formed the heart of the nest. They were a little smaller than a
robin's egg, and of a soft creamy white, blotched irregularly with
dull purplish maroon of varying tone. So jealous of these mottled
marvels were the king-birds that not even the most harmless of
visitors were allowed to look upon them. If so much as a thrush, or a
pewee, or a mild-mannered white throat, presumed to alight on the very
remotest branch of that elm, it was brusquely driven away.
One morning early, the male king-bird was sitting very erect, as was
his custom, on the naked tip of a long, slender, dead branch some ten
feet above the nest The morning chill was yet in the air, so it was a
little early for the flies which formed his food to be stirring. But
he was hungry, and on the alert for the first of them to appear. Only
the tense feathers of his crest, raised to show the flame-orange spot
which was his kingly crown, betrayed his eagerness; for he was a
self-contained bird. The sun was just beginning to show the red
topmost edge of his rim through the jagged line of firs across the
river, and the long, level streaks of aerial rose, creeping under the
branches, filled all the shadowed places of the wilderness with
mysterious light. The eastward sides of the tree-trunks and naked
branches glimmered pink; and dew-wet leaves, here and there, shone
like pale jewels of pink, amber, and violet. The mirror-like surface
of the river was blurred with twisting spirals of mist, silvery and
opalescent, through which the dim-seen figure of a duck in straight
flight shot like a missile.
As the king-bird sat erect on his branch, watching with bright eyes
the miracle of the morning, an over-adventurous dragon-fly arose from
a weed-top below him and flew into the rosy light. The bird darted
straight and true, zigzagged sharply as the victim tried to dodge,
caught the lean prize in his beak, and carried it very gallantly to
his mate upon the nest. Then he fluttered back to his post on the
branch.
As the sun got up over the hill, and the warmth dried their wings, the
intervale began to hum softly with dancing flies and hurrying
beetles, and the king-bird was continually on the move, twittering
with soft monotony (his sole attempt at song), between each successful
sally. At length the female rose from her eggs, stood on the edge of
the nest, and gave an impatient call. Her mate flew down to take her
place, and the two perched side by side, making a low chirping sound
in their throats.
Just at this moment a small black snake, warmed into activity and
hunger by the first rays of the sun, glided to the tree and began to
climb. Bird's-nesting was the black snake's favourite employment; but
it had not stopped to consider that the nest in this particular tree
was a king-bird's. It climbed swiftly and noiselessly, and the
preoccupied birds did not get glimpse of it till it was within two
feet of the nest.
There was no time for consultation in the face of this peril. Like
lightning the two darted down upon the enemy, buffeting its head with
swift wing-strokes. The first assault all but swept it from the tree,
and it shrank back upon itself with flattened head and angry hiss.
Then it struck fiercely, again and again, at its bewildering
assailants. But swift as were its movements, those of the king-birds
were swifter, and its fangs never hit upon so much as one harassing
feather. Suddenly, in its fury, it struck out too far, weakening for a
moment its hold upon the crevices of the bark; and in that moment,
both birds striking it together, its squirming folds were hurled to
the ground. Thoroughly cowed, it slipped under cover and made off,
only a wavering line among the grasses betraying its path. The
king-birds, with excited and defiant twittering, followed for a little
its hidden retreat, and then returned elated to the nest.
Among the kindred of the wild as well as among those of roof and
hearth, events are apt to go in company. For day after day things will
revolve in set fashion. Then chance takes sudden interest in a
particular spot or a certain individual, and there, for a time, is
established a centre for events. This day of the black snake was an
eventful day for the little kings of the intervale. They had hardly
more than recovered from their excitement over the snake when a red
squirrel, his banner of a tail flaunting superbly behind him, came
bounding over the grass to their tree. His intentions may have been
strictly honourable. But a red squirrel's intentions are liable to
change in the face of opportunity. As he ran up the tree, and paused
curiously at the nested crotch, a feathered thunderbolt struck him on
the side of the head. It knocked him clean out of the tree; and he
turned a complete somersault in the air before he could get his
balance and spread his legs so as to alight properly. When he reached
the ground he fled in dismay, and was soon heard chattering
vindictively among the branches of a far-off poplar.
It was a little before noon when came the great event of this eventful
day. The male king-bird was on the edge of the nest, feeding a fat
moth to his mate. As he straightened up and glanced around he saw a
large marsh-hawk winnowing low across the river. As it reached the
shore it swooped into the reed-fringe, but rose again without a
capture. For a few minutes it quartered the open grass near the bank,
hunting for mice. The two king-birds watched it with anxious, angry
eyes. Suddenly it sailed straight toward the tree; and the king-birds
shot into the air, ready for battle.
It was not the precious nest, however, nor the owners of the nest, on
which the fierce eyes of the marsh-hawk had fallen. When he was within
twenty paces of the nest he dropped into the grass. There was a moment
of thrashing wings, then he rose again, and beat back toward the river
with a young muskrat in his talons.
Considering the size and savagery of the hawk, any small bird but the
little king would have been well content with his riddance. Not so the
king-birds. With shrill chirpings they sped to the rescue. Their wings
cuffed the marauder's head in a fashion that confused him. Their
wedge-like beaks menaced his eyes and brought blood through the short
feathers on the top of his head. He could make no defence or
counter-attack against opponents so small and so agile of wing. At
length a sharp jab split the lower lid of one eye,--and this added
fear to his embarrassment. He dropped the muskrat, which fell into the
river and swam off little the worse for the experience.
Relieved of his burden, the hawk made all speed to escape. At the
farther shore the female king-bird desisted from the pursuit, and
hurried back to her nest. But the avenging wrath of the male was not
so easily pacified. Finding the tormentor still at his head, the hawk
remembered the security of the upper air, and began to mount in sharp
spirals. The king-bird pursued till, seen from the earth, he seemed no
bigger than a bee dancing over the hawk's back. Then he disappeared
altogether; and the hawk, but for his nervous, harassed flight, might
have seemed to be alone in that clear altitude. At last his wings
were seen to steady themselves into the tranquil, majestic soaring of
his kind. Presently, far below the soaring wings, appeared a tiny dark
shape, zigzagging swiftly downward; and soon the king-bird, hastening
across the river, alighted once more on his branch and began to preen
himself composedly.
The Kill
It was early winter and early morning, and the first of the light lay
sharp on the new snow. The sun was just lifting over a far and low
horizon. Long, level rays, streaking the snow with straight,
attenuated stains of pinkish gold and sharp lines of smoky-blue
shadow, pierced the edges of the tall fir forests of Touladi. Though
every tint--of the blackish-green firs, of the black-brown trunks, of
the violet and yellow and gray birch saplings, of the many-hued snow
spaces--was unspeakably tender and delicate, the atmosphere was of a
transparency and brilliancy almost vitreous. One felt as if the whole
scene might shatter and vanish at the shock of any sudden sound. Then
a sound came--but it was not sudden; and the mystic landscape did not
dissolve. It was a sound of heavy, measured, muffled footfalls
crushing the crisp snow. There was a bending and swishing of bare
branches, a rattling as of twigs upon horn or ivory--and a huge bull
moose strode into view. With his splendid antlers laid far back he
lifted his great, dilating nostrils, stared down the long, white
lanelike open toward the rising sun, and sniffed the air inquiringly.
Then he turned to browse on the aromatic twigs of the birch saplings.
The great moose was a lord of his kind. His long, thick, glistening
hair was almost black over the upper portions of his body, changing
abruptly to a tawny ochre on the belly, and the inner and lower parts
of the legs. The maned and hump-like ridge of his mighty
fore-shoulders stood a good six feet three from the ground; and the
spread of his polished, palmated antlers, so massive as to look a
burden for even so colossal a head and neck as his, was well beyond
five feet. The ridge of his back sloped down to hind-quarters
disproportionately small, finished off with a little, meagrely tufted
tail that on any beast less regal in mien and stature would have
looked ridiculous. The majesty of a bull moose, however, is too secure
to be marred by the incongruous pettiness of his tail. From the lower
part of his neck, where the great muscles ran into the spacious,
corded chest, hung a curious tuft of long and very coarse black hair,
called among woodsmen the "bell." As he turned to his browsing, his
black form stood out sharply against the background of the firs. Far
down the silent, glittering slope, a good mile distant, a tall, gray
figure on snow-shoes appeared for a second in the open, caught sight
of the pasturing moose, and vanished hurriedly into the birch
thickets.
[Illustration: "STARED DOWN THE LONG, WHITE LANELIKE OPEN."]
Having cropped a few mouthfuls here and there from branches within
easy reach, the great bull set himself to make a more systematic
breakfast. Selecting a tall young birch with a bushy top, he leaned
his chest against it until he bore it to the ground. Then, straddling
it and working his way along toward the top, he held it firmly while
he browsed at ease upon the juiciest and most savoury of the tips.
For some minutes he had been thus pleasantly occupied, when suddenly
an obscure apprehension stirred in his brain. He stopped feeding,
lifted his head, and stood motionless. Only his big ears moved,
turning their wary interrogations toward every point of the compass,
and his big nostrils suspiciously testing every current of air.
Neither nose nor ears, the most alert of his sentinels, gave any
report of danger. He looked about, saw nothing unusual, and fell again
to feeding.
Among the wild kindreds, as far as man can judge, there are
occasional intuitions that seem to work beyond the scope of the
senses. It is not ordinarily so, else would all hunting, on the part
of man or of the hunting beasts, be idle. But once in a while, as if
by some unwilling telepathic communication from hunter to hunted, or
else by an obscure and only half-delivered message from the powers
that preside over the wild kindreds, a warning of peril is conveyed to
a pasturing creature while yet the peril is far off and unrevealed.
The great moose found his appetite all gone. He backed off the sapling
and let its top spring up again toward the empty blue. He looked back
nervously over his trail, sniffed the air, waved his ears inquiringly.
The more he found nothing to warrant his uneasiness, the more his
uneasiness grew. It was as if Death, following far off but
relentlessly, had sent a grim menace along the windings of the trail.
Something like a panic came into the dilating eyes of the big bull. He
turned toward the fir forest, at a walk which presently broke into a
shambling, rapid trot; and presently he disappeared among the sombre
and shadowy colonnades.
In the strange gloom of the forest, a transparent gloom confused by
thin glints and threads of penetrating, pinkish light, the formless
alarm of the moose began to subside. In a few minutes his wild run
diminished into a rapid walk. He would not go back to his feeding,
however. He had been seized with a shuddering distrust of the young
birch thickets on the slope. Over beyond the next ridge there were
some bushy swales which he remembered as good pasturage--where,
indeed, he had a mind to "yard up" for the winter, when the snow
should get too deep for wide ranging. Once more quickening his pace,
he circled back almost to the fringe of the forest, making toward a
little stretch of frozen marsh, which was one of his frequented
runways between ridge and ridge. That nameless fear in the birch
thickets still haunted him, however, and he moved with marvellous
quietness. Not once did his vast antlers and his rushing bulk disturb
the dry undergrowth, or bring the brittle, dead branches crashing down
behind him. The only sound that followed him was that of the shallow
snow yielding crisply under his feet, and a light clicking, as the
tips of his deep-cleft, loose-spreading hoofs came together at the
recovery of each stride. This clicking, one of the most telltale of
wilderness sounds to the woodsman's ear, grew more sharp and insistent
as the moose increased his speed, till presently it became a sort of
castanet accompaniment to his long, hurried stride. A porcupine, busy
girdling a hemlock, ruffled and rattled his dry quills at the sound,
and peered down with little, disapproving eyes as the big, black form
fled by below him.
The snowy surface of the marsh was stained with ghosts of
colour--aerial, elusive tinges of saffron and violet--as the moose
came out upon it. As he swung down its lonely length, his gigantic
shadow, lopsided and blue, danced along threateningly, its head lost
in the bushes fringing the open. When he came to the end of the marsh,
where the wooded slope of the next ridge began, he half paused,
reaching his long muzzle irresolutely toward the tempting twigs of a
young willow thicket; but before he could gather one mouthful, that
nameless fear came over him again, that obscure forewarning of doom,
and he sprang forward toward the cover of the firs. As he sprang,
there was a movement and a flash far down a wooded alley--a sharp,
ringing crack--and something invisible struck him in the body. He had
been struck before, by falling branches, or by stones bounding down a
bluff, but this missile seemed very different and very small. Small as
it was, however, the blow staggered him for an instant; then he
shuddered, and a surge of heat passed through his nerves. But a second
later he recovered himself fully, and bounded into the woods, just in
time to escape a second bullet, as a second shot rang out in vain
behind him.
Straight up the wooded steep he ran, startled, but less actually
terrified now, in fleeing from a definite peril, then when trembling
before a formless menace. This peril was one that he felt he could
cope with. He knew his own strength and speed. Now that he had the
start of them, these slow-moving, relentless man-creatures, with the
sticks that spoke fire, could never overtake him. With confident
vigour he breasted the incline, his mighty muscles working as never
before under the black hair of shoulder and flank. But he did not know
that every splendid stride was measured by a scarlet sign on the snow.
For a few minutes the moose rushed on through the morning woods, up
and up between the tall trunks of the firs, half-forgetting his alarm
in the triumph of his speed. Then it began to seem to him that the
slope of the hill had grown steeper than of old; gradually, and
half-unconsciously, he changed his course, and ran parallel with the
ridge; and with this change the scarlet signs upon his trail grew
scanter. But in a few minutes more he began to feel that the snow was
deeper than it had been--deeper, and more clinging. It weighted his
hoofs and fetlocks as it had never done before, and his pace
slackened. He began to be troubled by the thick foam welling into his
nostrils and obstructing his breath. As he blew it forth impatiently
it made red flecks and spatters on the snow. He had no pain, no
realization that anything had gone wrong with him. But his eyes took
on suddenly a harassed, anxious look, and he felt himself growing
tired. He must rest a little before continuing his flight.
The idea of resting while his enemies were still so near and hot upon
the trail, would, at any other time, have been rejected as absurd; but
now the brain of the black moose was growing a little confused. Often
before this he had run till he felt tired, and then lain down to rest.
He had never felt tired till he knew that he had run a great distance.
Now, from his dimming intelligence the sense of time had slipped away.
He had been running, and he felt tired. Therefore, he must have run a
long distance, and his slow enemies must have been left far behind. He
could safely rest. His old craft, however, did not quite fail him at
this point. Before yielding to the impulse which urged him to lie
down, he doubled and ran back, parallel to his trail and some fifty
paces from it, for a distance of perhaps two hundred yards. Staggering
at every other stride, and fretfully blowing the stained froth from
his nostrils, he crouched behind a thicket of hemlock seedlings, and
watched the track by which his foes must come.
For a little while he kept his watch alertly, antlers laid back, ears
attentive, eyes wide and bright. Then, so slowly that he did not seem
aware of it himself, his massive head drooped forward till his muzzle
lay outstretched upon the snow. So far back from the gate of the
senses drew the life within him, that when three gray-coated figures
on snow-shoes went silently past on his old trail, he never saw them.
His eyes were filled with a blur of snow, and shadows, and unsteady
trunks, and confusing little gleams of light.
Of the three hunters following on the trail of the great black moose,
one was more impetuous than the others. It was his first moose that he
was trailing; and it was his bullet that was speaking through those
scarlet signs on the snow. He kept far ahead of his comrades, elated
and fiercely glad, every nerve strung with expectation. Behind each
bush, each thicket, he looked for the opportunity to make the final,
effective shot that should end the great chase. Not unlearned in
woodcraft, he knew what it meant when he reached the loop in the
trail. He understood that the moose had gone back to watch for his
pursuers. What he did not know or suspect was, that the watcher's eyes
had grown too dim to see. He took it for granted that the wise beast
had marked their passing, and fled off in another direction as soon as
they got by. Instead, however, of redoubling his caution, he plunged
ahead with a burst of fresh enthusiasm. He was very properly sure his
bullet had done good work, since it had so soon compelled the enduring
animal to rest.
A puff of wandering air, by chance, drifted down from the running man
to the thicket, behind which the black bull lay, sunk in his torpor.
The dreaded man-scent--the scent of death to the wilderness folk--was
blown to the bull's nostrils. Filled though they were with that red
froth, their fine sense caught the warning. The eyes might fail in
their duty, the ears flag and betray their trust; but the nostrils,
skilled and schooled, were faithful to the last. Their imperative
message pierced to the fainting brain, and life resumed its duties.
Once more the dull eyes awoke to brightness. The great, black form
lunged up and crashed forward into the open, towering, formidable, and
shaking ominous antlers.
Taken by surprise, and too close to shoot in time, the rash hunter
sprang aside to make for a tree. He had heard much of the charge of a
wounded moose. As he turned, the toe of one snow-shoe caught on a
branchy stub, just below the surface of the snow. The snow-shoe turned
side on, and tripped him, and he fell headlong right in the path of
the charging beast.
As he fell, he heard a shout from his comrades, hurrying up far behind
him; but the thought that flashed through him was that they could not
be in time. Falling on his face, he expected the next instant to feel
the bull's great rending hoofs descend upon his back and stamp his
life out.
But the blow never fell. The moose had seen his foe coming, and
charged to meet him, his strength and valour flashing up for an
instant as the final emergency confronted him. But ere he could reach
that prostrate shape in the snow, he forgot what he was doing, and
stopped short. With legs a little apart he braced himself, and stood
rigid. His noble head was held high, as if he scorned the enemies who
had dogged him to his last refuge. But in reality he no longer saw
them. The breath came hard through his rattling nostrils, and his
eyes, very wide open, were dark with a fear which he could not
understand. The life within him strove desperately to maintain its
hold upon that free and lordly habitation. The second hunter, now, was
just lifting his rifle,--but before he could sight and fire, the chase
was ended. That erect, magnificent figure, towering over the fallen
man, collapsed all at once. It fell together into a mere heap of hide
and antlers. The light in the eyes went out, as a spark that is
trodden, and the laboured breathing stopped in mid-breath. The fallen
hunter sprang up, rushed forward with a shout, and drew his knife
across the outstretched throat.
The Little People of the Sycamore
I.
The fantastic old sycamore, standing alone on the hill, thrust out its
one gaunt limb across the face of the moon. It was late April, and the
buds not yet swollen to bursting. On the middle of the limb, blackly
silhouetted against the golden disk, crouched a raccoon, who sniffed
the spring air and scanned the moon-washed spaces. From the marshy
spots at the foot of the hill, over toward the full-fed, softly
rushing brook, came the high piping of the frogs, a voice of poignant,
indeterminate desire.
Having reconnoitred the night to her satisfaction, the raccoon
returned to a deep hole in the sycamore, and hastily touched with her
pointed nose each in turn of her five, blind, furry little ones. Very
little they were, half-cub, half-kitten in appearance, with their long
noses, long tails, and bear-like feet. They huddled luxuriously
together in the warm, dry darkness of the den, and gave little
squeals in response to their mother's touch. In her absence they had
been voiceless, almost moveless, lest voice or motion should betray
them to an enemy.
Having satisfied herself as to the comfort of the furry children, the
old raccoon nimbly descended the tree, ran lightly down the hill, and
made for the nearest pool, where the frogs were piping. She was a
sturdy figure, yet lithe and graceful, about the bulk of the largest
cat, and with a tail almost the length of her body. Her legs, however,
were much shorter and more powerful than those of a cat; and when, for
a moment of wary observation, she stood still, her feet came down
flatly, like those of a bear, though in running she went on her toes,
light as the seed of the milkweed. Her head was much like a bear's in
shape, with the nose very long and pointed; and a bar of black across
the middle of her face, gave a startling intensity to her dark, keen,
half-malicious eyes. Her fur, very long and thick, was of a cloudy
brown; and the black rings on her gray tail stood out sharply in the
moonlight. Both in expression and in movement, she showed that strange
mixture of gaiety, ferocity, mischievousness, and confident sagacity,
which makes the raccoon unlike in character to all the other wild
kindreds.
[Illustration: "CROUCHED FLAT, MOVELESS AS THE LOG ITSELF."]
Though she was on important affairs intent, and carrying the cares of
the family, she was not too absorbed to feel the glad impulse of the
spring; and for sheer exuberance of life, she would go bounding over a
stick or a stone as if it were a tree or a boulder. Though life was a
serious matter, she was prepared to get out of it all the fun there
was to be had.