,12 



THE FALL OF THE YEAR 



It must have been about four o'clock when one of 

 the small boys tiptoed into my room and whispered, 

 " Father, quick ! there 's a fox digging under Pigeon 

 ^Kenny's coop behind the barn." 



I was up in a second, and into the boys' room. 

 '/Sure enough, there in the fog of the dim morning I 

 '.'. could make out the moving form of a fox. He was 



/ digging under the wire runway of the coop. 

 iA** The old hen was clucking in terror to her chicks. 

 It was she who had awakened the boys. 

 \ There was no time to lose. Downstairs I went, 

 .rdown into the basement, where I seized the gun, and, 

 ^slipping in a couple of shells, slid out of the cellar 

 /door and crept stealthily into the barn. 

 ,*2 The back window was open. The thick wet fog 

 ,-'-? poured in like dense smoke. I moved swiftly in my 

 J| bare feet and peered down upon the field. There 

 f stood the blur of the coop, a dark shadow only in 

 | the fog, but where was the fox? 

 ? f Pushing the muzzle of my double-barreled gun 

 A' ; across the window-sill, I waited. And there in the 

 ^ IT mist stood the fox, reaching in with his paw under 

 ' the wire that inclosed the coop. 



Carefully, deliberately, I swung the gun on the 







: , 



window-sill until the bead drew dead upon the thief ; 

 then, fixing myself as firmly as I could with bare 

 feet, I made sure of my mark and fired. 



I do not wonder that the fox jumped. I jumped, 

 myself, as both barrels went off together. A gun is 



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