The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1906-07-26

less, it hung above him.
"God !" breathed the prisoner, God ="
and turning his blanched cheek to the
sand, he fell into sort of sleep.
All through the waning day he slept
through the approach of night and the
swift desert change from heat to cold.
When he awoke the first pale amethyst
of dawn was in the sky. The snake
was sleeping, not as snakes are wont
TO sleep in freedom, head tucked to
tail and sinuous fold tapping on fold,
but with his swollen body back-thrown
and stiffened against the stake which
held him, caught mid-struggle by insen-
siblllty
The man turned his head to face
him.
Hey, rattler!" he called cheerily,
and scraped some grains of sand
toward the recumbent body.
But when he saw the start and
shudder with which the creature woke,
the anguish of returning consciousness,
suddenly he was sorry for his act.
When the snake, writhing round,
struck at its cord quivering from head
to tail, he would have given an hour
of his own rest to have restored the
sleep which he had broken.
The sun rose presently. Again the
weary panorama of the day unrolled
before the eyes of the two Jictims.
The snake was quiet, weakened by his
long struggle. The man, strengthened
by sleep, restored by the nights cold,
held himself strongly in hand.
Sometimes, indeed, the growing heat
drew from his lips broken sigh.
Sometimes birds, many now, swooped
low around him with hoarse cries and
Tapping of heavy wings at such times
his whole body grew tense beneath
the stress of almost uncomfortable
disgust and terror. But he lay still.
Not for his reasons sake dared he
again give way to the expression of
fear. 1t was comfort to him in
these moments that the snake showed
no apprehension of their gruesome
neighbors or eyed them only with the
avid eyes of hunger. Watching the
Indifference of the reptile, the man
feared less. Fixing his eyes upon it,
he could hold hard to sanity and to
endurance, though around him perched
and lowered the vulture ministers of
death.
But as the morning passed a new
anxiety should die first? 1t seemed to
weaken with every hour and the man
trembled. He spoke to it soothingly
at times and had. or believed lie had,
the power of quieting its paroxyms.
I'm his fevered mind he searched halt
ingly for some knowledge of it's needs.
Would it live longer for the taking of
life? And if by stretching out his
hand he could delay its end. what then
of the lengthening of its pain? Before
his dimming eyes, the snake loomed,
now refuge, now menace A dozen
times, he half relaxed his hand only
TO draw it quickly close again. Once
when the snake fell in its spring, seem
insly dead he thrust the fingers wide
with Il cry of utter deprivation When
it moved again he drew them in, the
instructive love CT life still strong
upon him.
A buzzard had risen at his cry and
perched on the sage-brush at his head.
He studied it quietly for while, its
coarse, draggled feathers, its filmed,
eyes and cruel beak. When the scrutiny
Lad grown intolerable, he strove to
shout to scare it from its place. His
voice came dry and breathless,
scarcely whisper, and the bird
swayed back and forth unmoved
He closed his eyes after this and
for long time lay still, only rolling
his head from side to side that the
vultures might not light upon his
body.
At last. when the sun lay low on
the horizon, he ceased the movement
and again looked about him. Overhead
Il cloud of birds, scared by the sudden
quiet, hung high in air; swarms of
ants and lesser insects crawled and fed
upon his arms and body; the sage
brush all around rustled with pungent
dryness and to the west the sky burn
hard and bright as FURNISHED copper.
For long time he waited. Then,
with sobbing breath, he flung round,
straining his body against the cords
which held him.
The snake too had moved. The
throng that bound 1t was drawn taut
and painfully it had thrust its swollen
head across its iinegrs. 1t lay thus
outstretched, not striking, its glazing
| eyes on the mans face.
And while they lag SO suddenly
there came to pass the impossible, the
one uncounted chance. From far
across the desolate sage-brush desert
sounded TO them the barking of a
dog
1t came nearer ana with 1t the
creak and grinding of heavy wheels.
The man stroye to cry out and, fail
ing, gnawed desperately at his baked
lips and tongue. When the feeble
| trickle of blood which paid his ef-
forts had moistened his dry throat,
he raised his voice in shrll and ter
rible cries. Above him at the sound
the startled birds swirled to the west.
The snake, too weak to spring, had
yet dragged himself to coil, his fiat
head raised In air.
Between the cries the man could
hear the abrupt stopping Of the wagon,
the confused exclamation of mems