great meadows, with plenty of chance to escape in every direction.
It was a very frosty biting cold morning in early December. There was a hard sharp crust on the snow. It was very hard to break the crust on the meadows where the mice hunting was the best. Such wary little creatures as the wood mouse had been keeping their houses where Redcoat could not find them. So on this crisp frosty cold morning Redcoat was so hungry that his stomach fairly ached. Hunger gnawed like a rat at his vitals. Because of this fact he was looking everywhere for food, and would take a chance on anything that offered. He was trotting along on the railroad track, his keen nostrils sniffing the air, when he suddenly smelled something that made him stop still in his tracks and sniff again and again. It was blood that he smelled; red, rich blood, such as makes a fox's jaws drip saliva, and it was very close to him. Then he happened to look down on the rails beneath his feet and he saw it, red and vital. It was under
