ded herself by the
tail--at last almost by its very tip--and swung like a pendulum,
clutching as she swung, it was all in vain. At length, with a bitter
snarl, she gave up the adventure as hopeless, detached the young ones
from their hold, flung them testily to the ground, and descending,
took them all into her pouch and upon her back, and trudged away.
'Frank and I now deemed it proper to interfere, and cut off the
retreat of the old 'possum: so, dropping from our perch, we soon
overtook and captured the whole family. The old one, on first seeing
us approach, rolled herself into a round clump, so that neither her
head nor legs could be seen, and in this attitude feigned to be quite
dead. Several of the youngsters who were _outside_, immediately
detached themselves, and imitated the example of their mother--so that
the family now presented the appearance of a large ball of whitish
wool, with several smaller "clews" lying around it!' The family
Crusoes, however, were not to be cheated: they took the whole
prisoners, intending to carry them home; and making the mother fast to
one of the saplings, returned to their tree.

Soon the persecuted orioles began to scream and scold as before. Their
enemy this time was a huge moccason, one of the most venomous of
serpents. 'It was one of the largest of its species; and its great
flat head, protruding sockets, and sparkling eyes, added to the
hideousness of its appearance. Every now and then, as it advanced, it
threw out its forked tongue, which, moist with poisonous saliva,
flashed under the sunbeam like jets of fire. It was crawling directly
for the tree on which hung the nest.' The birds seemed to think he
meant to climb to their nest, and descended in rage and terror to the
lower branches. 'The snake, seeing them approach almost within range
of his hideous maw, gathered himself into a coil, and prepared to
strike. His eyes scintillated like sparks of fire, and seemed to
fascinate the birds; for instead of retiring, they each moment drew
nearer and nearer, now alighting on the ground, then flapping back to
the branches, and anon darting to the ground again--as though they
were under some spell from those fiery eyes, and were unable to take
themselves away. Their motions appeared to grow less energetic, their
chirping became almost inaudible, and their wings seemed hardly to
expand as they flew, or rather fluttered, around the head of the
serpent. One of them at length dropped d