“THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE” 37 
back to his den, he trotted gloomily toward a high 
hill he saw to the south, with the guns sounding 
all around him in the woods, and found a cave 
into which he crawled till he was in complete 
darkness. Here he felt safe from the guns 
The firing ceased at sunset. It was a cold, 
clear night. He was hungry, and crept forth. 
All that night he hunted, in vain, till nearly morn- 
ing. Not even a rabbit crossed his path. But 
toward daybreak, from far off, he suddenly heard 
a familiar sound—familiar yet almost forgotten. 
It was the honk of a wild goose! Turning 
abruptly, his gray legs took him swiftly and si- 
lently toward the sound, till the smell of water 
came to him. 
And then he came face to face with a high, 
thick wire fence. The ground was frozen hard, 
and he could not dig under it. He trotted along 
it till at last he found a fallen log from which he 
could leap and clear the wire. One bound, and 
he was on the other side, and moving once more 
toward the smell of water. 
But he had not gone far when he caught an- 
other scent, the pungent, unpleasant scent of 
