Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1896-07-13
THE FIELD OF ADV ENTURE,
THRILLING INCIDENTS AND OAR.
ING DEEDS ON LAND AND SEA.
Fighting Brothers Shielded by Prov
idence-A Convlct's Thrilling Ad-
yentures-Lion MesmeriZes Man.

Fighting Brothers Shielded by Prov
idence-A ConvIct's Thrilling Ad-
ventures-Lion Mesmerizes a Man.
X HALF dozen or SO men were
"A sitting out in front of q
~ Washington ID. C.) hotel the
other evening telling stories.
"Nhen l was twenty-one," said
tall man, evidently from Southern
State, 81 had an ungovernable tenn
per, and half brother three years
older than myself. We were both
church members, but that didn't seem
to bring us any closer together. for
he was Methodist and 1 was Bap-
tist. You may have Observed" he
threw in as decoration to the story,
''that Christian charity and brotherly
love don't always thrive on denomlna-
tional feed. However, rs 1 was say
ing, we were of different denomina-
tions, and we got along fairly we'll to,
gether until We began arguing on our
respective faiths. Then we got hot,
and always lost my temper. / may
say that he did very nearly the same,
but he wasn't quite as bad as was in
that regard.
"One day we were out hunting with
only one gun, a squirrel rifle, between
us, and had tho gun. I may add
here that we lived on farm, and q
one-gun hunting party was not at all
unusual. We had sat down on q rock
near the edge of a stream to rest, and
in some way I slipped and went into
the water. 1t made me mad to begin
with, and when he began chatting me
and telling me that n Baptist ought to
be used to little thing like that, /
got ten times worse, and hit him lick
in the lace. He ran of few yards
and picked up boulder about as big
as your double fist, while 1 made a
grab for the gun, which L had set up
against willow under the bank.
"Of course, we did not know what
we were doing by this time; only l
remember telling him if he raised his
hand to throw the stone I'd shoot him.
He was nervy, though, and 1 hadn't
more than got the words out of my
mouth than he let the boulder come at
me, and, true to my word, banged
away at him. We weren't forty feet
apart, and it was standoff between
the boulder and the bullet as to which
was the more dangerous, but Provi-
dence, l reckon, was watching over
us, for as fired the boulder flew into
dozen pieces, and both of us were
left standing looking at each other in
dazed, helpless kind of way. Then,
still not nderstanding what had hap
pened, but realizing how nearly our
tempers had brought us to bloodshed,
we rushed into each others arms and
began crying over each other.
"When we had got over the excite
ment and collected our wits sufficient
ly to make an investigation, we dis
covered that by the merest chance
by Providential interference, mean
my bullet and his boulder had met
in their flight and nulifed each other.
On one piece of the broken stone we
found the blue mark of the bullet, and
in another place we found the bat
tered bullet. He took the bullet, and
] took the piece of marked stone, and
we have kept them to this day as sac
red souvenirs, and as very potent re-
minders never to discuss our respec-
tive beliefs. I'm just as strong a Bap-
tist as ever, and he is equally Meth.
odist, but we both believe that great
er than either Baptist or Methodist is
the Providence that watches over us
ALL"