BORDER LIFE IN THE WEST. 
225 
bore. I like to ' rough it' for mj part." Turning quickly 
to my red-haired host I said, 
You all hunt of course — ^bold boys like you ?" 
" Ye-e-es, we all hunts in course." 
You have a fine-looking, old-fashioned, long-barreled 
rifle up there over the door, I perceive !" and before any of 
them had time to think, I staggered roughly through them, 
and had the rifle down from its buck-horn hooks. Its mas 
sive barrel was a terrible weapon, even if unloaded, for i 
had marked it from the first, and it was its possession I haa 
been coveting, though altogether uncertain as- to its being- 
charged. 
This movement had been so unexpected, that they were 
entirely unprepared for it, and I had time to cock the rifle, 
and with a thrill of ungovernable joy, perceived, that it was 
freshly capped. 
The muzzle had been instantly brought down to the ^' pre- 
sent," as I placed my back against the corner of the cabin. 
There had been a slight movement among them, as if for a 
simultaneous rush upon me. It was only a scarcely percep- 
tible wave — but that wave fell back before the formidable 
muzzle which stared them in the face with its one dark, un- 
fathomable orb. 
" Ah ! I see it is loaded — a fine rifle no doubt 1 I love 
rifles, and, Mr. Host, I shall take the liberty of examining 
this for awhile!" and I walked through them as they stood 
gaping at me in mute astonishment, and took a seat near my 
sleeping friend. 
The tables were now effectually changed, and as I sat 
down on one of the trunks of H , I felt it to be unneces- 
sary longer to counterfeit drunkenness, for I had earned ex- 
perience enough of rufiians already to understand that they 
were all cowards, and incapable, unless armed with similar 
weapons, and in overpowering numbers, of facing a resolute 
man with a loaded fire-arm. I had possessed myself, by a 
coup de maiTij of the weapon of my villainous, inhospitable 
