The Wit of the Wild 



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good many copperheads, and we began to think 

 we were really getting rid of them when some 

 workmen on a neighbor's house suspected their 

 presence at a certain spot among the ledges 

 and fallen rocks, and were told to spend an hour 

 of their time daily in hunting them out. This 

 was toward the first of April, when the after- 

 noon warmed the sheltered stones considerably, 

 and enticed them to the surface. They were 

 found one by one in crevices under leaves, be- 

 neath loose rocks, and sometimes out in the sun- 

 shine drowsy and inactive, so that it was an easy 

 matter to kill them, and forty-four of various 

 sizes were destroyed before the place seemed 

 empty. This was within a hundred yards of the 

 famous summer-cottage " Slabsides " of Mr. 

 John Burroughs ; and his path to our spring, as 

 well as my road in and out to the highway, lay 

 right along the base of these danger-haunted 

 rocks ! 



But the people who dwell in the rough coun- 

 try between the Hudson and the Blue Ridge 

 have been alongside of this danger all their life, 

 and lose no sleep over it, which shows not only 

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