246 WILD SCENES AND WILD HUNTERS. 
greater value in those times than all a mouthing demagogue 
could utter in a year. 
He was elected Colonel, married happily, a genuine Ken- 
tucky girl, and was universally venerated and idolized, though 
yet scarcely past nis prime. His modesty was unconquera- 
ble, and he shrunk from all honors which he could possibly 
avoid. 
Strange to say, not even the endearments of his happy 
home, the love of his fellow citizens, or the charms of a society 
daily increasing in refinement, could win him from that sin- 
gular passion for solitary hunting,—which seems to be general 
and peculiar to the Hunter-Naturalist, in whatever guise he 
may be found—for which Harrod was so remarkable. He 
would still, rifle in hand, bury himself for weeks, and even 
months, in some unpenetrated fastness of the wilderness, from 
whence he would return as unexpectedly as he went, laden 
with the trophies of the hunt. 
Once he thus disappeared, never to return! By what 
casuality of the chase, or in what deadly contest with lis 
Indian foes, no one could ever more than conjecture. 
Thus died a true hero !—as he would no doubt have chosen 
best to die,—amidst those wild, stern scenes he had so dearly 
loved, and in fair battle with the chances that he gloried most 
in daring. Face to face, with God, the ancient nature and 
his foe, his noble heart was stilled, and his strong arm fell 
nerveless ! 
The wintry winds have moaned through stately mausole- 
ums, indeed, but never yet wailed they a grander requiem, 
above a nobler grave, than that wild spot of rocks and forest 
where James Harrod lies! He left, I believe, one daughter ; 
and a large and respectable family, descended from her, still 
live in Harrodsburg and the neighborhood. 
