“Oh! oh!” screamed poor Marrott, his wits on the stretch; “I only did it to get my living.”
“What! Hard-hearted man! could you not have stripped us after death, instead of torturing us while alive?” and then three quills fell upon him, and came away dyed in his blood.
“Oh, mercy! I could not obtain enough feathers that way,” replied Marrott, scarcely conscious of what he was saying.
“Was it avarice, then? Is that your explanation? Do you imagine that an excuse which rather aggravates your crime?” and a dozen feathers enforced the gander’s words, amid the cries of the miserable victim.
“Every one does the same!” he shrieked in his agony.
“If every one else is cruel, is that a reason you should be? Ought you not rather to have drawn a better moral from their vicious example?” and again the plumes plunged into his flesh, for he was but little protected against such an attack.
“Oh, murder! murder! The feathers of dead geese are not worth as much as those of live,” he cried out, the torture getting the better of his prudence.
This answer was too unfeeling for the gander and his followers to endure. They dashed, one and all, upon the old man, who leaped from the bed and took to flight. They followed, and now, when they plunged into his body, the feathers remained sticking there. They pursued him round the yard, while he fought with his arms, and cried, and begged, much as the geese had flapped, and fluttered, and cackled before. The rest of the flock joined in the hunt, and bit the flesh from his bare legs, and beat him with their wings, till the old man sank in a swoon. Then they spread their wings, and soared far, far out of sight.