Redruff 



low him with a gun, so when the snow was 

 deepest, and food scarcest, Cuddy hatched a new 

 plot. Right across the feeding-ground, almost 

 the only good one now in the Stormy Moon, 

 he set a row of snares. A cottontail rabbit, 

 an old friend, cut several of these with his sharp 

 teeth, but some remained, and Redruff, watch- 

 ing a far-off speck that might turn out a hawk, 

 trod right in one of them, and in an instant 

 was jerked into the air to dangle by one 

 foot. 



Have the wild things no moral or legal 

 rights ? What right has man to inflict such long 

 and fearful agony on a fellow-creature, simply 

 because that creature does not speak his lan- 

 guage? All that day, with growing, racking 

 pains, poor Redruff hung and beat his great, 

 strong wings in helpless struggles to be free. 

 All day, all night, with growing torture, until 

 he only longed for death. But no one came. 

 The morning broke, the day wore on, and still 

 he hung there, slowly dying ; his very strength 

 a curse. The second night crawled slowly 

 down, and when, in the dawdling hours of 

 darkness, a great Horned Owl, drawn by the 



357 



