The review. [volume] (High Point, N.C.) 1908-19??, 1921-01-20
CHAPTER I-Continued,

For when all thugs are said and
done, there were few bigger towards
in the whole wilderness world than
WhisperfoOt. A good many people
think that GraycOat the coyote
could take lessons from him in this
respect. But others, knowing how a
hunter is brought in occasionally with
almost all human resemblance gone
from him because cougar charged in
his death agony, think this is unfair
to the larger animal. And it is true
that q full-grOwn cougar will some
times attack horned cattle, something
that no American animal cares to do
unless he wants a good fight on his
paws and of which the very thought
would throw Graycoat into a spasm !;
and there have been even stranger
stories, If one could quite believe
them. A certain measure of respect
must be extended to any animal that
will hunt the great bull elk, for to
miss the stroke and get caught be-
meath the churning, flashing, slashing,
raZor-edged front hoofs is simply
death, painful and without delay. But
the difficulty lies in the fact that these
things are not done in the ordinary,
rational blood Of hunting. What an
animal does in its death agony, or to
protect it's young, what great game it
follows in the starving times of win
ter, can be put to neither it's debit
nor it's credit. A coyote will charge
when mad. A raccoon will put up
wicked fight when cornered. A hen
+ho4
nest. When hunting was fairly good,
Whisperfoot avoided the elk and steer
almost as punctiliOusly as he avoided
men, which is saying very much in
deed; and any kind of terrier could
usually drive him straight up tree.
But he did like to pretend to be
very great and terrible among the
smaller forest creatures. And he was
Fear itself to the deer. A human
hunter who would kill two deer a
week for fifty-two weeks would be
called much uglier name than poach-
er; but yet this had been Whisper
foot's record, on and off, ever since
his second year. Many a great buck
wore the scar of the full stroke-aft-
er which Whisperfoot had lost his
hold. Many a fawn had crouched
painting with terror in the thickets at
Just a tawny light on the gnarled limb
of a pine Many q doe would grow
.great-eyed and terrified at just his
strange, pungent smell on the wind.
He 'yawned again, and his fangs
looked white and abnOrmally large in
the moonlight. His great, green eyes
were still clouded and languOrous
from sleep. Then he began to steal
up the ridge toward his hunting
grounds. It was curious thing that
he walked straight In the face Of the
Boft wind that came down from the
now fields, and yet there wasn't a
veathercock to be seen anywhere. And
either had the chipmunk seen him
yet a paw and hold it up, after the
pproved fashion Of holding up a fn-
er. He had better way Of knowing
"a chill at the end Of his whiskerS.
The little, GREATNESS night sounds
the brush around him seemed to
he.dden him. They made q song to
m. strange, WILD melody that even
UGH 'frOntiersmen as Dan and Len
OK could not experience. A Thousand
nells brushed down to him on the
ind, more potent than any wine or
ct. He began to trembIe all over
18th rapture and excitement But I'M
xe Cranston's trembling, no wilder
ess ear was keen enough to hear the
Naves rustling beneath him.