Page 60 (1/1)
"What are a cougar and a silvertip?"
"Cougar rizzly bear"
"Oh, they're all cruel!" exclai
"I reckon Often I've shot wolves for relayin' a deer"
"What's that?"
"Sometimes two or more wolves will run a deer, an' while one of them rests the other will drive the deer around to his pardner, who'll, take up the chase That way they run the deer down Cruel it is, but nature, an' no worse than snow an' ice that starve deer, or a fox that kills turkey-chicks breakin' out of the egg, or ravens that pick the eyes out of new-born lambs an' wait till they die An' for that matter, men are crueler than beasts of prey, for men add to nature, an' have more than instincts"
Helen was silenced, as well as shocked She had not only learned a new and striking viewpoint in natural history, but a clear intiined or divined a remarkable character in this man A hunter was one who killed animals for their fur, for their meat or horns, or for some lust for blood--that was Helen's definition of a hunter, and she believed it was held by thein settled states But the ht be vastly different, and vastly ame The mountain world of forest was a mystery to almost all men Perhaps Dale knew its secrets, its life, its terror, its beauty, its sadness, and its joy; and if so, how full, hoonderful must be his mind! He spoke of men as no better than wolves Could a lonely life in the wilderness teach a reed, and hate--these had no place in this hunter's heart It was not Helen's shrewdness, but a woman's intuition, which divined that
Dale rose to his feet and, turning his ear to the north, listened onceRoy still?" inquired Helen
"No, it ain't likely he'll turn up to-night," replied Dale, and then he strode over to put a hand on the pine-tree that soared above where the girls lay His action, and the way he looked up at the tree-top and then at adjacent trees, held nificance which so interested Helen
"I reckon he's stood there soht," muttered Dale
This pine was the roup