The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1876-11-02
A Solemn NIght-W atch.

THE stories of guides and trappers
of the Adirondack region have proved
rich mines to Mr.. Murray. One of the
most powerful of these narratives is
that of an old trapper depicting his ex-
perience in projecting dead body
from the beasts of prey by night:
"Well, Henry, ! took my stand at
the foot of the bier. and kept my
death watch rifle in hand, steady as a
sentry on duty, save when / stirred
the fire or lighted pine knot. For
the aniInils was Uneasy, as they always
is when corpse is round, and I need
ed the pine knots more than once, and
some of the varmints got the tech of
lead and the smell of powder that
night, tell ye, for they was full of
their devilments, and made me and
the hound as wakeful as if we was
surrounded by inimies.'
odd you really have to kill any
thing?' I asked, speaking for the first
time in an hour; for the Old trapper
had told his story with such natural
ness of information and gesture that he
| had held me spell bound by his narra-
! tive-for no one could hear him tell
! the strange tale he was telling and not
be carried along by the movement of
! it-and now that he was evidently
reaching the climax, ! feared | should
miss some detail of his experience
which being omitted would mar the
narration, so, hoping to hold his ut
| terance to the line of actual occur
renee, said, Ibid you have to kill
anything that night?'
.'Wen, yis, l did," he replied. 81
bored hole through dog wolf oven
! there on the beach. arter / had borne
his onnateral howlin' as long as amor
tai could; and I dropped cat from
that dead cedar there, arter me and
| the hound had stood the stare of her
eyes ten minitS or more, and about
two in the mornin', litter of panthers
crawled in on us ontil the bush seemed
alive with 'em, and 1 lifted the scalr
of the biggest of the drove, arter he
had got within forty feet of the corpse,
and paid no more attention to brands
| pitched at him than if they were
tufts of sod; so. with a pine knot all
atire in one hand, to show me the
sights, | drove the lead in between his
Internal eyes in style that taught
'em all manners for the rest of the
watch. Yis, Henry, we had a solemn
and lively time of it, for sartin, that
night, and at times it looked as if there
would be no funeral the next day
leastways, none that me and the
hound would attind, onless we made
one for ourselves; but we stood to oul
post, and between the brands and the
lead and the help of the Lord we
brought the body through safe It'll
sunrise.
"But it was mighty solemn watchin'
by the body all by myself in the depths
OF the woods here that night, for at
times the animils would make the all
roar and scream, and the mountains to
yelp as if the upper world was inhab-
tied with cats and wolves and panthers,
and then they would suddenly become
quiet, and the world round about was
nothin' but silence, but the moon
shinin' through it; and the dead mans
face was white as the moon and still
as the air, for his troubles was over
and the marks of them passed from
his featur when his breath went away.
And so me and the hound kept our
watch by the dead It'll the sun riz in
the east and the hour had come for the
| funeral -