The Saint Paul globe., 1897-04-25

than on the previous DAY, ana MT.
Smith addressed the object in as po-
lite terms as he could summon, and
asked: What are you doing UP
there?" ~
There was no reply. Another mem
Der of the party more bold than the
rest said: Il believe Ill bark him.
drawing a revolver and aiming at
part of the tree a few inches from the
object. Don't shoot hom!' they all
protested The young man fired, and
the ball knocked the bark from the tree
only a few inches from the object.
Again the long arm slowly raised and
the pale, bOny fingers could be plainly
seen. Around the campfire on the pre-
vious night they had concluded that
what they had taken. for an arm had
probably been a limb of the tree
swayed by the wind. They now saw
the arm and hand as plainly as they
had ever seen anything in all their
lives,
Once more the arm motioned for them
to move on. The meaning Of the ges-
ture could not be misinterpreted, and
with one accord the party turned their
horses into the trail and rode away.
They came to town and told their
story. Some people laughed at them.
They expected that. Others asked
crowd together and making a further
investigation. Several citizens vOlun-
teered their services to help sift the
matter to the bottom, but there was
only one member of the party who had
already seen the strange object who
cared to pursue the subject further
This was Mr.. Janison, who agreed to
go and point out the tree. Yesterday
morning ten or twelve citizens of the
town, several small boys and two
negro aXmens went with Mr.. Jamison
and there lis not one among them who
will not remember the strange occur
rences that he witnessed as long as
! he lives We did not expect to see
anything, and were sure we were 60
/ ing on a FOOLS errand, and would be
| laughed at when we returned to town.
/ We were all as much aStOunded as
/ gratified when Mr.. JamiSOn halted in
the woods and hesitatingly said: Gle
is there yet. There he is in the same
| place" Never did any set of men
strain their eyes looking at a strange
object as we did, There was the head
and face of an old man. We could
| not be mistaken. We could see his
| hair his ears, nose, eyes and mouth
as plainly as we could see little bird
that had aighted on the same tree.
Several members of the party address,
ed the object, but it made no reply.
After consulting for few moments we
concluded to cut the tree down, and one
member Of the party took the ak and
struck the tree a few blows for the
purpose of seeing whether the object
would protest or not 1t remained per-
fectly mOtionless, though one of the
negroes declared that ii moved its lips.
The negroes were told to get to work
and cut the tree down, but they re
fused to touch it, and could not be
moved to do so, either by threats or
bribes. They would not stay to witness
the work Each of US used the ak in
turn, and as the tree was hollow we
soon had it ready to fall. Then John
Stallins summoned the courage to ad-
dress the object and inform it that
we had cut nearly through the tree,
and that a few more blows would GER
tainly cause it to fall Then we wit
messed something that transfxed us
to the earth and nearly -congealed our
blood.
The object in the stree-mortal or
ghost-plainly raised both arms. Not
a man would have remained a moment
if he had possessed the power to move.
The arms slowly descended, and the
hands pointed to the root Of the tree.
Just then the great oak swayed in
little breeze, and the next instant fell
with a crash. Every man ran away.
After a few moments we got out of
| breath, and while resting we somewhat
! recovered our courage, and concluded
to return and get the ak at any rate.
| Cautiously we approached the stump,
and the first man who looked at it
threw UP his arms and uttered such
an exclamation Of terror that we
thought he was hurt, and ran to him
Another surprise was in store for us.
Protruding from the hollow end of the
tree was a lot Of bones and old rags.
We were all too much agitated to do
| much talking. and we stood there for