly, snatching off the blanket and hurriedly 
 sopping it over the side of the canoe. Then, 
 swinging it once more, aJl dripping, about his 
 shoulders and over his head, and gripping a 
 corner of it between his teeth to enable him 
 to breathe through it in the thick of the 
 smoke, he thrust forth again into the current 
 and went dashing down the rapids, under the 
 low-rolling smoke-pall. For an instant the 
 
212 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 bear hesitated, whimpering like a puppy, and 
 then plunged after him. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the bear was a much 
 better swimmer than he had guessed himself 
 to be. After a few moments of bewilderment 
 in the terrific, corkscrewing clutch and pull 
 of the current, he found himself able to keep 
 his head generally above water, and then to 
 more or less choose his course. 
 
 At first he chose it badly, misreading the 
 signs of the water. After having buffeted 
 his breathless way through a series of mad 
 " rips," he saw ahead of him a httle to the 
 right, what seemed a smooth passage through 
 a barrier of breakers. Resolutely he struggled 
 towards it as he swept down the channel. He 
 gained it. His foot dragged bottom. He 
 clawed frantically to check himself, but he 
 was rolled clean over, and shot from the hp of 
 a perpendicular ledge into the churning 
 cauldron below. 
 
 Fortunately for him, the cauldron was deep 
 enough to break the direct thrust of the tor- 
 rent, and he was held in a sort of eddy-till his 
 wits and his wind came back to him. Then 
 he made his escape at the side, and was 
 swept on down the raging current. But now 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 213 
 
 he knew enough to avoid such spots of treacher- 
 ous smoothness, and to choose in preference 
 the steep, turbulent, heavily surging channels 
 which indicate depth and a clear way. 
 
 The man, urged on by his powerful paddle, 
 was now far ahead, and out of sight, but the 
 bear felt confidence in following where he had 
 led the way. Both shores of the river were 
 now a raging furnace, a chaos of belching 
 black smoke-bursts torn apart by sheets of 
 red and orange flame. Tall trunks blazed 
 for a few minutes above the tumult then 
 toppled and fell, the crash of their faU un- 
 heard in the universal raving. The bear at 
 times felt his very lips and nostrils wither 
 in the heat, as he Ufted his dripping head and 
 snatched painful breaths. But he was no 
 longer despairing, such confidence had he in 
 the man's leadership. 
 
 At length the main current of the South 
 Fork gathered itself into an appalling trough 
 and shot downward with a thunder that even 
 made itself heard amid the rage of the flames. 
 The bear struggled to gain the broken shallows 
 along shore, but he was too late. The current 
 gripped him implacably. A moment more, 
 and he was in the sluice. Irresistible cross- 
 
214 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 currents seized him, rolled him over, sucked 
 him under. Dull noises boomed in his ears, 
 and his lungs were near bursting. Then all 
 at once he was thrust up into the air again, 
 stranghng, and felt smooth rocks shpping 
 by under his feet. The next moment his 
 claws caught wood, and clung like a vice, and 
 held. A second or two more and he was draw- 
 ing himself clear of the torrent, and holding 
 with all his force to some logs which had been 
 driven and jammed into the jaws of a side- 
 ledge. Right before his nose, to his amaze- 
 ment, was clinging the man, his body under 
 water, in a crevice of the rocks, and his head, 
 all but the eyes, swathed in the dripping 
 blanket. The canoe was nowhere to be seen. 
 
 The man looked at the bedraggled and 
 gasping beast with bleared eyes of recognition, 
 and moved further along the logs to make 
 room for him. 
 
 " Glad to see you, pardner ! " he cried. 
 " Make yourself right to home ! You an' 
 me' s the sole survivors hereabouts, I guess ! " 
 
 Either catching a faint sound of the man's 
 words, or troubled by the man's eyes meeting 
 his, the bear shrank back diffidently. But, 
 when he felt again the current clutching at 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 215 
 
 his hindquarters, he once more came forward 
 and crouched low in the backwash within 
 reach of the man's arm. 
 
 For the moment both refugees were safe. 
 They had water enough to cover them, and 
 certain ridges of rock rising above the surface 
 protected their faces from the direct force of 
 the occasional devastating blasts of flame 
 which licked out across the water. There 
 was nothing to do but wait. 
 
 All that day, and all night (though when 
 day passed into night they did not know) 
 the man and the beast lay thus side by side, 
 holding on to life, while the fire raged by, 
 on either side and over them. Then it began 
 to die down, leaving red stumps and trunks 
 to smoke and smoulder up and down the 
 shores, with here and there a lonely spruce 
 stiU flaring. The air was now cool enough to 
 breathe without discomfort ; and a desolate 
 grey dawn looked down upon the scene of 
 ruin. 
 
 The man got up, stretched his numb legs, 
 squeezed the water from his clothes ; and 
 now, so quickly do our wants change, turned 
 his body to warm itself at the nearest glow. 
 The bear watched him anxiously, but ventured 
 
2i6 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 no nearer. He hung on to the man's move- 
 ments as a dog might have done. He had 
 lost, for the moment, all his initiative. 
 
 There was one thing that the man now 
 saw clearly : there could be no escape to 
 that fiery shore perhaps for several days, un- 
 less a deluge of rain should come to quench 
 the glowing moss-beds. But between his 
 precarious refuge and the shore, a little way 
 downstream, he marked a spit of sand and 
 gravel, with a few logs stranded upon it, 
 and a sparse growth of low sandplum and 
 osier. It lay so in the path of the driven 
 spray from the ledges that, though the heat 
 had blasted and shrivelled the bushes, it had 
 not been able to burn them, or to do more 
 than sear the logs with eating flame along 
 their seams of balsam. To the man's eye 
 this log-strewn gravel-spit seemed to offer 
 a chance of escape if only he could reach it. 
 But between raced a deep and turbulent 
 current, which, strong swimmer though he 
 was, he feared would whirl him away hke 
 a straw. If only the bear would try it first, 
 he thought ! Though on second thought he 
 reahzed that that could tell him little in any 
 case, the bear being able to master a tide 
 
THB GAUNTLET OF FIRE 217 
 
 in which he would go under Uke a kitten. 
 He looked at the bear appealingly, how- 
 ever, and shouted above the tumult of the 
 rapids — 
 
 " Try it, pard ! We can't hang out here 
 all day ! " 
 
 The bear thought he was being accused of 
 some enormity, and shrank nervously to the 
 lower edge of the refuge. 
 
 Seeing that there was nothing to do but 
 put his fate to the test, the man wasted no 
 more time. He knew he should gain neither 
 strength nor resolution by waiting. Care- 
 fully keeping to the crest of the ridge between 
 the two channels, he pushed his way upward 
 against the divided and weakened current, in 
 order to gain all the advantage possible for 
 his perilous venture. When he could no 
 longer resist the thrust of the current, he 
 threw himself as far out into it as he could, 
 and swam desperately, hoping against hope 
 to gain enough to bring him within reach of 
 the gravel-spit before being swept past it. 
 In the next instant, however, he realized the 
 futility of his hope. In that current he was 
 no more than a whirled leaf. 
 
 The bear, meanwhile, had been watching 
 
2i8 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 his movements eagerly as he worked his way 
 upstream. He had no idea what the man- 
 oeuvre meant, but he knew very well that 
 the man could not leave their refuge by that 
 route. When, however, he saw the man 
 throw himself clear out into the channel, 
 heading toward shore, he felt himself being 
 deserted. With a whining cry, he, too, 
 sprang out into the torrent. He dared not 
 let the man out of his sight, lest the fire 
 should come again to swoop at him. 
 
 In the grip of that sluicing flood he battled 
 magnificently, holding his muzzle high ; and 
 though he was carried downward at frightful 
 speed, he nevertheless succeeded in making 
 some progress diagonally. He had just about 
 got the measure of the forces against him, 
 and shaped such a course as would enable 
 him to fetch the sandspit, when the man, 
 to his astonishment, was swept down upon 
 him, and grabbed him by the long fur of his 
 haunches. Startled by this unexpected as- 
 sault, he struck out more energetically than 
 ever. And the man, swinging around behind 
 him, shifted to his lower flank, and hung 
 on inexorably. 
 
 In his alarm the bear gained the gravel 
 
THE GAUNTLET OF FIRE 219 
 
 by a handsome margin, and scurried out 
 upon it like a frightened cat. But that 
 terrifying clutch was no longer on his flank. 
 As he turned to see what had happened, 
 the man stood, laughing breathlessly, at the 
 edge of the gravel, and shouting — 
 
 " Thanks, pardner ! You done noble ! " 
 Much disconcerted at the laughter, which 
 was something quite beyond his compre- 
 hension, the bear slunk off to the further 
 side of the sandspit, and eyed wistfully the 
 smouldering shores. 
 
 The man, having regained his breath, now 
 proceeded to roll two of the logs together, 
 side by side, in the quiet water at the tail 
 of the sandspit. With the stringy roots of 
 the sandplums and the little shoots of the 
 scorched osiers, he lashed the two logs se- 
 curely together, and then again yet more 
 securely, till he had a raft that he thought 
 would hold together in any rapid yet to be 
 encountered. He knew that he was now 
 not half a mile from the lake and the open 
 barrens ; and he knew, too, that all the 
 worst ledges and chutes of the South Fork 
 were past. He had neither paddle nor pole 
 to guide his course, but he pushed off confi- 
 
220 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 dently. As he did so he waved farewell to 
 his feUow-refugee. 
 
 " Ye'd better sit tight now, pardner ! " 
 he shouted. " Ye're aU right where y'are 
 till the woods get a mite cooled down." 
 
 The bear, no longer daunted by the menace 
 of the flames, but stiU nervous of that mas- 
 terful clutch upon his flanks, appeared to 
 accept the advice as final. At first he followed 
 the raft to the edge of deep water, whining 
 irresolutely. Then he sat down on his 
 haunches, and watched it go ploughing and 
 wallowing through the waves, with the man 
 crouched upon it, till it vanished in a bend 
 of the stream. 
 
The Moose that Knocked at the Door 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 WHEN the snow stopped, and the wind, 
 Carson's clearing was buried to the 
 tops of the fence stakes. The old one-storey 
 frame house — with its long shed, and then 
 the low barn set at right angles to the shed 
 so as to form a letter L — was buried nearly 
 to the tops of the windows. The roofs, swept 
 clean by the wind, showed black against the 
 surrounding whiteness. In spite of the fact 
 that the two days' storm was over and the 
 sun was once more shining, the sky was still 
 of a hazy pallor as if it held yet more snow 
 to let drop upon the burdened world ; and 
 the sunlight had no sparkle. Along one side 
 of the clearing the snow was heaped in huge 
 drifts, and the fir trees towered above it in 
 black ranks, shaken clean ; while along the 
 other side, under shelter of the forest, all the 
 
 831 
 
222 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 trees were shrouded in white, their laden 
 branches drooping to the ground. 
 
 But however dead and desolate the world 
 outside, there was cheer within the house. 
 The main room, which was at once hving- 
 room, haU and kitchen, was darkened to a 
 curious twilight by the drifts of snow that 
 veiled the window panes, but the effect was 
 merely to shut out the outer loneliness and 
 cold. A generous fire of seasoned birch and 
 maple roared in the big kitchen stove, from 
 whose wide-open " draft " a red glow spread 
 across the room, flashing on the polished tins 
 which hung along the opposite wall and gleam- 
 ing capriciously from the white dishes and 
 old blue china platters which lined the shelves 
 of the spacious dresser. 
 
 At one end of the long deal table places 
 were set for two, it being now nearly noon, 
 the dinner hour in the backwoods. At the 
 other end of the table Mrs. Carson — a large, 
 bony woman with dark hair drawn back 
 uncompromisingly from a kindly but irascible 
 red face — stood " kneading up " the tray of 
 dough for her week's baking. As soon as she 
 could get the bread into the oven it would be 
 time to dish up the dinner for herself and 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 223 
 
 Amanda. The warm air of the kitchen was 
 savoury with a smell of corned-beef and turnips 
 from the black pot that stood simmering on 
 the back of the stove. 
 
 By the door Amanda was stamping vigor- 
 ously and brushing the snow from her blue 
 woollen skirt, using a somewhat frayed grey 
 goose wing for a whisk-broom. Her bright, 
 flower-like face was flushed with exercise, 
 and wilful wisps of light -yellow hair, escaped 
 from the thick, blue, home-knit hood which 
 she wore tied under her chin, curled down 
 across a pair of dancing blue eyes and a short, 
 straight, weU-modelled nose which had a 
 tendency to go up in the air. It went up in 
 the air now, with a gesture of gay audacity, 
 as she tossed her small head to throw back 
 the teasing curls. Though panting from the 
 violence of her exertions she was laughing 
 as if she had enjoyed them. She had been 
 shovelling paths through the great drifts — 
 from the house to the barn, from the barn 
 to the well, and back from the well to the 
 house — a heavy task, but one which, in her 
 young enthusiasm and her joy at being home 
 again from her months of teaching in the 
 distant Settlement, she had made a game 
 
224 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 of. The big wooden snow shovel, with lumps 
 of snow stiU adhering to its wide blade, lay 
 on the floor beside her where she had dropped 
 it as she came in. 
 
 " There ! " she cried joyously. " That was 
 lots more fun than teaching 'leven times 
 'leven, mother. Those paths are great. I 
 guess they'll last — till the next storm any 
 way." 
 
 Mrs. Carson smiled without looking up as 
 she deftly portioned the dough into the 
 deep, black baking-pans. 
 
 " Well, child, pick up the shovel an' stand 
 it behind the woodbox where it belongs. 
 'Tain't changed ye none, livin' there in Brine 
 Settlement an' teachin' school. Want a little 
 nigger to run 'round after you an' pick up 
 things same as you used to ? " 
 
 Amanda looked down at the shovel with a 
 whimsical air of surprise at its thoughtlessness 
 in being on the floor. She gave it a little 
 kick, then picked it up and dutifiiUy depo- 
 sited it in its exact place behind the wood- 
 box. Turning to her mother with the hopeful 
 expression of one who has earned a reward 
 she cried : " There, Mumzie ! And now I 
 want my dinner. I'm starving." 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 225 
 
 " It's been ready this ha'f hour," answered 
 the mother, sHpping a pan of dough into the 
 oven. " You jest dish it up, child, an' I'll 
 be with you in ha'f a minute." 
 
 Amanda plucked off her hood, flung it at 
 a chair on the other side of the kitchen, made 
 a pretence of smoothing her hair by pushing 
 it up with the palms of her hands over both 
 temples, then seized a fork and interestedly 
 lifted the cover of the steaming pot. 
 
 Just at this moment there came a knock 
 at the door. So strange a knock it was that 
 Amanda dropped the pot cover, startled ; 
 and Mrs. Carson, just about to slam the oven 
 door in her brisk way, paused and muttered 
 under her breath : " Lands ! What's that ? " 
 It was one unmistakable knock, heavy and 
 indefinite, but followed by a vague sound 
 as of scraping and fumbling. 
 
 Amanda, instinctively daring, took a couple 
 of steps toward the door. Then she stopped. 
 There was certainly something very " queer " 
 about such a demand for admittance. The 
 fumbling and scraping continued, punctuated 
 with several Ught taps which somehow 
 sounded unintentional. Then the heavy 
 wooden latch half Ufted in its deep socket, 
 
226 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 as if something which did not quite under- 
 stand how to work it was tugging at the latch- 
 string outside. The dehcate hair at the nape 
 of the girl's white neck began to creep. 
 
 " 'Mandy, don't you dare to go for to open 
 that door ! " whispered her mother, stepping 
 nimbly around the stove to her side and 
 clutching her arm. 
 
 But under her play of chUdish wilfulness 
 the young girl's courage was high and cool. 
 
 " Nonsense, mother ! " she replied in a 
 low voice. "It's probably some one nearly 
 dead with cold, too far gone to knock pro- 
 perly. We must open the door. It would 
 be wicked not to." But as she spoke she 
 ran into the bedroom and reappeared in- 
 stantly with a rifle in her hands. As she 
 went to the door she coolly opened the 
 breech to see that the cartridge was in place, 
 and she snapped it to with a loud cHck that 
 might serve, if necessary, for a warning to the 
 visitor. 
 
 Heedless of her mother's vehement com- 
 mands, Amanda reached out her left hand 
 to the latch, standing well back from the 
 door and holding the rifle in readiness to leap 
 in a flash to her shoulder. But before her 
 
" A huge moose, with antlers spreading far beyond each door-post, 
 stood before her." 
 
 More Kindred of the IViYi/] 
 
 227 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 229 
 
 fingers could touch the latch, in a terrifying 
 way it slowly lifted itself clear of the socket 
 and the heavy door swung open. Amanda's 
 first impulse was to hurl herself upon it and 
 strive to shut it against the mystery. But 
 before she could accomplish this she caught 
 sight of the visitor and stopped in amaze- 
 ment. A huge moose, with antlers spreading 
 far beyond each doorpost, stood before her 
 blocking the whole doorway, and hesitatingly 
 thrust in his great black muzzle. 
 
 " Shoot it ! Shoot it ! " cried Mrs. Carson. 
 " It's tryin' to git in at us ! Shoot it, I tell 
 you ! " 
 
 But Amanda, lowering the gun, broke into 
 half-hysterical laughter. The tension had 
 been brief but severe, and the relief was 
 infinite. She had not realized how des- 
 perately frightened she was. But she under- 
 stood animals, wild and tame, instinctively ; 
 and she loved them all. She reached out 
 her hand and patted the great, appealing 
 muzzle. 
 
 " Shoot him, mother ? Why of course 
 not ! Don't talk of such a thing ! See how 
 he's trembling. Something has been chasing 
 him and he's come to us for protection. 
 
230 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 What could it be to frighten a great big thing 
 like him ? " 
 
 Mrs. Carson had recovered herself by this 
 time, but she was angry at having been so 
 badly frightened. 
 
 " If you hain't got sense enough to shoot 
 the critter, ' Mandy, then shoo him out an' 
 shut that door, quick. I'll not have him 
 gittin' in here an' tramplin' over things, I 
 tell you. The impidence of him ! Shut 
 that door this minute. You're lettin' all 
 the cold in." 
 
 Amanda laughed cheerfully. 
 
 " He can't get in, possibly, Mumzie ! See, 
 his antlers are wider than the door. I think 
 he must be a tame moose who has been petted 
 a lot, so that a house means friends and 
 safety for him. Well, you've come to the 
 right place, old fellow. I wish I knew what 
 it was had scared you so." 
 
 The great beast's flanks were heaving 
 violently and he stiU trembled ; but it was 
 plain to Amanda that he now felt himself 
 to be with friends. Stretching out his ridi- 
 culously long, overhanging, semi-prehensile 
 upper lip he tried to get hold of a fold of the 
 girl's skirt. The mystery of the lifted latch 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 231 
 
 was explained. He had been pulling at the 
 string with that inquisitive Up. 
 
 Amanda stopped speaking for a moment, 
 delightedly inspecting her protege. Her 
 mother, still excited, was just about to return 
 to the attack when Amanda forestalled her. 
 
 " Oh, look ! " she exclaimed. " I told 
 you he was a tame moose, mother ! He's 
 been driven in harness. Look where it has 
 chafed him on the shoulder. How perfectly 
 lovely ! I wonder if the poor dear would 
 eat some cornmeal ! " 
 
 Snatching a plate from the table she ran 
 to the meal-barrel and scooped up a double 
 handful of the coarse golden meal. Mrs. 
 Carson, half ready to be moUified by the 
 idea that the animal was really a tame one, 
 looked on doubtfully while Amanda thrust 
 the plate of meal under his muzzle. The 
 moose sniffed at it, then, not recognizing 
 the smell, blew an irresolute blast through 
 his nostrils. The meal flew all over the 
 floor and over the front of Amanda's dress. 
 Straightway the moose, appearing to make 
 up his mind that this was something good 
 to eat, sank on his fore-knees and began 
 greedily licking up the yellow particles. The 
 
232 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 better to get at them he turned his head 
 sideways and succeeded in jamming a portion 
 of one great antler through the doorway. 
 
 But the sight of the spilt meal was too 
 much for the tidy soul of Mrs. Carson, whose 
 jarred nerves, moreover, took offence at the 
 gay laughter with which Amanda greeted 
 the animal's delinquency. Darting forward 
 with a cry of " Git out o' here, you dirty 
 beast ! " she snatched up the wooden potato- 
 masher and, before Amanda could stop her, 
 aimed a furious blow at the offender's nose. 
 
 Accuracy of aim, however, was not one of 
 Mrs. Carson's strong points. And besides, 
 just at the crucial moment Amanda had 
 caught her arm. The blow fell, not on the 
 animal's nose but on one of the branchy 
 points of the intruding antlers. It was a 
 sturdy blow, as the good lady in her vexation 
 had meant it to be. But the result of it 
 was so out of all proportion to its intent that 
 she recoiled with a horrified groan, dropping 
 the potato-masher while Amanda wailed piti- 
 fully : " Mother, mother, how could you ? " 
 
 The moose, startled by Mrs. Carson's 
 assault, had lurched to his feet and with- 
 drawn his head with such violence that the 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 233 
 
 antler was torn clear off. It fell at Mrs. 
 Carson's very toes, its raw butt, suffused 
 with tiny globules of blood, convicting her 
 amazed eyes of an atrocious piece of cruelty. 
 She wrung her hands and protested, half 
 crying : " Oh, 'Mandy, I didn't mean to ! 
 How was I to know it would come off so 
 easy ? " 
 
 The victim, however, seemed compara- 
 tively unperturbed by his astonishing injury. 
 After giving his head a vigorous shake, as if 
 perhaps a bee had stung him, he dismissed 
 the matter and once more thrust in his nose 
 toward Amanda as if begging her for caresses. 
 The loss of his antler he did not appear to 
 notice. Then Amanda remembered that this 
 was about the time when moose should shed 
 their antlers. Her horrified face relaxed. 
 She was on the point of bursting into wild 
 laughter. But she checked her mirth sternly, 
 thinking it advisable that her mother's peni- 
 tence should endure a httle. 
 
 " Poor critter ! " muttered Mrs. Carson, 
 picking up the shed antler and standing it 
 respectfully against the wall, and regarding 
 it as if she thought of trying to stick it on 
 again. " Seems to me he's mighty good- 
 
234 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 natured not to git ugly over a thing like 
 that. Hadn't we better rub some mutton 
 taller on to it, 'Mandy ? " 
 
 " I don't believe it's worth whUe, mother," 
 replied the girl. " You see, at this time of 
 year there'll be no flies to bother the sore 
 spot. I don't beUeve it hurts him so very 
 much after all ; because, you know, he'd 
 have to lose his horns before spring anyway. 
 They always drop off some time in the 
 winter ; so it isn't as if it would never grow 
 out again." 
 
 " Oh ! " exclaimed the woman in a tone 
 of immense rehef. " I forgot about 'em 
 sheddin' their horns. But I reckon it must 
 'ave hurt aU the same. Looks mighty red 
 an' sore. An' all I can say is I'd 'a' made 
 more fuss than he did if any one had 'a' 
 done that to me ! " 
 
 Amanda broke out into a peal of laughter 
 which made the moose draw back in astonish- 
 ment. 
 
 " Well, well, child," said her mother testily, 
 " you know what I mean ! Don't be so 
 smart. Git your old critter tied up in the 
 barn if you're goin' to, and don't keep dinner 
 waitin' aU day." 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 235 
 
 Amanda became thoughtful. " But I don't 
 quite know how we're going to get him 
 there," she answered. 
 
 " Why," said Mrs. Carson, " if he was a 
 horse you'd lead him. An' if he was a cow 
 you'd drive him. Now which is he ? That's 
 for you to decide, being a school-teacher, an' 
 your business to know such things. But 
 do be quick about it afore we freeze stiff." 
 And she turned away resolutely to dish up 
 the dinner. 
 
 " Of course," said the girl with authority, 
 " he's much more of a cow than a horse. 
 But I think I'll try leading him, all the same. 
 He doesn't look as if he'd be easy to drive. 
 Please hand me that bit of clothes-line, 
 mother, there's a dear ! " 
 
 Mrs. Carson comphed, and then brought 
 the girl her hood and put it on her head im- 
 patiently. Amanda, with the skill of one 
 who has been brought up on a farm, knotted 
 the rope first about the animal's neck and 
 then around his muzzle, forming a halter^ — 
 a process to which he submitted with a 
 patient air which showed that he was used 
 to it. Then she pushed his great forehead 
 vigorously with both hands, to make him 
 
236 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 get out of the doorway. He obeyed at 
 once, backing carefully as if stepping between 
 shafts ; and when she turned to lead him 
 down the deep, narrow path to the barn he 
 followed so close that his ponderous muzzle 
 was thrust over her shoulder. 
 
 They had almost reached the barn when 
 the moose lifted his head with a jerk and 
 gave an angry snort. Amanda, following 
 his eyes, peered away across the white, undu- 
 lating surface and caught sight of three sha- 
 dowy grey shapes just slinking into the woods. 
 
 " Wolves ! " she remarked to her follower. 
 " So that was what was hunting you, was 
 it ? Weh, you don't seem to be much afraid 
 of them now ! " And she concluded that 
 the shnking beasts had been harassing and 
 trailing their great quarry without daring 
 to come within reach of his hoofs and antlers 
 until he should be too worn out to defend 
 himself. It was evident that they had no 
 taste now for following up the venture. 
 
 For a few seconds the moose glared fiercely 
 after his vanished foes, then followed his 
 conductor obediently into the barn. Old 
 Jerry, the sorrel horse whom Amanda had 
 ridden as a child, from his stall whinnied 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 237 
 
 inquiringly at sight of the tall stranger ; 
 and the two red and white cows snorted and 
 backed in their stanchions. But the moose 
 paid them no attention whatever. It was 
 plain that he felt quite at home in a barn 
 with cattle and horses. Amanda tied him 
 beside the haymow where he could help 
 himself ; then, chafing her numbed fingers, 
 she raced back to the house, eager to get in 
 out of the stinging cold. Her mother was 
 already seated at the table awaiting her. 
 
 " Won't that splendid feUow be a great 
 Christmas present for Dad ! " she cried joy- 
 ously, patting back her rebellious wisps of 
 hair and hastily rinsing her shm fingers 
 before she sat down. 
 
 "I'd hke to know what good he'll be to 
 him ! " said Mrs. Carson sceptically. " With 
 them legs o' his he'll walk right over aU the 
 fences an' eat up everything he takes a shine 
 to. I never did see, 'Mandy, what you 
 could find so interestin' in aU such outlandish 
 critters. Give me a good horse, or a cow 
 that don't jump, or even a dawg, says I. " 
 
 " Well, mother, I hke them too, you 
 know ! " agreed Amanda happily, evading 
 the discussion. 
 
238 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 It wanted but two days of Christmas, and 
 there was yet much to be done in making 
 ready for Christmas Eve when, according to 
 his custom, John Carson would arrive home 
 hearty, ruddy and hungry after his long trip 
 in from the lumber camps on Black River. 
 Mrs. Carson and Amanda had a busy after- 
 noon making pies — pumpkin, apple, mince 
 — and frying in the great pot of sputtering 
 lard an endless array of fragrant, goldy-brown 
 doughnuts. The two women were Httle con- 
 cerned about the storm, which had drifted 
 full the narrow, backwoods roads. They 
 knew that it would be a storm, indeed, that 
 could hinder John Carson on his snowshoes 
 from getting home for Christmas. What 
 was forty miles of wilderness trail to him 
 even though the mercury should be hovering 
 around the twenty-below-zero ? UnfaiUng 
 as the almanac he would come shouting over 
 the twilight fields, kick off his snowshoes at 
 the door and impatiently wipe the frost 
 from his bearded lips before catching wife 
 and daughter to his breast. Neither woman 
 was troubled by misgivings on this score. 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 239 
 
 The event of the season would not fail them. 
 
 Occupied as she was Amanda had no time 
 to devote to the big stranger in the barn. 
 But when, toward ^ sundown, she and her 
 mother went out to milk the cows and fodder 
 the stock for the night she found that he had 
 managed to knock off his remaining antler, 
 probably having felt the uneven weight an 
 annoyance. The change which this wrought 
 in his appearance met with Mrs. Carson's 
 hearty approval for, as she remarked to 
 Amanda, it made him look " so much more 
 natural-like.'' She went up and stroked 
 him condescendingly ; and as he, in return, 
 nibbled trustfully at her apron with his long, 
 sensitive muzzle, Amanda saw that his posi- 
 tion in the family was assured. She knew 
 that her mother, having once accepted him, 
 would love him as she did Old Jerry and the 
 red and white cows. 
 
 The following morning was one of blue, 
 unclouded sky and snapping cold. Amanda 
 had intended putting the moose in harness 
 to see if he were really broken to it. But 
 there was still too much to be done in the 
 house. The plum pudding was yet to be 
 prepared. Instead of the novel and exciting 
 
240 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 pastime of harnessing a giant bull moose 
 she saw her duty sternly pointing her to the 
 task of stoning raisins. With a sigh she 
 obeyed ; and she managed to get some 
 consolation from the raisins themselves, which 
 were sweet and plump, the very best that 
 Brine Settlement could supply. 
 
 The dish of raisins was a formidable one, 
 for John Carson had always an appetite and 
 liked his pudding rich. But before Amanda 
 was halfway through her task she was inter- 
 rupted — and the raisins were forgotten. 
 
 There came a peremptory knock, which 
 was repeated before Mrs. Carson could get 
 to the door. The visitor proved to be a 
 good-looking young fellow, who kicked off his 
 snowshoes outside and pulled off his deep 
 fur cap ceremoniously as he entered. Mrs. 
 Carson hastened to bring him a chair ; while 
 Amanda, whose hands were conspicuously 
 sticky, pushed back her hair with a rounded, 
 white forearm and flashed him a smile of 
 cordial welcome. The stranger was dressed 
 in the thick homespuns and cowhide " larri- 
 gans " of the lumberman, but at his throat, 
 as he threw open his heavy jacket, showed a 
 collar obviously fresh and obviously linen, 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 241 
 
 with a neatly tied four-in-hand cravat. He 
 had a strong-featured though boyish face, 
 with dark, direct eyes and a close-trimmed 
 brown moustache, and from the accents of 
 his greeting Amanda decided at once that 
 though he might be from the lumber camps 
 he was certainly not of them. 
 
 " Won't you set up closer to the fire ? " 
 suggested Mrs. Carson heartily. " It's a 
 right cold day out." 
 
 " No, thank you, not just yet. My fingers 
 are a bit numb ! " replied the visitor, pulling 
 off his woollen mittens and chafing his hands 
 — which, as Amanda noted, were strong and 
 well kept. " You are Mrs. Carson, aren't 
 you ? " he continued. 
 
 " The same," said Mrs. Carson, while 
 Amanda, not to be quite left out, nodded 
 assent. 
 
 " My name's Ross — Alec Ross. And I'm 
 just on my way in from Donovan's Camp on 
 Forks Brook. I happened to stop in at 
 Crimmins's — and it was lucky I did. I 
 found Mrs. Crimmins desperately ill — pneu- 
 monia or something of that sort, I should 
 think. And she's all alone. No one else in 
 the house but her httle three-year-old boy 
 
242 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 and her feeble old grandfather who, as you 
 know, is almost as much of a care as the 
 child." 
 
 " Oh ! " exclaimed Amanda commiserat- 
 ingly, setting the bowl of raisins on the 
 table and going to wash her hands. The 
 young man's eyes followed her with quick 
 appreciation."' -/■ 
 
 " My, but that's bad I " said Mrs. Carson 
 in a worried voice. " The old man's pretty 
 nigh stone blind an' deafer'n a post." 
 
 " I fixed things up the best way I could," 
 Ross continued, " and now I'm hurr5dng in 
 to the Settlement for the doctor. But you 
 know what that will mean. The best I can 
 hope to do won't get him back there before 
 to-morrow morning. It's dreadful to think 
 of what may happen in the meantime. I 
 thought — I hoped — there might be some one 
 here who could go over and stay with them 
 tiU I get back. But I see it is impossible. 
 No woman alone could get a team through 
 those fifteen miles of drifts that I have just 
 
 come over." 
 
 Mrs. Carson wrung her hands. 
 "Oh," she cried in keen distress, " to think 
 o' poor Nancy Crimmins in sich trouble an' 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 243 
 
 us not able to lift a finger to help her I Quick 
 there, 'Mandy, git Mr. Ross a cup o' hot tea. ' 
 No, Mr. Ross, you set right where you are," 
 she continued with decision, seeing that the 
 young man had risen to go. " You spare 
 two minutes to wait for your tea an' you'll 
 go the faster an' the farther for it." 
 
 As it was yet a good twenty-five miles in 
 to Brine Settlement, Ross recognized the 
 wisdom of her advice and sank back into 
 his chair, rubbing the stiff muscles of his 
 calves. But he observed that Amanda was 
 not getting the tea. Instead of that she 
 was taking down a heavy, coonskin coat 
 from the yellow clothes-press by the bedroom 
 door. 
 
 " What on airth are you doin', child ? " 
 demanded her mother sharply, but with a 
 note of anxiety in her voice. 
 
 " I'm going over to take care of Mrs. Crim- 
 mins till the doctor comes," said the girl 
 quietly. 
 
 " But you ain't ! You ain't goin' to stir 
 out of this house, 'Mandy Carson," decreed 
 her mother. 
 
 Now Amanda was nearly twenty-two years 
 old, and it was a matter of general knowledge 
 
244 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 that her control of the rather turbulent 
 school at Brine Settlement was perfect. Her 
 usually wilful mouth was not wilful at all 
 now, but grave and firm. 
 
 " You know very well that I must go, 
 mother," she answered gently. " Do you 
 suppose I could stay here with poor Mrs. 
 Crimmins maybe dying ? Stay here safe 
 and comfortable — stoning raisins ? " she went 
 on, with a little break in her voice. " Please, 
 mother, get Mr. Ross his tea as quick as you 
 can and then come and help me get ready." 
 
 There was a finahty in this quiet speech 
 that brought Mrs. Carson at once to terms. 
 She bustled off to get the tea, but at the 
 same time she became almost tearful in her 
 excitement. 
 
 " Oh, why won't you never listen to reason, 
 'Mandy ? " she wailed. " You was always 
 that headstrong ! But you'll never git there. 
 You'll git stuck fast in the snow. An' 
 you'll be frozen stiff, you know you will. 
 An' oh ! what will your poor father say when 
 he gits home an' finds you gone ? Mr. Ross," 
 she cried, turning suddenly to the young man 
 who had been watching Amanda with the 
 keenest admiration, " you speak to her ! 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 245 
 
 You tell her she can't do it, an' hadn't ought 
 to try. Maybe she'll hsten to a man ! " 
 
 Alec Ross got up from his seat. " AUow 
 me to say, Miss Carson, I'm afraid your 
 mother's right. I know just how you feel 
 about it ; and if you'll allow me to say so I 
 think your pluck is splendid. But you could 
 never get a horse through those drifts all by 
 yourself. It's hard, but I guess you'll have 
 to give it up." 
 
 Amanda tossed her head defiantly. " That's 
 nonsense ! " she declared. " Don't you sup- 
 pose I can go on snowshoes just as well as 
 you if I want to ? What's fifteen miles ? " 
 
 Ross hesitated. He did not want to alarm 
 the two women, living there alone in the 
 vast sohtudes. But it was plainly necessary 
 to be frank. 
 
 " I've no doubt you could do it if you say 
 so," he replied. " But, strange as it may 
 seem, there are wolves around this winter. 
 For the last fifty years or so, as you know, 
 they've been unheard of in this part of the 
 country ; but now they've come back." 
 
 He spoke with an air of having settled the 
 question. And Mrs. Carson beamed approval 
 as she set the cup of hot, strong tea before him. 
 
246 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 But Amanda answered very quietly : " Yes, 
 I knew the wolves had come back ! " Both 
 Ross and Mrs. Carson stared at her in amaze- 
 ment. " You don't seem to concern yourself 
 much about them I " she continued. 
 
 Ross threw back his jacket with a boyish 
 gesture and displayed a pair of " thirty- 
 eights " in his belt. " I'm ready for them if 
 they should come along looking for trouble," 
 said he. 
 
 " Well," said Amanda, " I'm reaUy and 
 truly not one bit worried about them either. 
 They're nothing but skulking curs, these 
 Eastern wolves. And I've got my Win- 
 chester, a repeater, which I know how to use. 
 I'm not thinking about wolves — I saw three 
 of them yesterday slinking along the edge of 
 the clearing, and they ' put ' when they saw 
 me. It was they that had been chasing my 
 moose, mother. Well, now I'm going to 
 hitch up my moose in the pung and see if his 
 long legs won't puU me through the drifts 
 — for I know very weU Old Jerry couldn't 
 do it. If the moose fails me, I'U turn him 
 loose and go on with my snowshoes. But 
 I do beUeve, mother, it was just for this that 
 the moose was sent to us." 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 247 
 
 To Mrs. Carson's deeply religious and some- 
 what superstitious mind this last suggestion 
 carried such weight that forthwith, in spite 
 of the dreadful menace of the wolves, her 
 opposition vanished. It was " a sign," as 
 she would have called it. But Alec Ross 
 looked so amazed that it was necessary to 
 teU him the whole story while he drank his 
 tea. He was fuU of misgivings j but he 
 saw that it was useless to try to dissuade 
 the resolute girl. So assuming a confidence 
 which he was very far from feehng he cheer- 
 fully pledged himself to meet her next morning 
 at Crimmins's. Then, pulling his cap far 
 down over his ears, he slipped his feet into 
 the thongs of his snowshoes and went off 
 with the long, swinging stride of the practised 
 snowshoer. 
 
 " He ain't no lumberman," said Mrs. 
 Carson, eyeing him critically as he went, 
 " but I reckon he knows what he's about." 
 And Amanda, who was puUing on an extra 
 pair of thick woollen stockings, agreed with 
 her. 
 
248 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 Amanda was quite right about the moose. 
 He had been thoroughly broken to harness. 
 It was evident that he had been taken as a 
 very young calf and brought up as a pet on 
 some far backwoods farm. He was dociUty 
 itself, and plainly loved to be handled. But 
 as he had not been trained to take the bit 
 Amanda had to drive him with reins attached 
 to a halter. She found the reins of little 
 use, however, for the great beast responded 
 to the commands " Haw," " Gee," " Whoa," 
 " G'long," " Git-up," like a weU-trained and 
 willing ox, but far more sensitively than 
 any ox had ever the wit to do. 
 
 Sitting low in the sturdy pung with a hot 
 brick at her feet, warmly clad, weU bundled 
 in old-fashioned buffalo robes, her hands 
 double-mittened and her face shining rosy 
 from its encircHng folds of a white wooUen 
 scarf, Amanda found herself enjoying her 
 journey in spite of her anxieties and her sad 
 errand. She was exhilarated beyond words 
 by her easy control of this novel and imposing 
 steed. With his enormous, spreading hoofs, 
 which formed a species of snowshoe, partly 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 249 
 
 bearing him up, with his vast strength of 
 shoulder and singular length of leg, the 
 moose took her through depths of drift where 
 a horse would have hopelessly foundered. 
 He forged ahead not fast but steadily, and 
 the pung, on its low runners and wide shoes, 
 rode fairly high in the snow. 
 
 Of the wolves she saw never a sign ; and 
 so, without event, by the middle of the after- 
 noon she came to Crimmins's wide clearing. 
 
 She found the sick woman half delirious 
 with pain, fever and anxiety, the child >vhim- 
 pering with terror, the bent old man muttering 
 to himself as he gropingly fed the fire with 
 the abundant wood which Alec Ross had 
 stored behind the stove. The situation was 
 unspeakably pitiful, and Amanda thanked 
 Heaven that she had been resolute to come. 
 Her coming, indeed, seemed to work an in- 
 stant miracle, as the child's fears were soothed, 
 the sick woman's terrible anxiety relaxed, 
 and the old man felt once more free to doze 
 in his big chair. There was so much to be 
 done that for hours Amanda had no time to 
 think. Not till late that night, with the 
 child asleep in his trundle-bed, and the old 
 man vanished to his tiny cupboard room, 
 
250 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 was she able to sit down and rest. Only 
 then did she begin to realize how exhausted 
 she was. 
 
 She found an old magazine on a shelf in 
 the corner and turned over the pages. But 
 she could not read, with the sick woman's 
 painful breathing loud in her ears. She 
 found, though she did not realize it, that the 
 only thing that could divert her attention 
 from the sound was to think about the man 
 who had so unexpectedly launched her on 
 this errand. She pictured to herself his kind 
 and strong young face, his courtesy, his un- 
 selfishness, his helpfulness, the grace and 
 force of his figure as he swung off across the 
 snow from her mother's door. A pang seized 
 her as she thought of him, perhaps trailed by 
 wolves, perhaps in a running fight with them, 
 before he could reach the Settlement. But 
 this thought she threw off with scorn. The 
 slinking brutes would never dare actually to 
 attack him. Then she smiled to herself, a 
 smile of indulgent tenderness, as she recalled 
 the evidences which she had found of his 
 kindly but bungling efforts in the sick-room. 
 Yet he had not done so badly after all, for a 
 man, she thought. 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 251 
 
 The clock began to strike for midnight. 
 In a few seconds it would be Christmas Eve. 
 She wondered if she would be home before 
 her father arrived. She hoped so, passion- 
 ately. She did not Hke to think of his big, 
 disappointed face if she were not there to 
 greet him — of his desperate anxiety over her 
 rash expedition. At last she felt her eyelids 
 irresistibly drooping and she sprang to her 
 feet. She must not fall asleep. She went 
 over to the bed and found the patient less 
 restless, her breathing apparently eased by 
 the hot poultices of flaxseed in which Amanda 
 had lavishly enveloped her chest. Amanda 
 did not know much about sickness, but she 
 knew enough to feel gratified when she found 
 that the patient's racing pulse had grown 
 less threadlike and uneven. 
 
 And now for hours the fight to keep awake. 
 It occupied all her attention. She had never 
 known that hours could be so interminable. 
 She dared not sit down for more than a 
 moment at a time. And often she thought 
 the clock must have stopped, so slowly 
 crawled the hands. But the night did pass, 
 and just on the bitter edge of dawn came the 
 sound of bells. The doctor and Ross had 
 
252 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 arrived, bringing with them a nurse from the 
 Settlement. 
 
 Amanda heard the doctor pronounce that 
 her nursing and her jfiaxseed poultices had 
 probably saved the day — that Mrs. Crimmins 
 would probably pull through. She caught 
 the look of immeasurable admiration in Alec 
 Ross's eyes. Then, curhng herself up happily 
 like a child in the old man's big chair, she 
 went fast asleep. 
 
 After the long strain which she had been 
 under it was midday and past before Amanda 
 was fit to set out for home. Alec Ross, whose 
 muscles seemed to be of steel, was about 
 returning to the Settlement, and Amanda, 
 with a trepidation which made her angry at 
 herself, offered him a seat in the pung. He 
 accepted eagerly — but with a quizzical proviso 
 that she should not ask him to drive. 
 
 "I've no great idea of myself as a Hagen- 
 beck ! " he apologized. 
 
 " Don't think for a moment I'd let you 
 drive this dear beast ! " retorted Amanda 
 with decision. " He seems to know just 
 what I want him to do. I don't believe he'd 
 be quite pleased to have any one drive him 
 but me." 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 253 
 
 "He is a beast of sense. I entirely agree 
 with him," said the young man as he tucked 
 the wraps carefully about her before taking 
 his seat. 
 
 Amanda's small nose went up in the air 
 with a mixture of doubt and defiance. She 
 was not quite sure whether he was quizzing 
 her or not. Perhaps, even, he was making 
 fun of her moose — which would have been 
 unforgivably stupid of him. She was an- 
 noyed and disappointed. But as her atten- 
 tion was occupied with the start he never 
 noticed her iU humour. He began to talk, 
 gaily and interestingly. And he was so 
 obviously, bojdshly happy over the situation 
 that Amanda felt speedily convicted of in- 
 justice and set herself to make up to him for 
 the wrong of which he was so unaware. In 
 such a mood, with her beauty, her sparkle, 
 her childlike confidence and frank audacities, 
 she was dangerously intoxicating ; and Alec 
 Ross felt her going rapidly to his head. The 
 better to keep a grip on himself he became 
 grave and quiet. But as Amanda saw from 
 a side glance at his face that he was in no 
 way discontented, his quietness by no means 
 damped her spirits. She told herself, with 
 
254 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 conviction, that she was " having a lovely 
 time." 
 
 The moose, meanwhile, went faithfully. 
 But it was slow travelling through the depths 
 of broken drift. The early winter dark 
 closed down before they had covered much 
 more than half the journey. This was of no 
 consequence, however, for the sky was fuU of 
 stars so sharply clear that they almost seemed 
 to snap, and the snow spread everywhere a 
 wide, spectral ghmmer. With the falUng of 
 the dark Amanda fell silent and seemed to 
 give all her attention to the driving. But 
 she was content. As was fitting, nay, essen- 
 tial in such cold, she was allowing herself to 
 sit quite close to her companion, whose sUence, 
 somehow, did not seem uncompanionable. 
 
 About an hour after dark they came, still 
 silent, to the lonely fork of the roads where, 
 through a stretch of burnt lands, a confusion 
 of tumbled and shrouded trunks, the trail 
 from the Black River Camp joined the main 
 road. 
 
 " This is the road father comes by," said 
 Amanda. " I do hope we're ahead of him, so 
 he won't be worried. He doesn't generally 
 come so early as this." 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 255 
 
 " No," said Alec Ross, " he hasn't gone by 
 yet. No sign of snowshoe tracks along here 
 except mine of yesterday. You'll be in lots 
 of time the way this excellent menagerie of 
 yours travels. But, no 1 By George, I'm 
 wrong ! There is another track — over by 
 mine, on your right." 
 
 " Oh, let's hurry ! " cried the girl. " We 
 must hurry and try and overtake him. Get 
 up, there. Moose. There's a dear ! " 
 
 " But it may not be your father's track 
 after all," objected Ross. 
 
 " Of course it is I Who else could it be 
 from that direction ? " retorted Amanda 
 impatiently, 
 
 " You know," Ross reminded her, " the 
 trail from Johnson's runs into the Black 
 River road about a mile back." 
 
 " But I just know it's his," began Amanda, 
 
 " because " 
 
 * She stopped short as a shriU sound, half 
 bark, half howl, came from up the Black 
 River traU. It was answered instantly by 
 another in a slightly lower key. 
 
 The moose gave a leap forward, then 
 stopped abruptly with a snort. 
 
 " It's your friends, the wolves, and not far 
 
 9 
 
256 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 off," said Alec Ross. He spoke lightly. But 
 at the same time he slipped his right hand in 
 under his coat tiU it found the grip of his Colts. 
 
 Amanda's face was drawn with distress and 
 indecision. She was in a fever to hurry for- 
 ward, to overtake her father before he should 
 reach home. But there was something in 
 those sounds which stirred terrible imaginings 
 within her. She could not bear to go on. 
 The thin, hair-raising cries were repeated. 
 
 " It sounds to me as if they were at some- 
 thing," she suggested. "What if they had 
 some one up a tree ? " 
 
 The picture made by her own suggestion 
 burned itself into her mind with awful clear- 
 ness. 
 
 " Perhaps they have something up a tree," 
 agreed Ross. " A grumbling old porcupine, 
 most likely. Much good may it do them ! " 
 
 " I don't know anything about wolves 
 except what I've read ; but I don't beheve 
 they're such fools as that," said the girl. 
 And coming to a sudden decision she started 
 to turn the moose. "Won't you please get 
 out and Hft the pung around so we won't 
 upset ? " 
 
 " By George, but you've got the pluck ! " 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 257 
 
 exclaimed the young man, obeying with 
 alacrity. ' ' But will your beast stand for it ? " 
 
 The beast evidently had no objection, but 
 rather, having unlimited faith in his human 
 protectors, seemed ambitious to get to close 
 quarters with the foe. 
 
 As the pung started up the Black River 
 road Amanda said deprecatingly : "I expect 
 I'm an awful fool ! But you know it might 
 be — some man ! And I just couldn't go 
 home and be happy if I didn't make sure, 
 could I ? Could you ? " 
 
 " I think you are " — he hesitated, while 
 ardent words crowded to his Ups, and finally 
 said : " all right." 
 
 It was tame enough, but the tone in which 
 he said it made it seem to Amanda a l5ndc 
 eulogy. In a sort of exaltation she urged 
 the moose forward. For aU the thought she 
 had of danger to herself she might have been 
 going to a poultry show. 
 
 Just at that moment the wolves gave cry 
 again, several voices commingling and with 
 an unmistakable note of excitement. 
 
 " They have got something there, sure 
 enough ! " exclaimed Ross. " And they're 
 close ahead — just around that bend." 
 
258 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 The words were hardly out of his mouth 
 when across the clamour of the wolves came 
 a shout — a man's voice, dauntless and autho- 
 ritative. 
 
 Amanda's heart stood still. " My God ! " 
 she gasped. " It's father ! " 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 The fact that for the last half dozen miles his 
 steps had been dogged by five wolves did not 
 greatly trouble John Carson. It made him 
 angry, however, and he wished they would 
 get up courage enough to come within reach 
 of his axe. At last he fell to thinking how 
 awkward it might be if anything should hap- 
 pen. And then, just as he was thinking of 
 it, happen it did. The shivered top of a 
 stump, hidden by a film of snow, caught his 
 snowshoe in such a way as to, trip him in the 
 full swing of his stride and hurl him headlong 
 to the bottom of a little gulch. As he fell 
 he heard the snap of a breaking snowshoe 
 frame. 
 
 The flesh of his nape crawled, expecting 
 the crunch of teeth. He was up again in- 
 stantly out of the smother, facing the enemy 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 259 
 
 and dashing the snow from his eyes. But as 
 instantly he sank back, his right leg giving 
 way beneath him. 
 
 The wolves had darted forward, but had 
 not quite screwed up their courage to attack 
 him. Three of them stood, with bared fangs, 
 glaring down upon him, green-eyed. A light- 
 ning sweep of the axe-blade convinced them 
 that the man was still too dangerous to meddle 
 with, and they shrank back. They knew 
 they could afford to wait. But they did not 
 hke waiting. Two or three of them sat back 
 rather disconsolately on their haunches and 
 gave utterance to impatient cries — perhaps 
 trying to summon others of their tribe who 
 would enable them to overwhelm their quarry 
 at once. 
 
 A hideous fear went through John Carson's 
 mind that he had broken his leg — that at 
 last, spent with pain and deadened with the 
 creeping frost, he would no longer be able to 
 fight off the cowardly pack. With his heart 
 thumping in his throat he felt searchingly at 
 the place of his hurt. Soon he satisfied him- 
 self that there were no bones broken. But 
 it was plain that he had wrenched loose one 
 of the great tendons of the leg. How long. 
 
26o MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 he wondered, would it take him to struggle 
 home, dragging the helpless limb yard by 
 yard, hour by hour through the drifts and 
 fighting off the wolves, who would grow 
 bolder when they came to realize his plight ? 
 He set his jaw doggedly for the battle, freed 
 his feet from the now useless snowshoes and 
 raised himself erect on one leg, using the 
 unbroken snowshoe as a crutch. Could he 
 win through ? Well, he would make a great 
 fight for it. 
 
 As he stood there, his sinews stretching 
 with heroic wrath, a sudden jangle of sleigh- 
 beUs came to his ears. He shouted fiercely. 
 A woman's voice, as well as a man's, answered 
 him. To his astonishment the woman's voice 
 was Amanda's. But his surprise turned to utter 
 bewilderment, when a minute later, around 
 the turn of the road came into view a gigantic 
 moose, ploughing triumphantly through the 
 snow and drawing a loaded pung behind 
 him. The wolves drew back uneasily at this 
 strange apparition. From the pung a shot 
 rang out, and then another, and one of the 
 wolves dropped, kicking voicelessly. The 
 others wheeled and fled for cover, stretching 
 out belly to snow in the frantic haste of their 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 261 
 
 flight. The next minute the strange equipage 
 came to a stand close before him, the moose 
 snorting and shaking his head as if taking 
 all the credit of the victory. 
 
 " Father ! father ! " cried Amanda in a 
 voice that shook on the edge of hysterical 
 tears, as she leaped from the pung and strug- 
 gled to his side, " what — what's the matter ? " 
 
 John Carson's big-chested laugh reassured 
 her. 
 
 " It's jest a little h'ist, an' a game leg 
 thereby," said he. " But ye've happened 
 along mighty handy, Sis, you an' your circus. 
 Them brutes had their own notions about 
 doctorin' me, an' as we couldn't agree there 
 was goin' to be trouble." 
 
 " Oh, dad ! " murmured Amanda. And 
 then, overwhelmed by the thought of what 
 would have happened if she had gone straight 
 on, instead of turning up the Black River 
 road, she sat down in the snow and began to 
 cry. 
 
 " There ! there ! Don't be scared. Honey ! 
 pleaded her father anxiously. " It's all over. 
 They're all gone. An' ever5d:hing's all 
 right." 
 
 " I don't think Miss Carson's scared," said 
 
262 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 Alec Ross dryly. " She's the bravest woman 
 in the world. But she's a bit overstrained. 
 Come, Miss Carson, if you'll turn your beast 
 around we'll help your father into the pung 
 and get him home as quickly as possible." 
 
 The drive home did not seem long to either 
 Alec Ross or Amanda ; nor, for all his suffer- 
 ing, did big John Carson let it appear that it 
 seemed long to him. If his face went white 
 from time to time at the torturing lunges of 
 the pung among the drifts it could not be 
 seen, and his strong voice maintained its 
 cheer. He had much to ask about, much to 
 be told, in order to understand the happy 
 miracle of Amanda's appearance so in the 
 nick of time. When the sound of their bells 
 and voices summoned Mrs. Carson to the 
 door, and in the streaming light she saw her 
 husband being almost hfted from the pung 
 between Amanda and young Ross, she darted 
 out into the snow with a scream. But her 
 terror was forgotten in thankfulness and joy 
 when she heard the story of his rescue. 
 
 After supper, when Alec Ross rose to get 
 ready for the long tramp into Brine Settle- 
 ment, there was vehement protest from both 
 John Carson and his wife. 
 
MOOSE THAT KNOCKED AT DOOR 263 
 
 " You don't quit my house this night, lad," 
 thundered Carson. 
 
 " The idee I " snapped Mrs. Carson with 
 cordial heat. " After all you've been through 
 these last two days ! If you must git into 
 the Settlement why it'll be time enough to 
 start to-morrow mornin', surely ! " 
 
 " You would be perfectly crazy to start 
 to-night," said Amanda. 
 
 " An' why not stop over with us for Christ- 
 mas, anyways ? " urged John Carson, who 
 could not imagine any place more attractive 
 than this backwoods home of his from which 
 he had to be so much away. " We'll take 
 good care of ye here, an' give ye lots of plum 
 puddin' an' doughnuts — won't we, mother ? 
 Take my advice, young man, an' stay right 
 where ye are ! " 
 
 " But, dad," protested Amanda, " you 
 forget that Mr. Ross may have friends of 
 his own in at the Settlement, so he may not 
 be able to spare us so much of his time." 
 
 " If you hain't got any special, particular 
 reason for hurrjdn' off to-morrow you'd better 
 stay over I " said Mrs. Carson. " We sure 
 want you." 
 
 Alec Ross hesitated, bojdshly in doubt as 
 
264 MORE KINDRED OF THE WILD 
 
 to whether he might allow himself to accept 
 the tempting invitation. His eyes sought 
 Amanda's, but she would not meet them. 
 
 " It was just ' for Christmas ' I was going 
 in," he answered. Then, rather hurriedly : 
 " I have no reasons half as great for wanting 
 to go to the Settlement as I have for wanting 
 to stay here." 
 
 " Then please stay ! " said Amanda, getting 
 up quickly from her place by the lamp to 
 hide the flush which she felt moimting to her 
 cheeks. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Frintinf Worlcs, Frome, and London.