Waterbury evening Democrat., 1888-08-11
MY ADVENTURE.

MY ADVENTURE.
 A Timo When I Was Afraid or Being Frightened. This Is only a story of girls adventure, but am sure most of the girls whe read 1t will not wish for any thing more tragic in their own experience.
 I lived with my parents on the sloping side of Skitchawaug, long, low mountain on the west side of the Connecticut riyer.. The mountain was nearly covered with | wood, but the trees of the two sides dif- fered In kind. Sugar-naaple, white pine and white beech grow more plentafully on the western slope; blue beech and pitch pine on the eastern-and the pitch-pine tree was the indirect cause of my adventure. The events I am about to relate took place long ago, at 8 time when conc work was, among the young ladies of our section, the leading passion In fancy work. My sis ter and I had made work-baskets, frames and brackets, using tho scales of the white pine cones to make a scalloped edge, and spruce and hemlocG and the pretty NttAe tamarack cones to cover the rest of she woodwork.
 But we were dissatisfied because VIC had no pitch-pine cones in our collection. They were stiff intxactabAe things, hard to work: and of little beauty, but we wanted them because we did not have them. we knew there were pitoh-psne trees on the south eastern slope of the mountains. It was 1ap i've had no idea how far-from our usual haunts for play or for pionicking, but we: were convinced that we should never know, happiness till we had some cones from those trees. It was long, rough climb, we iD- ferred, and we could easily have made a pleasant excursion of 1t by taking lunch. and spending the day in the undertakings bat this did Aot occur to us.
 Ellen Story was to accompany us after school-after tea, In fact The school-house. was half mile on our way but as 1t was a hastily formed plan we were obliged to gs home for our tea.
 We had some difficulty in persuading mother to consent to our excursion. She was born on the side of Skitchawaug, but, as she had never been of an adventurous dispositon-and 1t was standing puzzle that both of her daughters were so different from herself in this respect-she had almost no knowledge of the wilder parts of the ! moyntain.
 "Doeyou know where the trees growa' she ! asked.
 70, yes, they'rertght over the east corner; we go In by MT. Towards gate" This was true far as 1t wont, and we had no intention of decelving her, though the truth was none of us had ever seen a pASch-pine tree to know It.
 "Are they near the rattlesnake dens3' 70, no, guess not Don't care If they arc. Yoa know we always wanted to kiu rattle ! snake"
 Mother had seen us start on too many l such excursions to hold out long with har objections; sometimes we went for chest ! nuts, and got them by climbing the trees i; ! sometimes we went after moss, or flowers, ! or acorns, and very often we took a full aup- ply Of weapons for killing rattlesnAkes; but ! as we never killed nor even saw one, mother by and by ceased to fear that we would en- l counter any. Sc, bsdding us take sone out side garments and be sure to leave ths woo4v before dark, she turned to the dairy, and we \ toward SkitchawauR.
 ! Although 1t was late, we strolled along, talking and planning. We stopped to peep \ in at the sohool-house window, for old sake's 6 sake, probably, though 1t was but little moro ! than an hour since we had left 1t. Turning \ in through the Howard gate, we stopped 10 tell our errand. Mrs Howard discouraged us more decidedly than mother had done
 'It is too late; 1t win be dark before you get there. It is more than two miles from here"
 1t won't take us long to go two miles" i" we answered, stoutay, though somewhat \ NA@A06yC0 w0 AAA AOt G8V10@E8u LU6 O9&. tance in rods and miles, but think about \ ha6 a miAe was tho distance had in mind when looking beyond Mrs. Towards.
 "But you don't know any thing about fl where you are going. You'd be just aa likely to go into the dogwood swamp or the rattlesnalzes' dens aS anywhere"
 '1'm not afraid" said l.
 "No, Jane Plumley, don't s'pose there Is any thing that you are afraid of. Those
 that know nothing fear nothing: but dc \ wonder your mother.let you go."
 70, she don't care where we sow I said
 without considering what said.
 "Well Jape, do haave oaYe to koep awas
 from the snakes d6nm w These s.dens'' were
 8 Quantity of loose, shelly rocks on the ouA
 side ofshe mountain, whore the rattlesnakes I were supposed to breed
 Hopang that Mrs- Howard was miatakex
 In the distance, but'fearing she was not. VI
 made little moro haste when we started
 away from her door; but we soon forgb'
 about It, and stopped to gather flowers anG
 ferns and curious hchens on the way. Sooz
 after entering the woods, we found quah
 sity ot white pine-eones so smooth in texture
 and so rich ln coloring that we made 6 larRs
 pile by the foot of tree, proposing to asth
 CT them In our aprons whan we caaas baoa
 with our baskets filled with the others. N We all lived in the valley. where we sn
 loved some hours of dayNgha after we wex,
 shaded by the western hiu, 90 VIC were is
 no alarm when the sunshine disappsaret
 from the highest tree-topA,' and whsn tn,
 darkness was fairly upon us, we theaaht VI,
 had come into 9 denser pa3t of the forest
 Let's got out of thds da'zk ho}ei" saAd M,
 @&ser. We hurried alos.g, but Hsmdang
 grew no lighter, we looked up amA thsougl
 the lea3y canopy we saw the a&ars. ROarHAYS Wanted