beast of prey

No beast of prey could fit into that log, or reach beak, talon, fang, or claw deep enough to get at Abel where he planned to sleep.

“I do not doubt that he hovers near the spot which I inhabit, and if he has indeed taken refuge in the Alps, he may be hunted like the chamois and destroyed as a beast of prey. But I perceive your thoughts; you do not credit my narrative and do not intend to pursue my enemy with the punishment which is his desert.”

He looked toward the river, where the cauldron crouched like a glowering beast of prey.

Even lovely nature is “the battleground of tormented and agonized beings who continue to exist only by each devouring the other. Therefore, every beast of prey in it is the living grave of thousands of others, and its self-maintenance is a chain of torturing deaths.”

When a shell lands in the trench we note how the hollow, furious blast is like a blow from the paw of a raging beast of prey.