INDIAN ADVENTURE RACCOON SHOOTING. 24O 



off, took aim, and fired ; feeling himself hit, he let go 

 the horse, brought forward his rifle, and fired, when 

 more dark figures appeared right and left. lie turned 

 his horse, and gave him the spurs. He sank fainting 

 to the ground, and the -dark blood flowed out as we 

 opened his clothes. He was hit in three places, and 

 two of the wounds were mortal. After a few minutes 

 he raised himself again, gave us each a hand, which we 

 pressed in silence, drew a deep breath, and fell back a 

 corpse. We buried him on the spot, and vowed a deep 

 revenge, which we faithfully consummated: a few nights 

 afterwards, the wolves were tearing the flesh from three 

 corpses over the fresh grave." 



Having finished his tale, my host sat for some time 

 with his head leaning on his hand, thinking of times 

 long past. His wife had fallen asleep : she had pro- 

 bably, heard the tale many times before, and as it was 

 rather late, we were all glad to retire. 



The dogs barked several times during the night, and 

 about an hour and a half before daylight, they were 

 quite furious ; supposing their excitement to be caused 

 by raccoons, or opossums, we started up, and took our 

 guns, called the dogs, and went into the piercing cold 

 morning air, though it was too dark to see one's hand; 

 my thin deer-skin moccasins were soon frozen, which by 

 no means added to my agreeable sensations. The bark 

 of the dogs soon showed that they had chased something 

 to a tree. As our feet were dreadfully cold, and it 

 was still too dark to shoot, we lighted a fire, and 

 though the dogs enjoyed its warmth, they never for- 

 got the object of our being there, keeping their eyes 

 21* 



