“Bushy-tails,” said he, with grave passion, waving his hand in the direction of the tree-tops above him, “you needn’t mind old Jim any longer. Lead is skeerce these times. You may skip ’round and chatter all you want to. Your smellers is safe. And gobblers, you may gobble and strut in peace now. You needn’t say put! put! when you see me creepin’ ’round. I won’t be a-lookin’ for you. You’ll have to excuse the old man. Bullets is skeerce these days, let alone powder. So, good-by, my honeys. And if you will forgive me the harm I _have_ done you, old Jim won’t trouble you any more.” And so, with his rifle across his lap, he sat upon a log and warmed his benumbed limbs, and, looking into friendly faces, warmed his heart, too. “I say, old man,” said a young soldier, chaffing him, “what do you call that thing lying in your lap? Can it shoot?” “I call her Old Betsey,” said he. “You may laugh at her, but if you hold her right and steady, she hurts. There ain’t anything funny about Old Betsey’s business end, I promise you.” And he tapped the muzzle of his rifle with a grim smile. Late in the afternoon of the next day (it took him all this day to get thawed) old Jim bade the jolly boys at the picket station good-day. He was going scouting, he said. “Leave the old pop-gun behind,” cried one. “No, take it along,” put in another. “Perhaps you may knock over a molly-cotton-tail. Fetch her in, and we will help you cook her.” 32. Just before sundown the old man reached the summit of a densely-wooded little hill, about three hundred yards from where his house had lately stood. Stopping in front of a tall hickory on its apex, he raised his eyes and surveyed the tree from bottom to top. “I went up it once, after nuts,” said he, speaking aloud; “but that was many a year ago,—let me see,—yes, forty-five years. Well, I must try—ah, I see,—I can make it.” And, leaning Old Betsey against the huge trunk, he tackled a young white oak.