in shyly to eat the scraps that the little fish- 

 hawks cast out when their hunger was satis- 

 fied, this cat habit was strikingly manifest. 

 Other animals would come in and quietly eat 

 what they found and slip away again ; but 

 the cats would seize on a morsel with flash- 

 ing eyes, as if defying all law and order, and 

 would either growl horribly as they ate or 

 else would slink away guiltily and, as I found 

 out by following, would climb the biggest 

 tree at hand and eat the morsel in the high- 

 est crotch that gave a foothold. And once, 

 on the Maine coast in November, I saw a 

 fierce battle in the tree-tops where a wildcat 

 crouched, snarling like twenty fiends, while 

 a big eagle whirled and swooped over him, 

 trying to take away the game that Pekompf 

 had stolen. 



By far the most curious bit of Pekompf's 

 cunning came under my eyes, one summer, 

 a few years ago. Until recently I had sup- 

 posed it to be a unique discovery; but last 

 summer a friend, who goes to Newfoundland 

 every year for the salmon fishing, had a simi- 

 lar experience with a Canada lynx, which 





