Page:The Way of the Wild (1930).pdf/58

 tree tops and across a little wheat field a hundred yards behind Dan Alexander's cabin.

A score of startled eyes saw him as he cleared the chestnut tops. Almost in the center of the wheat field stood a small wild cherry tree loaded with shining crimson fruit—crowded, too, with birds from the surrounding woods and thickets. Brown thrashers, catbirds, wood thrushes, towhees and one brilliant black-winged scarlet tanager were feasting in the cherry tree when the feathered cannon ball shot into view from behind the chestnut grove; and, of them all, the tanager, partial as always to the higher branches, was the most exposed, seeking his breakfast amid the topmost twigs. With a frightened cry the blood-red bird darted from his perch; but Cloud King, his eye caught instantly by that vivid spot of color, gripped him with long black talons before he had flown five feet.

When he had plucked and eaten his prey in a tall white oak which was one of his favorite feeding stations, the big duck hawk set about the real business of the day. The tanager was merely an appetizer. Often in cherry time Cloud King began his morning with a raid on the small birds which breakfasted at the small but prolific tree in the wheat field a thousand feet below his aerie; but he was never content with such trivial game, and these morning raids were little more than diversions.