HOW I LEARNED TO LOVE AND NOT TO KILL. 



BY A MEMBER OF THE AUDUBON SOCIETY. 



I KNOW that I was not an exception- 

 ally cruel boy, and yet there was a 

 time when I took delight in killing, just 

 for the sake of killing, everything that could 

 run or swim or fly. I do not think that 

 any one ever told me it was wrong or 

 showed me in any way how useless or cruel 

 it was to go banging about the fields with 

 my gun, ready to take the innocent life of 

 any and every moving thing, be it bird on 

 branchor tiny young squirrel not yet aware 

 of the dangers and wickedness of this great 

 rolling world. 



How I ever managed to shoot the beauti- 

 ful creatures, without getting a great pain 

 in my own heart, I am sure I cannot tell 

 you now, but I am certain that I must have 

 had a very strange and different kind of a 

 heart then — sound asleep perhaps, all the 

 time. It seems to have taken a long time 

 to teach me how brutal a thing I was, but 

 I shall try and tell you how it came about, 

 though it was not all at once, as you shall 

 see. 



One day in midwinter, when the snow lay 

 deep in the woods, three of us were out 

 rabbit hunting. I was standing in an open 

 spot waiting for a sound of the dogs, when 

 all three of them came yelping out of the 

 brush close upon the heels of a terrified lit- 

 tle rabbit, which was making but poor speed 

 through the drifted snow. Almost more 

 excited than the dogs, for I was only twelve 

 years old, I raised my gun and fired just as 

 the foremost dog pounced upon the little 

 creature, and having rescued my prize from 

 Hector, put him carefully into the wide 

 deep pocket of my new hunting coat. I 

 killed two other rabbits that morning, and 

 at last approached the old farmhouse where 

 my companions had arrived before me. I 

 put my gun in the house and came out to 



display my game. I drew out one rabbit 

 from the left pocket, and one from the rear 

 pocket, quite proud of my success as a 

 sportsman, then I went down into the wide 

 deep pocket for my third and last rabbit. 

 Out he came and was dropped upon the 

 porch beside the others, when to my aston- 

 ishment and the great glee of my com- 

 panions, up jumped Brer Rabbit and went 

 scampering off toward the woods, as fast as 

 his poor cramped legs would carry him. 



Certainly he had well earned his liberty af- 

 ter that terrifying day's ride in the clutches 

 of his worse foe, but it would never do to 

 be laughed at, anything rather than lose my 

 reputation as a butcher, so running in for 

 my gun I went hurrying after Mr. Bunnie, 

 following his tracks in the snow. It was 

 hard work for the poor tired little fellow, 

 just escaped from such a dreadful exper- 

 ience, and he had but reached the margins 

 of the wood, floundering along in the deep 

 snow, when this awful boy came running 

 and panting after him. There he sat rest- 

 ing on the clear white drifts, the beautiful 

 little fellow, apparently quite dazed by the 

 wonderfully bright world to which he had 

 been so miraculously restored; but there 

 was no eye for his beauty and no sympathy 

 for his sad plight in the monster there be- 

 hind. I remember, even now, as I raised 

 my gun to fire, how a sudden pity came in- 

 to my heart for the poor little tired and de- 

 fenseless creature, so soon to be free again 

 and back with his lonely fellows in the 

 burrow, but there were the boys already 

 laughing at me, and so bang went my gun. 

 Still Bunnie jumped wearily on, for I had 

 missed him. Certainly any but a monster 

 might have had mercy after that, but there 

 were the boys laughing harder than ever, 

 and the spirit of my wicked old ancestor 



