306 HILLS AND LAKES. 



as if it had found something good. Gabe lighted his 

 match, and held it cautiously to his shavins of fat- 

 wood, and as they blazed up, he sighted along the 

 barrel, shut up both eyes, and blazed away too. The 

 charge from the old musket went one way, and Gabe 

 went the other. The old continentaller, kiekin' him 

 worse than a whole team of horses, and the roar that 

 was heard in them woods, and went echoin' about the 

 hills and bellerin' among the mountains, gave the 

 wild things around fits. Gabe rolled over and over 

 down the bank, and brought up in a muddy pool, 

 with his shoulder half broke, and his cheek bruised as 

 if somebody had struck him with a sledge-hammer. 

 The folks at home, hearin' the report, concluded they'd 

 have venison enough for a week, and no mistake. 

 About ten o'clock, Gabe came creepin' along home. 

 He hung up his old musket, and stole off to bed in 

 the dark, He didn't answer any questions very dis- 

 tinctly, and when he crawled out in the morning, sich 

 another lookin' animal couldn't be found in the 

 Shatagee country. One eye was swelled tight, and 

 his face was all on one side, and his shoulder was blue 

 all over as an indigo bag. He didn't say much about 

 his deerlick, or what he'd let off old Queen Anne at, 



