234 WILD SPORTS IN THE SOUTH. 



I pulled out the shutter and put my head through, but yer might 

 as well have looked into the Kentucky cave, it was so dark. The 

 wind come in, too, so strong and chill-like, that it made the Doctor 

 and my old woman draw up a little clusser together. I listened a 

 while to see if I could make out any signs of the critter, but it war 

 no use. What between the surf a-hammerin' on the bar, and the 

 branches a-crackin' in the woods, and the squalling of the gulls that 

 had blowed in from the sea, you couldn't 'a' heerd a neighbour 

 asking you to take a drink, and I reckon that is what a man hears 

 quickest. Once in a while one of the big water-oaks would topple 

 over in the woods. I knowed'it had blovjed over, for it makes such 

 a smashin' of little branches when a hull tree comes over, and then 

 a short tug or two as the roots break. Then agin yer could hear 

 one of them tall pines on the ridge break. There was no give 

 there ; it would break short off with a crack like four or five rifles. 

 I would have bet I could have told the very trees that snapped, I 

 knew 'em all so welL Then agin the wind would die away, and 

 you didn't hear nothin' but the rain. 



" ' Jist the night fur them varmints,' says I, drawin' my head 

 in again ; ' they allers come down in a storm, kind of unsuspectin' 

 like ; that 's their natur'.' 



" ' Yes, nothin' so decaitful as the 'Piscopalians,' says the 

 Doctor. 



" ' I knowed what he was after ; the Doctor went tooth and 

 nail agin the 'Piscopalians, and so did the 'Piscopalians 'gin him. 

 That 's the natur' of religious people. 



" ' No,' sez I, ' it was the painters.' 



" ' Painters ! where ? — have you seen a painter ? ' 



" • No, but I heerd one just now.' 



" ' You don't mean it/ sez he, and he went right over to his 

 saddle-bags that was a-lyin' on the bed, and tuck out two of the 

 longest kind of Spanish pistols, and primed 'em up, sayin' all 

 the while somethin' about how with the jawbone of an ass he had 

 slain a thousand men. 



" I didn't believe the critter, for he was given to blowin' ; but 

 Marthy, she jist swallowed it all like batter-cakes. 



" I seen old Boz, who was asleep by the fire a-whimperin' away 



