Wampus Cat

**THE WAMPUS CAT** 8

*Aquilamappreluendens forcipe*

    Since the first specimen was discovered scratching false blazes on mount trails, the Wampus Cat has been blamed for a variety of forest tribulations. If a Wampus wades a stream, the fish won't bite for seven days. When the Wampus is on the prowl the only game abroad is the fool hen. The howl of the Wampus on a lonely night will curdle a crock of sourdough. Females of the species may be killed only with a crosscut saw. The males, practically indestructible, carry in their fur the germ of blister rust. Under the influence of a full moon, the glare from their eyes starts forest fires. Their footprints are visible only in solid rock. They steal prospectors’ picks to brush their teeth.

    Now the Wampus—still abundant in its native Idaho and particularly large and violent during the season when the crop of dudes yields a bushel to the picket-line—has an opportunity to redeem itself. A favorite pastime of the feline is snatching eagles. Trappers on the Salmon River are plagued, they say, with eagles killing deer. The game department is angry with the eagles and seeking a solution to a vexing problem. Eagle lovers—their name has been legion—are angry with the game department.

    The simple solution suggested by the Wampus Society, which is composed of every man who has seen a rampant Wampus Cat at dusk menacing a mountain lion with a jackhammer, is that the burden be turned Over to the Wampus breed. Once the Wampus reaches the eagle country the feathers will fly. Nature has endowed the marvelous cat with an amazing right forearm. It works like a folding pruning hook on the pantographic principle.

The Wampus lurks on a craggy promontory with its tufted ears aslant like the budding prongs of a young goat and its voice softened

from the customary howl of a disfranchised banshee to the bleat of a kid. When an eagle approaches, the strange arm shoots out with astonishing speed and direction. The eagle is caught and reeled in.

    If the Wampus is hungry, he devours the prey, feathers, beak, and all. If his mood is playful, the Wampus extracts the tail fan only and releases the bird. The feathers are given to the Indians. Wampus Cats are friendly with the red men. That has been offered as one reason why Indians never have turned in a Wampus fur. Primitive trappers of the primitive areas who have caught them declare that the hide runs mostly to quills anyhow and the color is akin to a Christmas necktie.

    Origin of the Wampus, on the authority of Stanley Basin mountain men, dates back to the old-fashioned beaver. It seems that a trapper’s dog surprised a beaver far from water. There was nothing for the animal to do but climb a tree. But beavers don’t climb trees. So it became a Wampus Cat.

    Once lured to the bailiwick of the wicked Salmon River eagles, the quick-witted Wampus will swiftly eradicate the fowls of the air, perhaps not even sparing the wild turkeys recently planted there. A Wampus knows an eagle, but trouble is anticipated when the eagle and the turkey cross into a new species known as the Turkeagle. The Wampus could not tell them apart because he cannot spell.

    The biggest puzzle brought to the attention of the Wampus Society is how to dispose of the Wampus once it has exterminated the pernicious eagle. Gorged on its favorite food and happy in the free, wild environment of the Middle Fork, the Wampus might decide to stay permanently. No predator is known that lives on Wampus meat. The Wampus might become a plague worse than the bird it is called upon to exterminate.

  Only one Idaho beast has ever put the Wampus to rout. The Whiffenpoofit has the way but seldom the will. The Whiffenpoofit comes down both sides of a river at once. Even the deadly Wampus cannot make up its mind which flank to attack, so it folds its pantographic arm and resolves itself into a midnight screech.