life, arrived at a perfect understanding.

This time, too, Blackie got a big and a small worm. The small he
coiled like a rope, and held up towards the base of his beak; the big
he carved up into sections, which he held more towards the tip. The
large ones, it seemed, were too awkward and lively simply to carry off
rolled up whole.

The journey that followed was a fearful one in Blackie's life, for he
met half-way the very last foe in the world he was expecting--namely,
an owl. Truly, it was a very small owl, scarce bigger than himself;
but it was an owl, and, like all its tribe, armed to the teeth. Men
called it a little owl. That was its name--little owl. Blackie didn't
care what men called it; he knew it only as one of the hundred or so
shapes that death assumed for his benefit.

Just at that time it happened to be cloudy, and little owls often hunt
by day. But how was Blackie to know that, little owls being a
comparatively new introduction into those parts?

Blackie screamed and fled. The owl did not scream, but fled,
too--after Blackie. Blackie had no means of judging how close _that_
foe was behind by the whir of its wings. Owls' wings don't talk, as a
rule; they have a patent silencer, so to speak, in the fluffy-edged
feathers. Therefore Blackie was forced to do his best in breaking the
speed record, and trust to luck.

It was a breathless and an awful few seconds, and it seemed to him like
a few hours. The owl came up behind, going like a cloud-shadow, and
about as fast, and Blackie, glancing over his shoulder, I suppose,