A 'Thousand- Mile JValk 
weather to which he had always been accus- 
tomed. But in speaking of animals, he at once 
became enthusiastic and told many stories of 
hairbreadth escapes, in the woods about his 
house, from bears, hungry alligators, wounded 
deer, etc. “ And now,” said he, forgetting in his 
kindness that I was from the hated North, 
“you must stay with me a few days. Deer are 
abundant. I will lend you a rifle and we’ll go 
hunting. I hunt whenever I wish venison, and 
I can get it about as easily from the woods 
near by as a shepherd can get mutton out of 
his flock. And perhaps we will see a bear, for 
they are far from scarce here, and there are 
some big gray wolves, too.” 
I expressed a wish to see some large alli- 
gators. “Oh, well,” said he, “I can take you 
where you will see plenty of those fellows, but 
they are not much to look at. I once got a good 
look at an alligator that was lying at the bottom 
of still, transparent water, and I think that his 
eyes were the most impressively cold and cruel 
of any animal I have seen. Many alligators go 
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