their prey.

"Quick, that crocus sack," he called. "Ah promised the kids to bring
one home. Give him a switch, Mitchell."

The 'possum, rousing from the semi-stupor into which the smoke and the
shock of his fall had thrown him, was beginning to struggle violently.
Robertson broke a finger-thick stick and thrust it between the snapping
jaws, that clamped upon it fiercely. The rat-like tail wound about the
other end of the rod, and the bag was drawn over him while he clung to
his fancied means of safety. Frady flung his burden high on his back to
secure it from the dogs, and the others put out the fire in the tree,
and again fell into open order to beat the woods.

The next 'possum which they discovered, more fortunate than his
brother, who had been sighted on the ground where locomotion is slow
and awkward for his kind, was aloft in the branches when the dogs spied
him. He clambered dexterously about with his hand-like extremities,
aiding his progress with his prehensile tail; but he had not calculated
upon the added heaviness which his autumn diet had given him. He
ventured upon a sapling that bent beneath him. Wendell added his weight
to bear it to the ground, and the dogs leaped at their victim and tore
him into bits.

Both men and dogs were tired now, and pushed on with less enthusiasm.
The dogs, indeed, who had covered many more miles in their wild
dashings than had their masters, were not above sitting down
occasionally and lapping a memento of the last 'possum's sharp teeth,
or passing a rueful paw over a slit and bleeding ear.

As they were approaching the southern end of the mountain, and realized
that the edge of the excitement was blunted, the men walked nearer to
each other, and talked on indifferent themes as they pushed through the
brush just below the top of the ridge. One after another fell silent,
perhaps through fatigue; possibly impressed with the beauty of the
night.

Through the openings in the tree-tops the stars shone with steady
clearness, doing their best to replace the light of the little moon
which had gone to rest early, like most young things. Under the forest
cover the starlight did not penetrate, and the darkness was illumined
by the yellow flare of the torches. The fall of feet on crackling
twigs, and the slapping of smitten shrub-leaves broke the thick silence
that falls on the earth with night.

To Pink Pressley, crouching at the entrance of his cave, the sound of
approaching st