66 WILD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH. 



jumps to the log over which the deer had run, and then cutting oft' 

 with his knife a grape-vine that had climbed a neighbouring tree, 

 he wound it around his arm and swung himself out toward Miss 

 Jackson. The first swing did not send him far enough, but putting 

 his foot against the trunk, as his rope oscillated, he swung out to 

 where the young girl lay up to her arm-pits, and rapidly sinking 

 in the sands, and putting his hand under her arm began slowly to 

 draw her from her perilous position. When she was entirely above 

 the surface, he swung the vine sufficiently to carry his charge to 

 the root of the tree, from whence it was easy to reach the shore. 

 I would have given a year of life to get such a look of thanks from 

 a lady I know as the breathless girl gave Mike — the ugly scamp ! 

 The Doctor's turn came next, and then the horses, until finally, 

 after two or three hours of hard work, we were all once more in 

 the saddle, and some of us looking more like scavengers than 

 gallant hunters under the greenwood tree. 



" S'pose you tink dat white buck 's de debbil for true now, 

 hey ? " said Scipio, as he was tightening my girths. 



" No, I don't ; why do you ask ? " 



• Kase I 'se not sartin the niggahs here'bouts knows heaps, and 

 dey sez dey ain't agwine to hunt dat buck nohow, and I spec as 

 how I wouldn't nudder. 'Spec as how sumthin' wuss en what 

 we 's seen '11 come out o' dat eer chase yit I 'se not scared, but 

 dat is very 'plexing." 



The day was wearing away fast, and, sending one of the boys 

 for the two deer last killed, we all turned toward the place ap- 

 pointed for our meeting, where after a few minutes' riding a blue 

 smoke column arose among the trees, and the distant gleam of 

 water announced a dinner and a rest — two pleasant things, whose 

 worth is only known to those who have laboured well. From our 

 dining-place, a bend of the river showed us two vistas down the 

 ancient woods, and the broad sheet of water, half in shadow half 

 in sunshine, was broken by the flocks of ducks that were coasting 

 along its banks. The trees that fringed the shore were covered 

 with immense creeping vines, that clasped the trunks and sus- 

 pended themselves from the branches. Down by the water's edge, 

 the aster reared its purple head, and the love-vine wove its 



