746 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Dec. 14, 1912 
Uncle Esek’s wife, known to Jimmy and indeed 
everybody else as “Aunt Clarisy,” as white of 
hair as Uncle Esek himself, was simply one 
broad grin as she said: “Miss Harriet, dem 
kyards sholy does look good ter me. Dem whar 
we has is pint blank worn out.” There was a 
gay bandanna handkerchief for Aunt Clarisy and 
a lot of other things, not forgetting some gun 
caps and some English powder of the fine kind 
known as rifle powder for Jimmy, for the friend 
who had sent these boxes with their wonderful 
contents was a man who lived at Wilmington, 
and who had been a guest of this family while 
he was convalescing from a sickness that sum¬ 
mer. It was a proud day for Jimmy, and the 
can of powder was “toted - ' by him directly to 
the fort, and there put on a shelf. There were 
writing paper, real ink, lead pencils and a book 
or two in the boxes, and when Jimmy compared 
the clean-printed English books .with his poor 
Confederate geography, printed at Raleigh, the 
contrast was almost painful, for the maps in 
that geography looked as if pokeberry juice had 
been used to give one of the colors. There was 
Jimmy's arithmetic, too, also printed in North 
Carolina with so “many of its examples” tell¬ 
ing about the war, such as for example, “If Cap¬ 
tain Tuttle, of a company of the Twenty-sixth 
North Carolina regiment, took into the battle of 
Gettysburg three officers and eighty-one men and 
came out with one officer and two men, how 
many were killed, wounded and missing?" 
But, though the opening of these boxes, 
which really seemed to be from another world 
than this, was something which no child of to¬ 
day can even conceive of so far as pleasure is 
concerned—for the very finest Christmas box of 
this period is as nothing compared to it—yet 
there was something else in store for Jimmy, 
for there came down the lane between the high- 
staked and riddled rail fences Jimmy’s grandpa 
in his old “stick gig,” which he thought the best 
vehicle in all the world. It had been about a 
year since Jimmy had seen this much beloved 
grandparent, but it was Uncle Esek who saw 
him first and absolutely ran to meet him, his 
wooden soled shoes with their tops of half- 
tanned yellow leather fairly clattering as he 
went, but Jimmy was right at his heels. Grand¬ 
pa had in the gig two or three bundles and also 
his long rifle. He had been in the Mexican War 
and had been injured, and so was not able to 
do service in the Confederate ranks. He was 
very active, considering his injured leg, how¬ 
ever, and as Uncle Esek put it, “Got erbout 
sprizingly.” Jimmy was allowed to “tote” the 
long and heavy rifle, as well as the powder horn 
and bullet pouch; Uncle Esek “tuk dem bundles 
an’ de carpet bag;” another slave looked after 
the horse and the gig, and in a minute there 
was a happy party at the house. Mother was 
there to embrace the old man, and grandfather 
very proudly went along with one arm around 
her neck and the other around that of his tall 
and wounded son, while Jimmy and Uncle Esek 
brought up the rear. Grandpa had some mighty 
fine chestnuts and had also brought some real 
sugar and coffee, which he had obtained in some 
wonderful manner, and the supper that night was 
something never to be forgotten. Grandpa said 
he had come to stay a fortnight, and Jimmy had 
to run to tell Uncle Esek this good news. Uncle 
Esek expressed his delight and said to the little 
fellow at the cabin door: “Yo grandpa sho is 
er mity man. He's been a-huntin’ many in his 
time. I members one night when Marse Henry 
was er havin' de fambly prar at the gret house 
dat he read fum de Scripture erbout er man 
whar wuz er mity hunter fo’ de Lawd. Yo 
grandpa wuz one er dat sort er man. He’s killed 
deers an' bears an' wildcats an’ panthers an' 
buffaloes an' lions an’ elefunts in his time. He 
don't use no kind uv gun, ’ceptin’ er rifle, dat 
one whar he brung wid him terday. He don't 
believe in no scatter-gun, like Marse Henry an' 
you uses. He all de time say er flint lock gun 
is de only kind, and dem whar uses caps ain’t 
’pendable. I’ve hearn yo’ grandpa say dat dem 
cap guns is too quick, an' dat dem flint locks 
is slo’ but sho'. Many’s de squrl whar I’ve seen 
yo' grandpa knock outen de high trees, 'thout 
makin’ no wound in ’em. He ‘barks’ um.” 
Jimmy, who had never had the great good for¬ 
tune of hunting with grandpa, wanted to know 
what “barking” was. Uncle Esek laughed and 
said: “Barkin’ ain’t what a dog does. Hit is 
shootin’ er squrl ez he’s er lyin’ out on de lim’, 
so de bullet goes under his throat an' pint blank 
knocks the wind outen him. Down he falls and 
you don’t find no wound ’till you skin him, and 
den yo’ finds er little bruise place whar de 
bullet kinder grazed.” 
Jimmy right then began to regard his grand¬ 
pa as simply wonderful, and the long flint lock 
gun, with its slender hickory ramrod, was re¬ 
garded as a “sure killer” at any distance. The 
next day grandpa said he would take a little 
hunt with Jimmy, who must first of all be told 
about the wonderful rifle. There was the pow¬ 
der horn made out of a well-shaped cow horn, 
with some very creditable engraving done upon 
it, and hanging from the small end, in which 
was a little wooden stopper, was a piece of reed 
infinitely smooth from long use. this being the 
powder gauge. Grandpa explained to Jimmy 
that to tell how much powder a rifle should 
use, a bullet should be put in the hollow of the 
hand and enough powder poured to cover it. 
and then the gauge could be fixed to hold just 
that much. In the bullet pouch there were the 
bullets, which grandpa himself had made, the 
slender bullet mould, a few extra flints for the 
lock, and some "patching,” together with a little 
box of grease. Jimmy must needs see the rifle, 
which was fully as long as grandpa, loaded and 
this operation was performed. The powder was 
poured in, then a bullet was laid in a little cor¬ 
ner of a piece of thin cloth, which had been 
greased, and with a knife grandpa cut off the 
cloth after the bullet had been started. Then 
with the long ramrod he gently but steadily sent 
the patched bullet down on top of the powder. 
Next he looked at his flint to see that every¬ 
thing was all right, and put a few grains of 
powder in the "pan” so that when the flint struck 
the steel, the resultant spark would touch off 
the powder. Uncle Esek was on hand, for he 
was going on the little hunt, too, and the way 
he praised grandpa as a shot delighted that good 
old soul and pleased Jimmy, as Uncle Esek 
said, “mighty night ter death.” Jimmy was 
armed with the Joe Manton, and one-armed 
uncle looked at the group very admiringly, in¬ 
tensely proud of the boy who in his homemade 
shoes and clothes and rough hat of rabbit fur 
and wool was ready to go anywhere and take 
a chance at anything in such an environment. 
Uncle Esek said: “Jimmy, yo’ grandpa kin 
knock de eye outen er hawk. I seen him do it. 
Hawks better keep outen his way. Ef he gits 
nigh one er dem chicken-stealin’ birds, he sho 
is er gwine er knock him, and ter git chicken 
pie.” Jimmy laughed, for he knew very well 
the good old country rule in the South, that if 
you kill a hawk on the premises you are fully 
entitled to the best chicken pie the woman can 
provide, and she is only too happy to do the 
providing. So the three of them started off, 
mother standing in the porch and smiling. 
Grandpa was unusually sure of his rifle, for his 
powder horn had been filled with some of the 
English powder which had so luckily come in. 
It chanced that in a tree there was a very beau¬ 
tiful bird which Uncle Esek called a “yaller- 
hammer, an’ one uv de sociablest birds whar dey 
is, fur he goes wid dem birds whar flies high all 
de time, an’ dem whar stays mostly on de 
ground.” Jimmy begged his grandpa to show 
what he could do right then and there, and 
luckily for his reputation down fell the yellow- 
