My Boyhood and Youth 



have neither mind nor soul, have no rights that 

 we are bound to respect, and were made only 

 for man, to be petted, spoiled, slaughtered, or 

 enslaved. 



At first we were afraid of snakes, but soon 

 learned that most of them were harmless. The 

 only venomous species seen on our farm were 

 the rattlesnake and the copperhead, one of 

 each. David saw the rattler, and we both saw 

 the copperhead. One day, when my brother 

 came in from his work, he reported that he had 

 seen a snake that made a queer buzzy noise 

 with its tail. This was the only rattlesnake 

 seen on our farm, though we heard of them 

 being common on limestone hills eight or ten 

 miles distant. We discovered the copperhead 

 when we were ploughing, and we saw and felt 

 at the first long, fixed, half-charmed, admiring 

 stare at him that he was an awfully dangerous 

 fellow. Every fibre of his strong, lithe, quiver- 

 ing body, his burnished copper-colored head, 

 and above all his fierce, able eyes, seemed to 

 be overflowing full of deadly power, and bade us 

 [ no ] 



