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Then, as he wended his way by swamp and stream and awful woodland to the farmhouse where he happened to be quartered, every sound of Nature at that witching hour fluttered his excited imagination the moan of the whip-poor-will* from the hillside; the boding cry of the tree-toad, that harbinger of storm; the dreary hooting of the screech-owl, or the sudden rustling in the thicket of birds frightened from their roost.
At these times you could see the owls abroad in the late afternoon, before sunset, in quest of prey, quartering the ground like harriers, and dropping suddenly into the grass at intervals, while at dark the air resounded with their solemn hooting, a sound as of a deep-voiced mastiff baying at a great distance.
The streets were crowded with perils waggons, carts, automobiles; great, straining horses pulling huge trucks; and monstrous cable and electric cars hooting and clanging through the midst, screeching their insistent menace after the manner of the lynxes he had known in the northern woods. All this was the manifestation of power.
Coot!" came the signal again, and in spite of my companion's opinion I felt forced to agree with the Arab that there was something more than a bird hooting, for at times I plainly heard an answering cry.
Eleven o'clock; the white owls were at their boldest, hooting lugubrious serenades to the answering wolves. Pepillo was at the cabin door, trying the latch. Mex heard the sound, got up, and unfastened the bolts. "Sh!" said she, and giving him the candle, pointed to the back room; then drowsily resumed her nest on the buffalo robe.
Then a sound began to reach my ears faintly, a peculiar sound something like the humming of a distant gong. It seemed to come across to us in the darkness from the waste of swamps and willows opposite. It was repeated at regular intervals, but it was certainly neither the sound of a bell nor the hooting of a distant steamer.
Now the Indians gather their forces to go against Northampton. Over night one went about yelling and hooting to give notice of the design. During my abode in this place, Philip spake to me to make a shirt for his boy, which I did, for which he gave me a shilling. I offered the money to my master, but he bade me keep it; and with it I bought a piece of horse flesh.
At last, faint and far across the valley, rose the doleful cry of a curlew thrice repeated, the which was answered from the east by the hooting of an owl, which again was caught up like an echo, and repeated thrice upon their right. Then Beltane sheathed his dagger. "Look," said he, "Cnut Prat, look north and tell me what ye see!" "Fire, my lord!" quoth Prat.
Nightingales abounded in the woods, singing both by night and by day; and one bright moonlight night my daughters, who slept with their window open, were startled from their sleep by the hooting of one of those beautiful birds, the great-eared owl "le grand duc" of Buffon which had settled on the railing of their balcony.
The owl began it, hooting from beneath the house roof; the bats rustled with flimsy wings, and flew towards the house, where shone the panes of the windows and human faces; but nearer, the little sisters of the bats, the moths, hovered in a swarm, attracted by the white garments of the women; they were especially troublesome to Zosia, beating against her face and her bright eyes, which they mistook for two candles.
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