e. Again and again his attacks were parried.
The snarling growls now rose to shrieks, and the croaking quocks to
loud, dissonant cries.

"Faugh!" muttered Ben. "Smell his breath--fisher's breath--clean here.
Always let that out somehow when they're mad."

Even at our distance, that strong, fetid odor, sometimes perceptible
when a cat spits, could plainly be discerned.

"Old _hairn_ seems to be having the best of it," continued Ben. "I bet
on him. How cool he keeps! Fights like a machine. See that bill come
down now! Look at the marks it makes, too!" For the blood, oozing out
through the thick fur of the cat in more than a dozen spots, was
attesting the prowess of the heron's powerful beak.

But at length, with a sudden bound upward, the fisher fell with his
whole weight upon the back of his lathy antagonist. Old long-legs was
upset, and down they both went in the water, where a prodigious
scuffle ensued. Now one of the heron's big feet would be thrust up
nearly a yard; then the cat would come to the top, sneezing and
strangling; and anon the heron's long neck would loop up in sight,
bending and doubling about in frantic attempts to peck at its foe, its
cries now resembling those of a hen when seized in the night, save
that they were louder and harsher. Over and over they floundered and
rolled. The mud and water flew about. Long legs, shaggy paws, wet,
wriggling tail, and squawking beak, fur and feathers--all turning and
squirming in inextricable confusion. It was hard telling which was
having the best of the _melee_, when, on a sudden, the struggle
stopped, as if by magic.

[Illustration: {The marten about to attack the heron}]

"One or t'other has given in," muttered Ben.

Looking more closely, we saw that the fisher had succeeded in getting
the heron's neck into his mouth. One bite had been sufficient. The
fray was over. And after holding on a while, the victor, up to his
back in water, began moving towards the shore, dragging along with
him, by the neck, the body of the heron, whose great feet came
trailing after at an astonishing distance behind. To see him, wet as a
drowned rat, tugging up the muddy bank with his ill-omened and
unsightly prey, was indeed a singular spectacle. Whatever had brought
on this queer contest, the fisher had won--fairly, too, for aught I
could see; and I hadn't it in my heart to intercept his retreat. But
Ben, to whom a "black cat" was particularly obnoxious, from its
nefarious ha