THE STILL HUNT. 133 



of a panther, and the taking off his robe, is an incident 

 that calls forth the liveliest feelings of pleasure in those 

 who participate in it, and only the hunter can understand 

 the accent of pride with which Mike at length held up 

 in both hands the huge tawny skin, with its pendent 

 claws and cat-like head, saying, " Ain't that a bed for a 

 king ?" When we had completed this work, noon had 

 long since passed away, and we looked around for a spot 

 to dine. 



Near where we had hung our first deer, on the slop- 

 ing side of a clay bank, a spring of water rose from the 

 earth, " and a clearer one never was seen," which filling 

 a natural basin among the roots of the trees that over- 

 hung it, poured down the hill in a trickling rivulet, and 

 joined by other smaller springs, sought its level on the 

 great savannah, where its course could be traced by the 

 eye for a mile or more by the line of joint grass and flags 

 that took root in its waters^ By this spring we carried 

 our three saddles of venison, our hog, and our panther 

 skin, and sat ourselves down to dinner. Not a grand 

 dinner of cold fowl and claret, sandwiches and cakes, 

 with which in more favored places hunters in the woods 

 regale their inner man, but a dinner that consisted sim- 

 ply of a large square of corn-bread, and an equally large 

 square of venison steak, but so hungry were we that no 

 rich repast, even though spread at Verey's, at Paris, 

 would have been more highly honored, and surely no 

 table, even on the Santa Lucia, with the broad bay of 

 Naples, and the flaming spire of Vesuvius before the 



