his head through the screen he secured this and 
then in plain view of the owl proceeded to eat it, 
after which he went on with his croaking and 
cawing as though he wanted to call every crow 
within ten miles to come and see what he had 
discovered. 
It would be pretty hard for any one to have his 
breakfast stolen, then to be insulted over and 
over by the screaming thief, and still keep his 
temper; but people do not cail the owl wise with- 
out good reason. The old fellow did not fly 
into a fury, for about the only resentment he 
showed was to raise the feathers on his head and 
neck a time or two and pop his bill. I am not 
at all certain, though, that he did not store up 
resentment in his heart, and he may possibly 
have recalled these insults on a later occasion. 
Most of the time the coon was kept chained 
to a wire that ran across the yard from the owl 
cage to one of the live-oak trees. The end of 
the chain attached to the wire had a ring on it 
so that the coon could run up and down the 
yard for thirty or forty feet. Jim Crow soon 
turned his attention to the coon, abusing it in 
. 132 
