<TITLE>06. Par 20-22</TITLE>L-20 And then when we went out to find out, this old mother opossum, had nine little bitty naked babies about inch and a half, two inches long. Now, opossums don't travel in daytime; they prowl at night. So when I seen her in there, I thought she had rabies. And we put a rake over it, and found out that she was biting and biting that rake. And I said, "Looky here, there's really more motherly love in this animal, the opossum, then there is in that colored girl who drowned her baby." That's right.
And then I looked at that poor leg, instead of her laying there playing opossum, she took out to the house and exhausted and fell over. I said, "You see, she only has just a few minutes to live. But there's such a mother love to her, that she'll spend those--spend those moments that she's got left to that motherly love constraining her to give those moments to those babies. There's more love to the animal for her baby than there was to that ill woman."

L-21 All day she laid in the sun nobly, her little opossums nursing the milk from her. That night Mr. Woods come by and taken me out for awhile to rest, come back eleven o'clock, she was still laying there. Said, "She's gone." Mrs. Wood said to me, said, "Billy, why don't you kill it."
I said, "I can't do it, Mrs. Wood; she's a mother."
Well, said, "Them little babies will die a horrible death. You have to punch her to see if there's any life in her."
I said, "She hit all over, Her head's chewed up; her legs is all chewed up."
Said, "But she's--she's got to die." And said, "She's just suffering." Said, "It's only a humane thing to take her life."
I said, "But, Sister Wood, she's a mother; she's crying for those babies."
Said, "Well, the babies are going to die a horrible death. Kill her and just pick up the little ones..." And she's a veterinary, said, "Throw them on the ground, kill them or something," said, "and they'll die quickly." Said, "You're a hunter, why don't you take your gun and shoot them?"
I said, "I'm a hunter, but I'm not a killer."

L-22 Then the next morning, getting up, my little girl Rebekah, setting here somewhere this morning, she was out on the porch early. And she--I looked at her, and I got up; I couldn't rest very well through the night. And I know, as studying conservation, that that, an animal life, if that opossum would have ever moved, she'd have moved when the sun went down. And any other hunter, conservationist, knows that. She'd have moved when the sun went down. But she laid all night, and those little opossums were still trying to nurse their mother. Becky said to me, my little girl of eight years old; she said, "Daddy, are you going to kill her?"
I said, "No, honey." I said, "What you doing up so early? You run on in the house with mommy."
I went over there, I kicked her on her foot, dew all over her, she still laying there, but I see her--part of her mouth move; she's alive. I thought, "Oh, what can I do?" I made Becky go back in the house. I went in the den room and set down. Set in there, rubbing my forehead, I thought, "Well, I don't know what to do with this animal."


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