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coursed in billowy ripples of silver-gray 

 along a log, stopped on a stump to look 

 around and religiously fluff her tail, while 

 mother dreamily watched through half- 

 closed eyes. Then out into the brilliant 

 sunlight she went. Some creatures are 

 dazed and made lazy by the hot, bright 

 glare, some find in it a stimulant, a multi- 

 plier of their life force ; it sets their senses 

 on a keener edge; it gifts them with new 

 speed, intensifies their every power. 



The Gray coats are of the first kind, 

 and of the second was Coluber, the long, 

 black, shiny, blue-black Snake that was 

 lying like a limp and myriad-linked chain 

 flung across a big, low log — a log that 

 sucked the sun heat as it lay, just where 

 the brook expanded to the pond. Never 

 a blink was there in those gray-green eyes, 

 never a quiver in that long, lithe tongue. 

 One not knowing would have said he is 

 dead; one knowing him well would have 



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