April 4, 1908.] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
53 i 
limb it or go through the gate. Pussy Tom 
,:hosc the latter alternative, ascertained that 
here was no wire snare set in the opening, 
md stepped over a log on to a little platform 
■overed with dry moss. In an instant there was 
i crash, he was hurled into the air, and hung 
suspended round the middle by an inch rope, 
l'he little stick placed under the pan of the 
noose-snare to prevent its being sprung by a 
passing wildcat or porcupine had rotted, his 
.veight had depressed the pan, released the 
oggle, and the heavy log used as a spring-pole 
did the rest. For deer, caribou or calf moose, 
•he snare would have proved a death trap. An 
adult moose would probably have broken the 
swollen and mildewed rope. The noose failed 
to run taut; even if it had, the cat’s teeth would 
soon have cut the rope, and in a few seconds 
Pussy Tom wriggled himself clear, crossed the 
little stream at a bound and stood spitting and 
iswearing on the other side. 
Two years previously the authorities had 
“gone for” one Lois Randall, trapper, guide, 
[poacher, moose-snarer, etc. Lois had decided 
that a foreign tour was preferable to a winter’s 
residence in jail, and the authorities had (for 
•once in their lives) agreed with him. His exit 
from the province had been so sudden that he 
had not had time to spring his snares or re¬ 
move his steel traps. The snares remained set 
until they rotted down. The steel traps became 
useless as soon as the bait decayed. The game 
wardens had destroyed a large number of the 
moose snares, but several remained intact. A 
fine cow lay rotting in one of them, and her 
calves were dead beside her. All three had 
perished fropi starvation. In addition to his 
snares and deadfalls, Lois left many steel traps 
in the woods. They varied from the little mink 
trap, set under water, to the ponderous bear 
trap, baited with carrion, molasses or honey, to 
catch bears; or set un-baited in the gate of a 
rough hedge, ready for moose. When Pussy 
Tom was foraging round an otter slide, he 
nearly fell a victim to one of the steel traps. A 
rotted bough had fallen close to the trap, the 
small branches had not sufficient weight to spring 
it, and when he trod on the pan a fragment of wood 
choked the jaws and he dragged his paw out, 
unbroken but badly lacerated. Henceforth the 
cat learned to dread the smell of metal, and 
when,* later in the season, he found a rabbit in a 
miniature camp of spruce and fir boughs, his 
nose warned him that there was an enemy lurk¬ 
ing under the leaves and moss. Carcajou-fashion, 
he went to the back of the miniature camp, tore 
away the boughs and ate tjne bait. 
Through that fall, the winter and the spring, 
Pussy Tom ranged the south woods. He 
avoided traps and snares, denned only in the 
immediate vicinity of tall timber, and on the 
two occasions when Sullivan’s hounds picked up 
his trail, he eluded them by jumping from tree 
to tree. Then one day Sullivan’s little hound 
went hunting on her own account. She was a 
cross between a foxhound and a beagle. She 
had a splendid nose, and she was very small; 
she weighed barely twenty pounds. She took 
Pussy Tom’s tracks and followed them for 
some distance. Pussy Tom retreated to a thick 
grove of second growth spruce, fir and hemlock, 
climbed a tree, jumped from it to another one, 
and thence made his way for some fifty yards 
among the branches. From his point of safety 
he watched the little hound, and when he saw 
that she was alone, the remembrance of his 
fight with a far larger dog, in the days of his 
kittenhood, recurred to him. A couple of days 
later Sullivan found little Judy’s body. She was 
a good tracker but a very poor fighter. 
Three or four years rolled by. Pussy Tom 
avoided all the snares and traps set in the south 
woods. More than once he turned on the pur¬ 
suing hounds and routed them. He eschewed 
sheep, but not from any dread of men or dogs— 
there was better game to be had. Deer had 
been imported, and they were commencing to 
multiply in Nova Scotia. The fawns made de¬ 
licious eating, and their killing was attended 
with little or no risk. The cat’s instinct told 
him that there were deer on the North Moun¬ 
tain. He crossed the Annapolis valley one night 
and denned near Connor’s Brook. Geologists 
say that the bed of the brook was once the 
course of a river. At the present time it is a 
mere thread of water, running at the bottom of 
a vault or canon, two hundred feet deep. The 
honeycombed trap-rock affords an ideal 
denning place for foxes and raccoons, the dense 
brush on the sides gives good cover for deer. 
A month or more before Pussy Tom arrived at 
Connor’s Brook, a little doe had crossed the 
valley and given birth to two fawns on the east 
side of the vault. Though they were within 
half a mile of a house, no one suspected then- 
presence. The fawns had passed from the stage 
when they emit no scent and were commencing 
to feed. Pussy Tom scented the deer, ascended 
an old pine, and saw the doe and fawns. Be¬ 
ing an arrant coward, he had no wish to pitch 
battle with the doe—he remembered the close 
call he had when he tackled a caribou calf, and 
the cow caribou turned on him. He flattened 
himself out on the pine branch, and waited to 
see if fortune would send the deer his way. 
Now, it happened that the day was Sunday, 
and a pleasure party from Kingston had driven 
over to Connor’s Brook. The party consisted 
of Squire Turnbull, his wife and child, a mulatto 
nurse-girl and the bulldog, Mr. Pickwick. In 
his younger days Mr. Pickwick would have fol¬ 
lowed the wagon, to the terror of all the hens 
and turkeys along the road and the great detri¬ 
ment of the mongrel curs. Being an old dog. 
he rode between his master and mistress, ignored 
poultry and looked disdainfully at curs and cats. 
The horse was unhitched, the dinner basket 
carried to the “Look-off,” where you can see 
the Isle au Hault and the New Brunswick 
shore, and then Mr. Turnbull discovered that he 
hadn’t a match in his pocket. 
“You run right back to that house along this 
path, and ask them for a bunch of matches. 
Just follow the path along, and it ’ll bring you 
right out in the door yard. What, Jessie, you 
want to go with Mandie? All right, toddle 
along, then. Mandie, you’d better carry that 
child part of the way. Don’t let them feed 
Pickwick; he’s too full already.” 
The mulatto girl, the child and Mr. Pickwick 
went along the path. Before they had gone a 
hundred yards the little doe bbtli winded and 
heard them. She gave a snort and a stamp, then 
slipped noiselessly down the path, and as the 
deer passed under him, Pussy 1 om launched 
himself on the fawn which was furthest away 
from its mother. Two lightning strokes with 
the fore paws severed the veins and arteries of 
the little creature’s neck, and the cat sprang 
into the bushes. The fawn gave a terrified 
bleat, the doe wheeled and saw it stagger round 
for a minute, then collapse in a heap. The sight 
of Pussy Tom, all bristled up and ready for 
fight, combined with the scent of human beings, 
was too much for the doe. She ran, and the 
remaining fawn followed her. Pussy Tom slunk 
out of the bushes and lapped the warm blood. 
A few minutes later Mandie, with the child 
in her arms, came round a sharp angle in the 
path and met the cat face to face. He was 
tearing at the fawn’s carcass and did not hear 
or scent her until she was within twenty feet 
of him. She gave a scream of terror, dropped 
the child, and ran. She had never seen a wild¬ 
cat before, and did not know what an arrant 
coward Pussy Tom was. Luckily for the child, 
she fell on a clump of lambkill, which broke her 
fall. A hundred yards away Mr. Pickwick was 
investigating a hollow log in which a chipmunk 
had taken refuge. The chipmunk had gone in 
at one end and out at the other, and was sunning 
himself on a windfall some distance away, while 
Pickwick made futile attempts to get into the 
hollow dree. He heard the scream of the 
frightened negro, then the cry of the child. He 
realized that something was wrong, forgot the 
chipmunk and raced through the woods toward 
the child. Whether Pussy Tom would have done 
the baby any harm, or whether he would merely 
have dragged his prey into the bushes or 
abandoned it where it lay will never be known. 
I think if he had been left to himself he would 
most probably have slunk away into the bushes. 
Pickwick hated the mulatto, but he loved the 
baby. 
As he arrived on the scene, the child had 
raised herself from the bushes and was within 
ten feet of the snarling cat. Another second 
and the bulldog rushed jn, received two or three 
strokes from the cat’s paws across his sides and 
a ripping cut from the hind claws on his chest, 
and Pussy Tom found himself caught by the throat 
in a grip like a vise. The fight went on in per¬ 
fect silence. The cat tore and ripped at the 
dog’s side, breast and belly. He felt the re¬ 
morseless jaws on his throat. Over and over 
the combatants rolled. The dog had “taken his 
holt,” the cat felt that his breath and strength 
were leaving him. Just as Mr. Turnbull arrived 
on the scene with a stake torn from, a fence in 
his hand, wildcat and dog reached the edge of 
the vault, crashed through the little bushes 
which overhung the precipice and disappeared in 
the abyss. There was a thud on the rocks two 
hundred feet below, and the Squire picked up 
his child and carried her back to her mother. 
Late that afternoon they found the bodies of 
the bulldog and wildcat on the rocks. The dog’s 
teeth were still locked on Pussy Tom’s throat. 
THE CAMPER’S FRIEND. 
Pure Milk is desirable wherever you camp. 
Borden’s Eagle Brand Condensed Milk always 
opens up perfectly fresh, pure and satisfactory. 
It is the first item thought of by the veteran 
camper.— Adv. 
The Forest and Stream may be obtained from 
any newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to 
supply you regularly. 
