were abundant enough to supply his own needs as well as those of the lesser hawks which also hunted them. Except when the imperial eagles came, Cloud King was lord of all the airy spaces above the peaks and valleys, a monarch as valiant as he was ruthless, swift as the wind, thewed and muscled more powerfully in proportion to his size than any other bird of prey—a perfect specimen of the "Noble Peregrine" which the knights of ancient time, who delighted in falconry, considered the premier bird of the chase.
From his aerie fifty feet above the entrance of Red Rogue's den, Cloud King saw the old fox pass around the shoulder of the cliff and vanish amid the kalmias. Then, as though the sight of his neighbor going forth to the hunt had whetted his own appetite, he spread his dark barred wings, much longer than those of most other hawks, and swept out from the face of the precipice. After a few strong wing thrusts, he closed his pinions and dropped for perhaps thirty feet. Spreading his wings again, he planed down a long incline, gaining speed every second, rushing down toward the billowy tops of the tall chestnuts at the bottom of the deep valley. When it seemed that in another instant he must crash into the uppermost branches of the trees, he checked his descent by an almost imperceptible movement of his wings and sped onward past the
