Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-04-02
Directly Above
the Leader the
Cruel GOshawk
Came to a Stop.

and he glded moonless, with the wind of his speed
Kissing in the Stff-set feathers and his fat cruel head
limb of the wedge shortened little certain of the
younger birds at the nervOuSly drew closer to
their fellows But the leader and the other older birds
paid attention to the menace, beyond turning up-
ward as they flew steady and watchful gaze
few moments later and apparently without effort,
the splendid marauder sailed on ahead. Two minutes
more, and he had overtaken the journeying geese.
Pouncing upon the hinderrnost he gripped its out
stretched neck with his cutchng alons and fairly tore
out its throat But it too heavy bird for him to
bear up; so, after two of tremendous flap
ping he let drop. 1t fell sprawlngly turning
eral times in the air before it landed with crash in the
top of dense old cedar. The great hawk, with half
folded wings, dropped after it straight stone and
caught again securely in his talons just touched
the branches With heavy fappings he guided it to
perch where he could devour it in comfort and the
they beat their way above the scene stared
down on it with eyes of grave Indifference
Soon passing beyond the zones of canefeld pine
barren and cypress swamp they crossed the harsh and
the gantet of the rifles of the wild mountaineers. In
this perous passage they lost three of the flock; but
their leader swept them without allowing the
to become demOralized. For a few seconds only was
there confusion, strong bird the head of
the wedge having got his death wound, struggled
bl1ndly to keep on. A moment more, however and he
went plunging downward and the line closed up.
And now the skies they traversed longer of
palptatng blue, but more often of sullen gray
lowering with black and windrent clouds Gusts of icy
rain burst them, and those wanton storms which
strive to buffet back the vanguardS of the difdent
Northern spring The rivers that now rolled swiring
beneath them cold and swollen foods heavy with
silt The broad plains that stretched the horizon and
beyond began to be notified uncouthy with patches of
gray and shrinking Soon the brown disappeared
and all was snow, white and intermnabe, broken only
by the black watercourses rolling along their bur
den of logs and ice by dark green ragged belts of
spruce forest. Such scattered cities passed beneath
them they hardly needed unless it CHANGED to be
night and the city one of Importance. Then the wide
flung glare always drew them, and there would be,
the part of the younger BIRDS tendency descend and
investigate But the leader always checked this mex
oraby, and swung the flock, sometimes, to higher
level
VOYAGING thus day by day toward ever and
more inhospitable lands and skies. they came at
last to those sheteress and incredibly bleak expanses
of the Barren Grounds that stretch along the northwest
shores of Hudson Bay In a binding smother of snow
they arrived at small lake few miles inland from the
which had been the leaders objective since
leaving the drenched Florida lagoons. But he had
too far outfown the advance of the sluggish spring and
the little lake was not yet open After crcling above it
with loud, disappointed cries, they flew off down the
course of the shallow. turbulent stream which
boiling from under the ice and aghted amid the muddy
and foes that rnged the shores of the bay