“The rattler stopped his pretty gliding motion away from me and seemed in doubt. Then he began to take on a few quirks. ‘He is going to coil and then to strike,’ said I, recalling a paragraph from my school reader. It was an unhappy moment! “I knew that tradition had fixed the proper weapons to be used against rattlesnakes: a stone (more, if necessary), a stick (forked one preferred), and, in rare cases, a revolver. I had no revolver. There was not a stick in sight, and not a stone bigger than a hazelnut; but there was the rattler. I cast another despairing glance around and saw, almost at my feet and half hidden by sage brush, several inches of rusty iron--blessed be the teamster who had thrown it there. I darted towards it, and, despite tradition, turned on the rattler, armed with the goodly remains of a--frying-pan. “The horrid thing was ready for me with darting tongue and flattened head--another instant it would have sprung. Smash! on its head went my valiant frying-pan and struck a deadly blow, although the thing managed to get from under it. I recaptured my weapon and again it descended upon the reptile’s head, settling it this time. “Feeling safe, I now took hold of the handle to finish it more quickly. Oh! that tail--that awful, writhing, lashing tail. I can stand Indians, bears, wolves, anything but that tail, and a rattler is all tail, except its head. If that tail touches me I shall let go. It did touch me. I did not let go. Pride held me there, for I heard the sound of galloping hoofs. Whiskers’ empty saddle had alarmed the rest of the party. “My snake was dead now, so I put one foot on him to take his scalp--his rattles, I mean--when horrid thrills coursed through me. The uncanny thing began to wriggle and rattle with old-time vigor. But, fortified by Nimrod’s assurance that it was ‘purely reflex neuro-ganglionic movement,’ I hardened my heart and captured his ‘pod of dry peas.’” HOW PLANTS LIVE By Julia McNair Wright In the hot August days, when the air scarcely stirs, the birds sit silent in their coverts, the cattle stand under the thickest shade or knee-deep in the ponds. Only the insects seem to rejoice in the burning rays of the sun, and gayly hover around the splendid profusion of flowers.