Wild Western Scenes | Page 2

face--Another stump--The high passes--The bear roused--The chase--A sight--A shot--A wound--Not yet killed--His meditations--His friend, the bear--The bear retreats--Joe takes courage--Joe fires--Immense execution--Sneak--The last struggle--Desperation of the bear--His death--Sneak's puppies--Joe.

CHAPTER III.
Glenn's castle--Mary--Books--A hunt--Joe and Pete--A tumble--An opossum--A shot--Another tumble--A doe--The return--They set out again--A mound--A buffalo--An encounter--Night--Terrific spectacle--Escape--Boone--Sneak--Indians.

CHAPTER IV.
The retreat--Joe makes a mysterious discovery--Mary--A disclosure --Supper--Sleep--A cat--Joe's flint--The watch--Mary--The bush--The attack--Joe's musket again--The repulse--The starting rally--The desperate alternative--Relief.

CHAPTER V.
A strange excursion--A fairy scene--Joe is puzzled and frightened--A wonderful discovery--Navigation of the upper regions--A crash--No bones broken.

CHAPTER VI.
A hunt--A deer taken--The hounds--Joe makes a horrid discovery--Sneak --The exhumation.

CHAPTER VII.
Boone--The interment--Startling intelligence--Indians about--A skunk --Thrilling fears--Boone's device.

CHAPTER VIII.
Night--Sagacity of the hounds--Reflection--The sneaking savages--Joe's disaster--The approach of the foe under the snow--The silent watch.

CHAPTER IX.
Sneak kills a sow that "was not all a swine"--The breathless suspense --The match in readiness--Joe's cool demeanour--The match ignited --Explosion of the mine--Defeat of the savages--The captive--His liberation--The repose--The kitten--Morning.

CHAPTER X.
The dead removed--The wolves on the river--The wolf hunt--Gum fetid --Joe's incredulity--His conviction--His surprise--His predicament--His narrow escape.

CHAPTER XI.
Mary--Her meditations--Her capture--Her sad condition--Her mental sufferings--Her escape--Her recapture.

CHAPTER XII.
Joe's indisposition--His cure--Sneak's reformation--The pursuit--The captive Indian--Approach to the encampment of the savages--Joe's illness again--The surprise--The terrific encounter--Rescue of Mary--Capture of the young chief--The return.

CHAPTER XIII.
The return--The young chief in confinement--Joe's fun--His reward--The ring--A discovery--William's recognition--Memories of childhood--A scene--Roughgrove's history--The children's parentage.

CHAPTER XIV.
William's illness--Sneak's strange house--Joe's courage--The bee hunt --Joe and sneak captured by the Indians--Their sad condition --Preparations to burn them alive--Their miraculous escape.

CHAPTER XV.
Glenn's History.

CHAPTER XVI.
Balmy Spring--Joe's curious dream--He prepares to catch a fish--Glenn --William and Mary--Joe's sudden and strange appearance--La-u-na, the trembling fawn--The fishing sport--The ducking frolic--Sneak and the panther.

CHAPTER XVII.
The bright morning--Sneak's visit--Glenn's heart--The snake hunt--Love and raspberries--Joe is bitten--His terror and sufferings--Arrival of Boone--Joe's abrupt recovery--Preparations to leave the West--Conclusion.

WILD WESTERN SCENES: A NARRATIVE OF ADVENTURES.

CHAPTER I.
Glenn and Joe--Their horses--A storm--A black stump--A rough tumble--Moaning--Stars--Light--A log fire--Tents, and something to eat--Another stranger, who turns out to be well known--Joe has a snack--He studies revenge against the black stump--Boone proposes a bear hunt.
"Do you see any light yet, Joe?"
"Not the least speck that ever was created, except the lightning, and it's gone before I can turn my head to look at it."
The interrogator, Charles Glenn, reclined musingly in a two-horse wagon, the canvas covering of which served in some measure to protect him from the wind and rain. His servant, Joe Beck, was perched upon one of the horses, his shoulders screwed under the scanty folds of an oil-cloth cape, and his knees drawn nearly up to the pommel of the saddle, to avoid the thumping bushes and briers that occasionally assailed him, as the team plunged along in a stumbling pace. Their pathway, or rather their direction, for there was no beaten road, lay along the northern bank of the "Mad Missouri," some two hundred miles above the St. Louis settlement. It was at a time when there were no white men in those regions save a few trappers, traders, and emigrants, and each new sojourner found it convenient to carry with him a means of shelter, as houses of any description were but few and far between.
Our travellers had been told in the morning, when setting out from a temporary village which consisted of a few families of emigrants, with whom they had sojourned the preceding night, that they could attain the desired point by making the river their guide, should they be at a loss to distinguish the faintly-marked pathway that led in a more direct course to the place of destination. The storm coming up suddenly from the north, and showers of hail accompanying the gusts, caused the poor driver to incline his face to the left, to avoid the peltings that assailed him so frequently; and the drenched horses, similarly influenced, had unconsciously departed far from the right line of march; and now, rather than turn his front again to the pitiless blast, which could be the only means of regaining the road, Joe preferred diverging still farther, until he should find himself on the margin of the river, by which time he hoped the storm would abate. At all events, he thought there would be more safety on the beach, which extended out a hundred paces from the water, among the small switches of cotton-wood that grew thereon, than in the midst of the tall trees of the forest, where a heavy branch was every now and then torn off by the wind, and thrown to the earth with a terrible crash. Occasionally a deafening explosion of thunder would burst overhead; and Joe, prostrating himself on the neck of his horse, would, with his eyes closed and his teeth set, bear it out in silence. He spoke not, save to give an occasional word of command to his team, or a brief reply