Little Rifle; or, The Young Fur HuntersEllis, Edward Sylvester
General
Little Rifle; or, The Young Fur Hunters
Ellis, Edward Sylvester
Dime novels; Trappers -- Fiction
They say an Injin never forgits a kindness, and I s’pose they
don’t, fur if you’re kind to one of ’em he’ll hunt you for a week, and
never give up till he gets a lock of your ha’r to remember you by. The
only trouble is that when he takes the lock he’s mighty sartin to take
all thar is on your head.”
“Then I suppose, Uncle Ruff, that the fellow I started off on a walk
won’t be likely to forget me very soon?”
“Not much; and while you’re ’bout it, you might jist as well hold him
in remembrance. You see, Little Rifle,” continued Old Ruff, resuming
his supper, “I never b’l’eve in murder--not at all; but when you’ve
got your gun p’inted at a red-skin, and don’t feel like pulling the
trigger, it’s a good idee to shet your eyes, hold your gun steady, and
sneeze. When a man has his finger on the trigger, and onexpectedly
sneezes, the gun is purty sartin to go off. I found that out when I
was a little younker, and had a bow and arrer sighted at my dear old
grandmother, wondering how near I could come to the end of her nose
without hitting it, and not intendin’ to shoot at all. The old lady
jist then had her snuffbox out, and I s’pose some of it got into my
norsetrils; fur I fetched a sneeze that like to have blowed my nose
off, and when I got over the a’rthquake that had shook me to pieces, I
see’d my grandmother picking up the only three teeth that she had left,
from the floor. Afore I could ax her pardon, the old man come in. I
remember he had been digging in the garden, and carried a spade in his
hand. Wal,” added the old joker, with a sigh, “I won’t describe the
incidents that follered; suffice it to say that I warn’t able to set
down for two weeks, and I don’t s’pose I’ll forgit that little episode
as long as I live.”
“Perhaps if I live all my life in these woods,” said Little Rifle, in a
voice of unconscious sadness, “I may come to look upon life as you do;
but I can not do so just yet.”
“You ain’t going to live here all your life,” said the hunter, with
such abruptness that the lad looked up inquiringly into his face, as if
he failed to get the full import of his words. “You’re getting to be
quite a likely-sized youngster, and it’s time that you see’d something
more of the world than you can see in these parts, though a chap can
see a powerful sight when he looks toward the mountains. I’m going on
East arter the summer is over, and I’ll take you with me. You’ll see
sights then that I reckon will make you open your eyes.”
“There is one sight which I often wonder whether I shall ever be given
to look upon.”
“What’s that?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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