THE LAST FORAY. 15 
evening flight continued—because it must, I 
suppose ; the gay cock-wigeon, more than half- 
naked, wholly dead, crumpled beyond belief, 
already marked by a ghoul of a carrion crow 
for its own when he stranded, was floating in 
the sullen, muttering surf. 
It was a wanton act, the act of a prince, or 
a pirate, or—both. 
The Spirit of the Blizzard was a gerfalcon, 
white as the driven snow, except for a few 
dark pepperings, nearly two and a half feet 
long, enormous in wing-span, the king of all 
the tribe of falcons, the living rapier of the 
clouds, the shrouded ‘chooser of the slain,’ 
the terror of the black north. 
I know not where that falcon spent his 
lordly night ; somewhere on the shore, doubt- 
less, erect, unsheltered, implacable as ever. 
But at dawn he appeared, whirling down 
along the line of high tide, and in the white, 
shadowy waste below a gun spoke, with a 
jagged spit of flame to mark where it was 
waiting. 
Another and another, another and yet others, 
shattered the snowed-up silence. The falcon 
leapt in mid-air, he shot aloft, he hurtled, he 
dived, he tore, he swept, he glanced, he 
swerved, he swooped, all at lightning speed, 
and—he was gone. 
