Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1893-08-02
Raced With n Snapper.

Three smart nutmeg State youngsters,
Jimmie Lyons, Jimmie Deadly, 'and
Herman Finder of Seymour village,
Conn, went to Beach's pond the other
day to gather water lilies, and while
they were padding about in the blue
water, Jimmie Lyons caught sight Of
something on the bank that was half
as big as Connecticut cellar door,
looked just like q wrinkled brown rock,
that gazed at him in a steady, cold
blooded, and markedly personal way
totally unlike rock. Jimmie was
swimming in deep water not ten rods
from the curious heap on the shore,
and when he felt its steely gaze boring
a figurative hole into his bosom, he be-
gan to shiver all over and struck out
for shore as swiftly as he could with
legs and arms. Then it was that the
gnarled and d-backed monster on
The beach, comprehending the lads at
tempt TO escape suddenly unlimbered
himself for action. Four great swarthy
claws were shot out at the four corners
of himself, q frightful great rapacious
head was run out like battleship's
gun, the mass Topped awlIwardly down
The beach, splashing iuto the still lake
furously-and Jimmie Lyons, with
sinking heart and one spluttering howl
of frenzied fear, realized that a Co.,
pound swapping turtle, the terror of the
lake, was hot on his trail.
Jimmie is pretty fair swimmer, but
it was no fair shake of race, for the
reason that the big turtle covered two
yards of the course to J. Lyons's one,
gaining on him with threatening rapid
itv. Jimmie knew all about that, too,
for with his face turned backward he
watched the oncoming oblong, barge
like giant splashing on in horrible form
and with no science, but with killing
''git thar" stroke. Jimmie yelled just
once again, and the other scared young
sters in sympathy and excitement
''Hi there, Jimmie Scoot! Their ole
son of guns right onter yer" jim
mie Lyons knew that fact far better
than did they. Now and then the big
fellow splashed drop of water on jim
mics bare shoulders. His head was far
out of his shell, turning this way and
that, as if swung on q toggle Joint; his
wick,d d black eyes cleaned hungrily;
he was straining every sinew and al
ready cached for one of the boys rela-
lively white arms But, just then, jim
mie Lyons touched bottom with one of
his feet, and then gathering himself for
an elastic spring, was about to "scoot, "
and no mistake about it. at that in
slant the turtle dived with the grace
and dexterity ofa large washtub, but
he got there all the same. He also got
Timmic's big toe, which had struck out
j final kick before taking run up
the oozy, shelving lake shore. Jimmie
screamed and kicked and the turtle
back off into the deep waters Of the
lake, presumably intending to drag his
prey into one of his secluded emerald
caves, where he might eat him quietly
without any interference. But, the lad,
frantic with fright and pain, struggled
manfully. His blood was up. He pur-
posed to give the big fellow his toe
rather than submit to the humiliating
iate of having swapping turtle eat the
whole of him. So with desperate,
powerful, final firt of his foot, recking
not of consequences, he yanked the
crushed and bleeding toe, the remains of
it, out of the knifelike, bony beak ofhis
enemy, and fled up the lake bank.
There his frightened, but thankful COM
rades received him in their arms, dane
ing about him like Comanche Indians
about a captive, and Jimmie Deadly
sized up the happy termination of the
episode with the joyful exclamation /:
Gosh! Jimmy, but waren't he a
corker But he didn't eat yer, did he?"
Out in the middle Of the lake, the
boys facing about deserted the discom-
fited snapper, his head just protruding
through the waves, and looking grim,
grumpish, and full of malice and ire
The boys dressed quickly and scooted
home through the woods, and Jimmie
Lyons, wearing great bunch of rags
about his "off7' big toe, struts about
town and is the hero of Seymour.
When the envious other boys say to
him inquiringly now: "Stonc bruise =?
| or snakes" Jimmie replleS loitlly, ana
with scorn of such trivial everyday
words: Nav, snapper! and he was
bigger'n meetin' house. You JUS asst
Jimmie Deadly, eff yer wants ter
know"
A lot of Seymour men are hunting
that big snapper in Beach's pond with
shotguns. They say he is the biggest
chap of the kind ever seen in middle
Connecticut. But he isn't at home to
men with firearms as he is to boys with
toothsome and tolerably white big toes
Jimmie, in telling his adventure to a
local country reporter, declared that
the snapper dragged him twice beneath
the water as handily as if he were o
piece of cheese.