Then the 'possum glided out into the open ground, to the astonishment of all still carrying the hare in her mouth.

She made directly for the tree, and proceeded to climb it, grasping the trunk with her fore-arms, like a human being.

Her taking to the tree also excited surprise, as it was a small one--not over thirty feet high--and the young hunters knew that the lynx could climb as well as she.
The latter now came out of the bramble; and with one bound sprang to the foot of the pecan.

He did not follow up immediately, but stopped a moment to breathe himself, evidently exulting--as he knew he could easily climb after, and feeling satisfied that he now had his game safe and secure.
"Treed at last, old mother 'possum!" soliloquised he, although not _aloud_.

"I'll get you now, an' if I don't give you a good woppin' for the trouble you've put me to--_see if I don't_! I wouldn't eat ye, nohow--you ain't sweet enough for that--but I'll eat that hare, an' I'll chastise you for using it so!" And with this determination he galloped up the pecan, his claws rattling against the bark.
By this time the opossum had got near the top of the tree, and out upon one of the branches that grew horizontally.