He felt in touch with Nature; inspired by her music to great deeds.... Tiny red ladybirds with black-spotted body-shields wandered up and down the corn; and when he stopped to think, or to peer ahead through the waving green multitude of straws, he could see the little red fox-tongue of the poppy and the rough-haired cornflower’s deep blue snake’s-eyes. At intervals the white marguerite flashed like a lark’s breast momentarily into view, fixing his gaze for one fleeting moment with hypnotic attraction.
The depths of the corn vibrated with mystery.... Sounds which lived and died before he could guess their maker, thronged his ears on every side! Uncanny things happened out here in the jungle of the summer corn—he felt sure of it!
A sudden rustling followed by a crashing retreat sounds in front of him; it is the corn shrieking under the foot of a fleeting hare! Presently a loud turmoil in the air breaks for the moment Nature’s harmonious melody: he starts up, and the nervous twitching of his whiskers betrays his overwrought condition; soon he hears the warning call of an approaching partridge—and now he recognizes the noise, and sits down again while his sensitive nerve-strings gradually resume their normal vibration.
Finally, when a long-legged frog, panic-stricken at his approach, leaps with its cold body right into his face, he has, fortunately, recovered from his previous shock, and continues calmly on his way.
A large flock of tame pigeons from the farm sweep past just overhead, bringing a glow to his eyes. Soon afterwards he hears the flap of their wings as they land among the peas. In the flock are white, red, and blue pigeons....
His body sinks to the ground. Now is the chance to prove that he is a born master-hunter. He feels his pulse hammer and his heart thump!
After a quarter of an hour’s stalking he pokes his head out of a heap of cut-down peas. He is panting for breath with a half-open mouth, and his eyes shine with a greenish light. His muscles are tense to the uttermost—the great thing now is not to surrender to his exhaustion and so spoil everything he has already done....
The pigeons rise and float round in a circle—a habit they have—and the next moment a dazzling white turbit flaps within reach.
No need for him to spring; he just lashes out and hooks three of his curved claws into its breast! The claws go in easily enough; but they will not come out again so willingly! In fact, the more frantically the victim struggles to get loose, the more firmly his nails seem to hold; they literally stick to everything they touch. Now his jaws flash forward with their strong muscles—and the pigeon gives up the ghost at the first bite!
With the spoil in his mouth Big-cat retires hurriedly into a recess between two burdock plants; here he devours his catch.