Young Hunters 



ing, shrieking, distressful cries, telling that down 

 in the dark something terrible was being done. 

 Then suddenly out popped a half-grown gopher, 

 four and a half or five inches long, and, with- 

 out stopping a single moment to choose a way 

 of escape, ran screaming through the stubble 

 straight away from its home, quickly followed 

 by another and another, until some half-dozen 

 were driven out, all of them crying and running 

 in different directions as if at this dreadful time 

 home, sweet home, was the most dangerous and 

 least desirable of any place in the wide world. 

 Then out came the shrike, flew above the run- 

 away gopher children, and, diving on them, 

 killed them one after another with blows at the 

 back of the skull. He then seized one of them, 

 dragged it to the top of a small clod so as to be 

 able to get a start, and laboriously made out 

 to fly with it about ten or fifteen yards, when 

 he alighted to rest. Then he dragged it to the 

 top of another clod and flew with it about the 

 same distance, repeating this hard work over 

 and over again until he managed to get one 

 ( 197 ] 



