rew up her arm in time, and
Wully's long, gleaming tusks sank into her flesh, and grated on the
bone.

"Help! help! feyther! feyther!" she shrieked.

Wully was a light weight, and for a moment she flung him off. But there
could be no mistaking his purpose. The game was up, it was his life or
hers now.

"Feyther! feyther!" she screamed, as the yellow fury, striving to kill
her, bit and tore the unprotected hands that had so often fed him.

In vain she fought to hold him off, he would soon have had her by the
throat, when in rushed Dorley.

Straight at him, now in the same horrid silence sprang Wully, and
savagely tore him again and again before a deadly blow from the
fagot-hook disabled him, dashing him, gasping and writhing, on the
stone floor, desperate, and done for, but game and defiant to the last.
Another quick blow scattered his brains on the hearthstone, where so
long he had been a faithful and honored retainer--and Wully, bright,
fierce, trusty, treacherous Wully, quivered a moment, then straightened
out, and lay forever still.

REDRUFF, The Story of the Don Valley Partridge

I

DOWN THE wooded slope of Taylor's Hill the Mother Partridge led her
brood; down toward the crystal brook that by some strange whim was
called Mud Creek. Her little ones were one day old but already quick on
foot, and she was taking them for the first time to drink.

She walked slowly, crouching low as she went, for the woods were full of
enemies. She was uttering a soft little cluck in her throat, a call
to the little balls of mottled down that on their tiny pink legs came
toddling after, and peeping softly and plaintively if left even a few
inches behind, and seeming so fragile they made the very chickadees look
big and coarse. There were twelve of them, but Mother Grouse watched
them all, and she watched every bush and tree and thicket, and the whole
woods and the sky itself. Always for enemies she seemed seeking--friends
were too scarce to be looked for--and an enemy she found. Away across
the level beaver meadow was a great brute of a fox. He was coming their
way, and in a few moments would surely wind them or strike their trail.
There was no time to lose.

'Krrr! Krrr!' (Hide!! Hide!) cried the mother in a low firm voice, and
the little bits of things, scarcely bigger than acorns and but a day
old, scattered far (a few inches) apart to hide. One dived under a leaf,
another between two roots, a third crawled into a