Owingsville outlook. [volume] (Owingsville, Ky.) 1879-192?, 1897-03-11
Bull-baCk Ride.

Bull-baCk Ride.
New York world.l
The emergencies which made
heroines of 80 many women of the
early colonial days have not even
now ceased to arise in some parts
even of the older settled portions
of the country. An instance in
this line occurred only last week,
and within a few hours ride of
New York, which might well go
down with some of the pluckiest
exploits of the pioneer mothers.
In desolate, lonely place near
Staracca, Pa, there lives a family
consisting of husband, wife and
a young daughter. The husband
has to be away from home good
deal on account of the nature of
his work, and was away last week
when his daughter was taken i'll.
The mother exhausted her store of
household remedies, but the girl
grew rapidly worse. There was
not doctor within more than four
miles, and there was no neighbor
within reach to go for him.
But even that was not all the
poor mothers source of perplexity.
The girls condition was fast be-
coming so alarming that, desperate
as the step sesmed, she saw that
she must herself go for the doctor.
And there was no horse to take her.
Her husband was too poor to own a
horse even if he had much use for
one, which he had not. The wild
mountain roads we're rough and
clogged in places with snow. To
think of undertaking the journey
on foot and ever getting to the
doctor in time to bring him to the
sick girls bedside in season to have
his service of any avail seemed lit
tie short of madness.
But the doctor must be reached,
otherwise the child's death seemed
certain. The woman went to the
doorway of her little home and
looked forlornly out on the bleak,
wintry hills. Then an idea came
to her. 1t was desperate, but the
situation demanded desperate meas
ures. Among the live stock her
husband owned was a young and
frisky bull, barely two years old,
but rather tanned down by scanty
rations and the general winter de
preston, He was skinny and his
backbone suggested serrated ridge
of miniature peaks. But the brute
had abundant strength to travel,
and if he could be dubbed into
some sort of sense he might be used
as a conveyance.
There was nothing to hitch to;
he must be ridden. So, after ex-
haustivs maneuvering, the plucky
woman managed 60 get a rope tied
to each of his horns, and, with a
strong club in her hand, she at last
maMged to nt0'nt him and head
him out into the highway. He
proved a very sensible and decently
disposed sort of a beast, obeying
the sharp jerks to the right and
left from the ropes on his horns,
and galloping off finely along the
road when he was properly encour-
aged by the club. 1t was not an
equestrian expedition that would
quite do for the park, but the poor
mother thought little of that. She
was after the doctor to come and
save her child from death, and af-
ter nearly two hours of rough jolt
ing she got there. The doctor was
not at home, and it would be some
time before he would return, but
his wife promised for him that he
should respond to that call if he
never did to another. She urged
the woman to wait and ride back
with him, but she would not listen
to it.
She must get back to her child,
and off she vert on her grotesque
mount. The bull had settled down
to a philosophic acceptance of the
situation by this time, and started
off at brisk canter, possibly with
some sordid association in his in
tellectuals between the homeward
road and the shelter and fodder at
the end of it. About a mile from
the house he saw a man driving a
mountain wagon along the road in
front of him, and that man had the
inconceivable impudence to wear a
red shirt.
From that time on the return
was one wild, headlong charge. The
man heard the snorting and clatter
behind him, and when he looked
around and got a glimpse of the
awful nightmare freak that was
pursuing him, he lashed his horses
onward with the very frenzy of
fright.
There was no need of the club
now. 1t fell by the wayside, and
the woman's whole energies were
devoted to hanging on. She clung
to the bulls back until he reached
her home, when she rolled off un-
harmed In the snow, while the bull
and the man in the red shirt dis
appeared in a cloud of flying snow
and gravel over the crest of the
nearest hill. At the last accounts
no tidings of either the one or the
other had been received.
But the doctor came along soon
after and had two patients on his
hands, for the mother, too, had to
take to her bed after her rough ex-
perience. Her daughters life was
saved, however, and she, too, will
soon be mono the worse for her he
roic exploit.
GENERAL NEWS.
| Mrs. Henry Ward Beecher died