Connecticut western news., 1884-08-27
DYING FOR HIS MASTER.
A sHEP HERD DOCS ENCOUNTER WITH A
 RATTLEsNAKE.

live in Philadelphia, where my son Harry is 8 prominent business man. Thirty -one years ago married, in Great Burlington, Mass, as pretty a girl as that village Gamous for its pretty girls) ever sheltered. She had been well brought up, but had no fortune. had M, ,5O0 which had made by running a sawmill. We were young and had the world before us, and we concluded to go West. Going West in those days didn't mean, as it seems to now, going beyond the Mississippi. Going into York State was going West then. I had 8 cousin in Cattaraugus, little viii lage on the Erie Railway, 30 miles east of Dunkirk, and we concluded to go there.
 1t wss late in August when we reached Cattaraugus. My cousin gave us a hearty welcome, and set about looking for spot to build Cattaraugus is a curious sort of place. The village is surrounded by hills. and the wonder to meSis that it doesn't slide down into the washbowl-like valley on the side of which it is built A little creek runs through the village, and a mile to the west finds itself in deep, narrow valley, with almost perpendicular sides, 100 feet high. This valley is called Skinner Hollow, and is one of the most pictur- esque spots on the Erie Road. went down into the hollow prospecting. The aides, where they were not too steep, were covered with heavy growth of frst-class pine, and for miles around the hills were thick with the same timber. saw there was money in sawmill right down in that hollow, and built one on the stream, which could see was 8 good-sized creek most of the year. It is one of the branches of Cattaraugus Greek, which empties into Lake Erie 30 miles west of Buffalo.
 ''I built my mill there, and close to it little house, 80 close, in fact, that the two joined. I took Katie, that is my wife, down there, and we began house. keeping. That was well into the winter, and began logging at once. hired 8 gang of men to help me, raised money by contracting my lumber ahead, and started in. We cut Jugs on the hills close to the mill, rjgged up slides, and ran them down to the logway. I tell you it was music to me when the saw ripped into the first log and clean-cut slab dropped away from the teeth. We had little jollifcation. That was the hrst log ever cut in Skinner Hollow, and people drove miles to see 1t Business was good. There was lots of snow, which made 1t easy work getting logs to the mill and drawing the lumber out to the village, besides giving me all the water I wanted. In fact water was run ming over the tail of my Hume every hour from the time turned it into the race till the middle of July. Then dry spell came on, and had to shut down for two or three hours every day to let my race fill up.
 "But didn't mind that I had had 8 tip-top season and had made money. l had logs enough at my door to keep me busy for year. and knew where there were plenty more when those ran out And, besides, had two to look after in- stead of one. You wouldn't think If you'd see Harry, with all his refined ways and education, that the first music he ever heard was saw tearing through pine knot. But it's so. He was a pioneers son and knocked around a sawmill till he was into his teens. Well. when business was slow I worked around the house, fixing up things here and there for Katie, so as to make hel more comfortable. She couldn't have been more contented. She used to think that sawmill was just about the pleas antest place in the country. Hour after hour she'd stay out there with me, and we'd keep up the conversation while the log was running back and stop when i went up to the saw. Dear me Deal me Why, can see her as she used tc look in those days in that little sawmiI just as plainly as if stood there witt her to-day. She used to jump on tn, log and ride up pretty close to the saw and then, just as would get scared ant jump to drag her away, of she'd go Nobody was ever happier than we were and we have never been as happy since though we've been pretty happy and ar, yet.
 The yellow sunlight fickered into tn, room where the two sat, and the win, looked like blood as the dancing ray
 shone throughit if. The old man was los