A RACE. 221 



We had separated a short distance from each other, he to 

 gather berries, and I, with a small fowling-piece, in pursuit 

 of game. Presently I saw my friend crashing through the 

 brush towards me, and also towards the fields, without his 

 basket, and bare headed, his hair standing straight up, put- 

 ting in his very best jumps, as if a thousand tigers were at 

 his heels. Without heeding for a moment my anxious inqui- 

 ries as to what was the matter, he kept right on, leaping 

 the logs like a deer, looking neither to the right hand nor 

 the left, but with his coat tail sticking out on a dead level 

 behind, making a straight wake for home. Fear is said to 

 be contagious, and I believe in the doctrine that it is so. I 

 caught it bad; and without knowing what I was afraid of, 

 I started, and if any fourteen year old boy can make better 

 tune than I did on that occasion, I should like to see him 

 run. I kept possession of my fowling-piece, and came out 

 neck and neck with my friend. We scrambled over the 

 outer fence, and ran some dozen rods or more in the open 

 field, without either of us looking back. Then, however, 

 we made the astounding discovery, that there was nothing 

 after us, and we both paused to take breath, and, so far as 

 I was concerned, to ascertain, if possible, what had occa- 

 sioned the race. I learned that my 'friend, after I left him, 

 had gone into the windfall, and was standing upon the long 

 trunk of a fallen tree, picking berries, when he saw, a few 

 rods from him towards the other end of the log on which 

 he was standing, a great black hand reach up and bend 

 down a tall blackberry-bush that was loaded with berries. 



