Belding banner. (Belding, Mich.) 1889-1918, 1900-05-03


after the yell was finished. as the AMI
NAL took a quick breath. The moon
had set and George was quite In tho
dark till he came out into the circle
OF light, reused instantly from his
sleep. l was struck by the CHASTITY
pallor OF his face. as he no doubt was
by mine II he took time to notice It..
He ran to get his axe. stuck In log
close by. and l took up the gun and We
both stood In front Of the fire and
waited for something to happen.
"A few more OF those yells. eacn one
seemingly little nearer. and could
endure it no longer. Plucking up a
little courage, / stepped around be-
hind the leanto and fired both barrels
or the shotgun up into the air, think
Ing In that way to brighten away our
tormentor. 1t seemed to have a con-
trary effect. Almost simultaneously
with the discharge of the second bar
rel. with a short but awfully piercing
yell, the brute jumped toward the
place where l stood from his standing
place. thirty or forty feet back in the
bushes, and landed SO near me that I
only very dimly by the light OF the fire
actually felt on my face some of the
dirt he kicked up when he landed. The
leap was SO sudden and unexpected
that | was. for the moment, paralyZ ID
with fright and stood like a dummy.
waiting for him to seize me, as / fully
expected he would. / could see him
behind me. for you know how one Is
bothered when going away from a
light and looking at once into the
darkness beyond. Within a few Sec
onds my wits returned, and l made
a break for the protection OF the fire,
leaving the cat crouched in the shad-
ow back of our camp.
"A sudden inspiration led re to
think of a little bundle of nails we
had brought to help build the shelter
with Hastily turning big charge OF
powder into the right barrel, wadding
1t with piece Of lining from my jack
ct, | then charged it with a good sized
handful OF those nails, rammed home
place, and felt ready for a fight The
way that brute had jumped right up
Into our camp had made me mad az
soon as l recovered from the first
shock OF it. and l thirsted for mis-
blood. fully determined to put an end
to his bowling for good and all II he
gave me a chance.
Telling George to back me with his
axe, l crept round the corner of the
camp and, after looking for two Or
three minutes. was able to make out
the animal still crouching in the par
tial shadow of maple tree. 1t was, OF
course, a foolish thing to do. for
miss would have brought a wounded
panther right on top of us in a jiffy,
but my blood was up and | could not
wait another second. so drawing up
the gun, l took a good aim at the
outlines in the shadow and pulled the
trigger.
The recoil OF the heavy charge al
most knocked me over backward. and
at first l could not tell what had hap
pened. But the beast was still lying
in the same place when looked, and,
taking a burning stick from the fire,
we both approached him with axes,
ready. He was quite dead and that
handful of nails had torn an ugly
hole in his neck.
so | know. as I said before, that
there have been panthers in Maine.
That one was over seven feet from
the tip of his tail to his nose, and his
jump, when we came to look things
over by daylight, must have been over
80 feet.
I'VE were too much excited to sleep
any more that night. and the next,
after SHINING the panther, we had to
go out to Madrid to tell the story and
send the hide to a taxidermist. 1t
came out in the discussion that fol.
lowed our adventure that no panthers
had been seen in that vicinity for more
than Is years, with the exception of
one big one which had been caught in
a trap the preceding spring by the
farmer who lived the nearest to the
scene OF our night combat"