understand, had no such misgivings in regard to moose. He knew how to
fight moose, and he had made more than one good meal, in his day, on
moose calf. He was game for the encounter. Reassured to see that the man
was not coming any nearer, and possibly even sensing instinctively that
the man was on his side in this matter, he crouched close against the
rock and waited, with one huge paw upraised, like a boxer on guard, for
the advancing bull to attack.
He had not long to wait.
The bull drew near very slowly, and with his head held high as if
intending to ignore his opponent. Peddler, watching intently, felt some
surprise at this attitude, even though he knew that the deadliest weapon
of a moose was its fore-hooves. He was wondering, indeed, if the
majestic beast expected to press past the bear without a battle, and if
the bear, on his part, would consent to this highly reasonable
arrangement. Then like a flash, without the slightest warning, the bull
whipped up one great hoof to the height of his shoulder and struck at
his crouching adversary.
The blow was lightning swift, and with such power behind it that, had it
reached its mark, it would have settled the whole matter then and there.
But the bear's parry was equally swift. His mighty forearm fended the
stroke so that it hissed down harmlessly past his head and clattered on
the stone floor of the trail. At the same instant, before the bull could
recover himself for another such pile-driving blow, the bear, who had
been gathered up like a coiled spring, elongated his body with all the
force of his gigantic hindquarters, thrusting himself irresistibly
between his adversary and the face of the rock, and heaving outwards.
These were tactics for which the great bull had no precedent in all his
previous battles. He was thrown off his balance and shouldered clean
over the brink. By a terrific effort he turned, captured a footing upon
the edge with his fore-hooves, and struggled frantically to drag himself
up again upon the ledge. But the bear's paw struck him a crashing
buffet straight between the wildly staring eyes. He fell backwards,
turning clean over, and went bouncing, in tremendous sprawling curves,
down into the abyss.
Upon the defeat of their leader the two cows and the calf turned
instantly--which the ledge at this point was wide enough to permit--and
fled back down the trail at a pace which seemed to threaten their own
destruction. The bear followed more prudently, with no apparent thought
of trying to overtake them. And Peddler kept on behind him, taking care,
however, after this exhibition of his champion's powers, not to press
him too closely.
The fleeing herd soon disappeared from view. It seemed to have
effectually cleared the trail before it, for the curious procession of
the bear and Peddler encountered no further obstacles.
After about an hour the lower slopes of the mountain were reached. The
ledge widened and presently broke up, with trails leading off here and
there among the foothills. At the first of these that appeared to offer
concealment the bear turned aside and vanished into a dense grove of
spruce with a haste which seemed to Peddler highly amusing in a beast of
such capacity and courage. He was content, however, to be so easily quit
of his dangerous advance guard.
"A durn good thing for me," he mused, "that that there b'ar never got up
the nerve to call my bluff, or I might 'a' been layin' now where that
unlucky old bull-moose is layin', with a lot o' flies crawlin' over me."
And as he trudged along the now easy and ordinary trail, he registered
two discreet resolutions--first, that never again would he cross Old
Bald Face without his gun _and_ his axe; and second, that never again
would he cross Old Bald Face at all, unless he jolly well had to.
The Morning of the Silver Frost
All night the big buck rabbit--he was really a hare, but the
backwoodsman called him a rabbit--had been squatting on his form under
the dense branches of a young fir tree. The branches grew so low that
their tips touched the snow all round him, giving him almost perfect
shelter from the drift of the storm. The storm was one of icy rain,
which everywhere froze instantly as it fell. All night it had been busy
encasing the whole wilderness--every tree and bush and stump, and the
snow in every open meadow or patch of forest glade--in an armour of ice,
thick and hard and glassy clear. And the rabbit, crouching motionless,
save for an occasional forward thrust of his long, sensitive ears, had
slept in unwonted security, knowing that none of his night-prowling foes
would venture forth from their lairs on such a night.
At dawn the rain stopped. The cold deepened to a still intensity. The
clouds lifted along the eastern horizon, and a thin, icy flood of
saffron and palest rose washed down across the glittering desolation.
The wilderness was ablaze on the instant with elusive tongues and points
of coloured light--jewelled flames, not of fire, but of frost. The world
had become a palace of crystal and opal, a dream-palace that would
vanish at a touch, a breath. And, indeed, had a wind arisen then to
breathe upon it roughly, the immeasurable crystal would have shattered
as swiftly as a dream, the too-rigid twigs and branches would have
snapped and clattered down in ruin.
The rabbit came out from under his little ice-clad fir tree, and, for
all his caution, the brittle twigs broke about him as he emerged, and
tinkled round him sharply. The thin, light sound was so loud upon the
stillness that he gave a startled leap into the air, landing many feet
away from his refuge. He slipped and sprawled, recovered his foothold,
and stood quivering, his great, prominent eyes trying to look in every
direction at once, his ears questioning anxiously to and fro, his
nostrils twitching for any hint of danger.
There was no sight, sound, or scent, however, to justify his alarm, and
in a few seconds, growing bolder, he remembered that he was hungry.
Close by he noticed the tips of a little birch sapling sticking up above
the snow. These birch-tips, in winter, were his favourite food. He
hopped toward them, going circumspectly over the slippery surface, and
sat up on his hindquarters to nibble at them. To his intense surprise
and disappointment, each twig and aromatic bud was sealed away,
inaccessible, though clearly visible, under a quarter inch of ice. Twig
after twig he investigated with his inquiring, sensitive cleft nostrils,
which met everywhere the same chill reception. Round and round the
tantalising branch he hopped, unable to make out the situation. At last,
thoroughly disgusted, he turned his back on the treacherous birch bush
and made for another, some fifty yards down the glade.
As he reached it he stopped short, suddenly rigid, his head half turned
over his shoulder, every muscle gathered like a spring wound up to
extreme tension. His bulging eyes had caught a movement somewhere behind
him, beyond the clump of twigs which he had just left. Only for a second
did he remain thus rigid. Then the spring was loosed. With a frantic
bound he went over and through the top of the bush. The shattered and
scattered crystals rang sharply on the shining snow-crust. And he sped
away in panic terror among the silent trees.
From behind the glassy twigs emerged another form, snow-white like the
fleeting rabbit, and fled in pursuit--not so swiftly, indeed, as the
rabbit--with an air of implacable purpose that made the quarry seem
already doomed. The pursuer was much smaller than his intended victim,
very low on the legs, long-bodied, slender, and sinuous, and he moved as
if all compacted of whipcord muscle. The grace of his long, deliberate
bounds was indescribable. His head was triangular in shape, the ears
small and close-set, the black-tipped muzzle sharply pointed, with the
thin, black lips upcurled to show the white fangs as if in a ferocious
but soundless snarl, and the eyes glowed red with blood-lust. Small as
it was, there was something terrible about the tiny beast, and its
pursuit seemed as inevitable as Fate. At each bound its steel-hard claws
scratched sharply on the crystal casing of the snow, and here and there
an icicle from a snapped twig went ringing silverly across the gleaming
surface.
For perhaps fifty yards the weasel followed straight upon the rabbit's
track. Then he swerved to the right. He had lost sight of his quarry.
But he knew its habits in flight. He knew it would run in a circle, and
he took a chord of that circle, so as to head the fugitive off. He knew
he might have to repeat this manoeuvre several times, but he had no
doubts as to the result. In a second or two he also had disappeared
among the azure shadows and pink-and-saffron gleams of the ice-clad
forest.
For several minutes the glade was empty, still as death, with the bitter
but delicate glories of the winter dawn flooding ever more radiantly
across it. On a sudden the rabbit appeared again, this time at the
opposite side of the glade. He was running irresolutely now, with little
aimless leaps to this side and to that, and his leaps were short and
lifeless, as if his nerve-power were getting paralysed. About the middle
of the glade he seemed to give up altogether, as if conquered by sheer
panic. He stopped, hesitated, wheeled round, and crouched flat upon the
naked snow, trembling violently, and staring, with eyes that started
from his head, at the point in the woods which he had just emerged from.
A second later the grim pursuer appeared. He saw his victim awaiting
him, but he did not hurry his pace by a hair's-breadth. With the same
terrible deliberation he approached. Only his jaws opened, his long
fangs glistened bare; a blood-red globule of light glowed redder at the
back of his eyes.
One more of those inexorable bounds, and he would have been at his
victim's throat. The rabbit screamed.
At that instant, with a hissing sound, a dark shadow dropped out of the
air. It struck the rabbit. He was enveloped in a dreadful flapping of
wings. Iron talons, that clutched and bit like the jaws of a trap,
seized him by the back. He felt himself partly lifted from the snow. He
screamed again. But now he struggled convulsively, no longer submissive
to his doom, the hypnotic spell cast upon him by the weasel being broken
by the shock of the great hawk's unexpected attack.
But the weasel was not of the stuff or temper to let his prey be
snatched thus from his jaws. Cruel and wanton assassin though he was,
ever rejoicing to kill for the lust of killing, long after his hunger
was satisfied, he had the courage of a wounded buffalo. A mere darting
sliver of white, he sprang straight into the blinding confusion of those
great wings.
He secured a hold just under one wing, where the armour of feathers was
thinnest, and began to gnaw inwards with his keen fangs. With a
startled cry, the hawk freed her talons from the rabbit's back and
clutched frantically at her assailant. The rabbit, writhing out from
under the struggle, went leaping off into cover, bleeding copiously, but
carrying no fatal hurt. He had recovered his wits, and had no idle
curiosity as to how the battle between his enemies would turn out.
The hawk, for all her great strength and the crushing superiority of her
weapons, had a serious disadvantage of position. The weasel, maintaining
his deadly grip and working inwards like a bull-dog, had hunched up his
lithe little body so that she could not reach it with her talons. She
tore furiously at his back with her rending beak, but the amazingly
tough, rubbery muscles resisted even that weapon to a certain degree. At
last, securing a grip with her beak upon her adversary's thigh, she
managed to pull the curled-up body out almost straight, and so secured a
grip upon it with one set of talons.
That grip was crushing, irresistible, but it was too far back to be
immediately fatal. The weasel's lithe body lengthened out under the
agonising stress of it, but it could not pull his jaws from their grip.
They continued inexorably their task of gnawing inwards, ever inwards,
seeking a vital spot.
The struggle went on in silence, as far as the voices of both combatants
were concerned. But the beating of the hawk's wings resounded on the
glassy-hard surface of the snow. As the struggle shifted ground, those
flapping wings came suddenly in contact with a bush, whose iced twigs
were brittle as glass and glittering like the prisms of a great crystal
candelabra. There was a shrill crash and a thin, ringing clatter as the
twigs shattered off and spun flying across the crust.
The sound carried far through the still, iridescent spaces of the
wilderness. It reached the ears of a foraging fox, who was tip-toeing
with dainty care over the slippering crust. He turned hopefully to
investigate, trusting to get a needed breakfast out of some
fellow-marauder's difficulties. At the edge of the glade he paused,
peering through a bush of crystal fire to size up the situation before
committing himself to the venture.
Desperately preoccupied though she was, the hawk's all-seeing eyes
detected the red outlines of the fox through the bush. With a frantic
beating of her wings she lifted herself from the snow. The fox darted
upon her with a lightning rush and a shattering of icicles. He was just
too late. The great bird was already in the air, carrying her deadly
burden with her. The fox leapt straight upwards, hoping to pull her
down, but his clashing jaws just failed to reach her talons. Labouring
heavily in her flight, she made off, striving to gain a tree-top where
she might perch and once more give her attention to the gnawing torment
which clung beneath her wing.
The fox, being wise, and seeing that the hawk was in extremest straits,
ran on beneath her as she flew, gazing upwards expectantly.
The weasel, meanwhile, with that deadly concentration of purpose which
characterises his tribe, paid no heed to the fact that he was journeying
through the air. And he knew nothing of what was going on below. His
flaming eyes were buried in his foe's feathers, his jaws were steadily
working inwards toward her vitals.
Just at the edge of the glade, immediately over the top of a branchy
young paper-birch which shot a million coloured points of light in the
sunrise, the end came. The fangs of the weasel met in the hawk's wildly
throbbing heart. With a choking burst of scarlet blood it stopped.
Stone dead, the great marauder of the air crashed down through the slim
birch-top, with a great scattering of gleams and crystals. With
wide-sprawled wings she thudded down upon the snow-crust, almost under
the fox's complacent jaws. The weasel's venomous head, covered with
blood, emerged triumphant from the mass of feathers.
As the victor writhed free, the fox, pouncing upon him with a careless
air, seized him by the neck, snapped it neatly, and tossed the long,
limp body aside upon the snow. He had no use for the rank, stringy meat
of the weasel when better fare was at hand. Then he drew the hawk close
to the trunk of the young birch, and lay down to make a leisurely
breakfast.
THE END
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
The following pages contain advertisements of books by the same author
or on kindred subjects.
Neighbors Unknown
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
AUTHOR OF "KINGS IN EXILE," "HOOF AND CLAW," ETC.
_Decorated cloth, illustrated, 12mo, $1.50_
"Mr. Roberts knows his animals intimately and writes about them with
understanding and reality."--_The Continent._
"Whether viewed as stories, as natural history, or as literature, young
and old should lose no time in making the acquaintance of 'Neighbors
Unknown.'"--_N. Y. Times._
"Few stories about animals have as strong a power to interest and
entertain or carry as deep a conviction of their truth and
reasonableness as those by Charles G. D. Roberts, which comprise the
volume 'Neighbors Unknown.'"--_Chicago Tribune._
"What observation, what power of description is displayed in Charles G.
D. Roberts's latest volume of stories!"--_Bellman._
Hoof and Claw
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
AUTHOR OF "KINGS IN EXILE," "NEIGHBORS UNKNOWN," ETC.
With illustrations by PAUL BRANSOM
_Ill., decorated cloth, 12mo, $1.35_
"Whoever loves the wilderness and its furred and feathered inhabitants
is always glad to know of a new book by Charles G. D. Roberts, whose
knowledge and sympathy with wild things is profound, but who never falls
into that danger of humanizing his characters."--_Springfield
Republican._
"A great deal of keen observation has evidently gone into the making of
these tales ... city dwellers owe to this sort of book a debt which they
probably will never sufficiently pay, and that is to read
them."--_Chicago Evening Post._
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
THE BACKWOODSMEN
_Illustrated. Cloth. 12mo, $1.50_
Juvenile Library $.50
"'The Backwoodsmen' shows that the writer knows the backwoods as the
sailor knows the sea. Indeed, his various studies of wild life in
general, whether cast in the world of short sketch or story or
full-length narrative, have always secured an interested public.... Mr.
Roberts possesses a keen artistic sense which is especially marked when
he is rounding some story to its end. There is never a word too much,
and he invariably stops when the stop should be made.... Few writers
exhibit such entire sympathy with the nature of beasts and birds as
he."--_Boston Herald._
"When placed by the side of the popular novel, the strength of these
stories causes them to stand out like a huge primitive giant by the side
of a simpering society miss, and while the grace and beauty of the girl
may please the eye for a moment, it is to the rugged strength of the
primitive man your eyes will turn to glory in his power and simplicity.
In simple, forceful style Mr. Roberts takes the reader with him out into
the cold, dark woods, through blizzards, stalking game, encountering all
the dangers of the backwoodsmen's life, and enjoying the close contact
with Nature in all her moods. His descriptions are so vivid that you can
almost feel the tang of the frosty air, the biting sting of the snowy
sleet beating on your face, you can hear the crunch of the snow beneath
your feet, and when, after heartlessly exposing you to the elements, he
lets you wander into camp with the characters of the story, you stretch
out and bask in the warmth and cheer of the fire."--_Western Review._
KINGS IN EXILE
The Macmillan Fiction Library, Ill., 12mo, $.50
_Illustrated. Cloth. 12mo, $1.50_
"More wonderful animal tales such as only Mr. Roberts can relate. With
accurate knowledge of the exiled beasts and a vivid imagination,
the author writes stories that are even more than usually
interesting."--_Book News Monthly._
"It is surprising how much of the wilderness his wistful eye discovers
in a Central Park buffalo yard. For this gift of vision the book will be
read, a vision with its reminder of the scent of dark forests of fir,
the awful and majestic loneliness of sky-towering peaks, the roar of the
breakers and salty smell of the sea, the whispering silences of the
forests. We rise from its pages with the breath of the open spaces in
our lungs."--_Boston Transcript._
BY CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS
AUTHOR OF "KINGS IN EXILE," "THE BACKWOODSMEN," ETC.
Children of The Wild
_With illustrations, cloth, 12 mo_, $1.35
As might be inferred from the title of Charles G. D. Roberts' new book,
"Children of the Wild," the reader is brought very close to nature. Mr.
Roberts has written many stories about the wild, all of which have the
atmosphere which few writers are able to breathe into their books--the
atmosphere of outdoor life told with the sure touch of a recognized
authority. Here he writes for boys particularly, still of the creatures
of the forests and streams, but with a boy as the central human figure.
Babe and his Uncle Andy and Bill, the guide, are camping in the
wilderness. What they see and hear there suggest stories about young
animals, the "children of the wild." These tales are recounted by Uncle
Andy. In them Mr. Roberts shows that he knows his fellowmen fully as
well as he knows the lore of the woods and the haunts and habits of the
animals of the forest. Into his stories creep snatches of humor,
glimpses of tragedy, and the poignant touch of pathos, all of which make
his work natural. The present work should prove a most acceptable
remembrance to every boy who cares, and what boy does not, for a hearty
book of outdoor life.
The Feet of the Furtive
_Decorated cloth, 12mo_, $1.35
Illustrated by PAUL BRANSOM
It is to be doubted whether there is a more popular animal writer to-day
than Charles G. D. Roberts, whose stories of forests and streams are
read with pleasure by young and old alike. In his present book are tales
of the bear, the bat, the seal, the moose, rabbit and other animals
written in his usual vivid style.
"A great book for boys of all ages, and one that could have been written
only by Charles G. D. Roberts."--_Boston Times._
JACK LONDON'S NEW BOOK
The Turtles of Tasman
_$1.25_
Here are brought together some of Mr. London's best short stories,
stories of adventure, of character, of unusual experiences in unusual
places. Here will be found _The Turtles of Tasman_, a tale of two
brothers as different in nature as it is possible for human beings to
be, and raising the old question as to which got the most out of life,
the one with possessions or the one with rich memories; here also _The
Eternity of Forms_, a mystery story dealing with a crime and its
expiation; here again _Told in the Drooling Ward_, a masterly bit of
writing which gives a human insight into the life of the inmates of a
home for feebleminded people. Among the other stories are noted _The
Hobo and the Fairy_, _The Prodigal Father_, _The First Poet_, _Finis_
and _The End of the Story_.
Gold Must Be Tried by Fire
BY RICHARD AUMERLE MAHER
AUTHOR OF "THE SHEPHERD OF THE NORTH."
From the opening chapter when Daidie Grattan revolts at the "eternal
grind," defiantly destroys a valuable piece of machinery in the factory
where she is employed, and runs out into the open, this story is brimful
of action and character. In _The Shepherd of the North_ Mr. Maher
demonstrated his ability to create tense situations. Here his skill is
once again seen and in addition he makes the reader acquainted with a
number of interesting people, not the least of whom are Daidie herself
and her ardent lover.
The Key to Betsy's Heart
BY SARAH NOBLE IVES
_Cloth, 12mo, $1.25_
This is the story of Betsy and her dog. Betsy is a little country girl
who, after her mother's death, is taken into the family of her Aunt
Kate, a wise and charming person whose duty it is to bring Betsy up
properly, while Betsy in turn has to bring up Van, a fox terrier. It is
the dog, of course, that proves to be the key to the shy girl's
heart--an extraordinarily nice "pup" whose education is carried on
simultaneously with Betsy's, only along different lines. Both as a dog
story and as a girl story _The Key to Betsy's Heart_ is eminently
satisfying, and it is safe to conjecture that there will be many little
girls in real life and a few elders, too, who will be delighted with it.
Pilot
BY H. PLUNKETT GREEN
Pilot is a roguish and cunning dog who is an inveterate poacher and has
a distinct sense of humor. He always gets the best of the gamekeepers
and other enemies and laughs in their faces. About him Mr. Green has
woven a thoroughly enjoyable--and humorous--story. In addition to this
the book includes a number of other tales, one or two dealing with
fairies, with real charm and imagination, and others having to do with
boys and fishing.
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
Publishers 64-66 Fifth Avenue New York
End of Project Gutenberg's The Secret Trails, by Charles G. D. Roberts