Explore "A Gentleman of Courage" by James Oliver Curwood on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
It was the blue jay that mellowed the fear of death in the swiftly beating heart of Peter McRae. He had always been a friend of the blue jays, and this particular bird had perched himself in a spruce top a hundred feet away, screaming defiance at Peter's enemies and telling him to keep up his nerve and not be afraid.
Without going beyond his fourteen-year-old power of reasoning Peter had a strange and abiding faith in the Canadian blue jay tribe. He was a boy's bird, if there ever was one, with his everlasting cocksureness, his persevering courage and his hundred and one little tricks of outlawry and piracy -- a bird who was always ready for a fight, never ran away from trouble, and who lived up beautifully to the man-made law, "Do others before others do you. " He was a gentleman and a sportsman even if he was a robber and a pest, and Peter loved him.