out it. Her every superb muscle was tingling with
force and mad with hate as the mother Cat closed like a swooping
Falcon. The Skunk had no time to aim that dreadful gun, and in the
excitement fired a volley of the deadly musky spray backward,
drenching her own young as they huddled in the trail.

[Illustration: "The Cat and the Skunk"]

Tooth and claw and deadly grip--the old Cat raged and tore, the black
fur flew in every direction, and the Skunk for once lost her head and
fired random shots of choking spray that drenched herself as well as
the Cat. The Skunk's head and neck were terribly torn. The air was
suffocating with the poisonous musk. The Skunk was desperately wounded
and threw herself backward into the water. Blinded and choking, though
scarcely bleeding, the old Cat would have followed even there, but the
Kitten, wedged under the log, mewed piteously and stayed the mother's
fury. She dragged it out unharmed but drenched with musk and carried
it quickly to the den in the hollow log, then came out again and stood
erect, blinking her blazing eyes--for they were burning with the
spray--lashing her tail, the image of a Tigress eager to fight either
part or all the world for the little ones she nursed. But the old
Skunk had had more than enough. She scrambled off down the canon. Her
three young ones had tumbled over each other to get out of the way
when they got that first accidental charge of their mother's battery.
She waddled away, leaving a trail of blood and smell, and they waddled
after, leaving an odour just as strong.

[Illustration: "The old Cat raged and tore"]

Yan was thrilled by the desperate fight of the heroic old Cat. Her
whole race went up higher in his esteem that day; and the fact that
the house Cat really could take to the woods and there maintain
herself by hunting was all that was needed to give her a place in his
list of animal heroes.

Pussy walked uneasily up and down the log, from the hole where the
Kittens were to the end overlooking the canon. She blinked very hard
and was evidently suffering severely, but Yan knew quite well that
there was no animal on earth big enough or strong enough to frighten
that Cat from her post at the door of her home. There is no courage
more indomitable than that of a mother Cat who is guarding her young.

At length all danger of attack seemed over, and Pussy, shaking her
paws and wiping her eyes, glided into her hole. Oh, what a shock it
must have be