The Florida agriculturist., 1907-10-09
A FRIENDLY RATTLESNAKE.
Z It Saved Miner's Libe BY Killing "a Panther

half the time without even rattI1n.
cit was about o'clock, and the SUI
was climbin' out of the canon and only
| touchin' the sides higher up. AS I came
around a curve, I came pretty neal
runnin' slap up against big buck thai
stood by the edge of the creek drinkin
as if he had never seen water before
and never expected to again. There
was a regular nest of boulders right
there, piled up in the steep bed Of the
gulch. I climbed in amongst 'em as
softly as a cat and rested my gun on
| a big, round rock.
CAS- [ put my weight on the boulder
the thing suddenly rolled from under
me and I went over the edge of the pile
after it, head first. I lit in the gravel
four feet below the pile, and before
had time to move, kerplunk, just missin'
my legs, down came a big whopper of a
rock, and then it slowly rolled over on
this left leg O. mine as [ lay sprawled
out. The rock was half as big as a small
shanty it seemed to me then, and I felt
the leg grind under the weight Of the
thing. 1t hurt like the mischief for a
minute, and then it sort a. went numb
and throbbed like big tooth that needs
tinkerin.'
"There I was, in a pretty fix, pinned
down by a rock that must a. weighed
close to half a ton, night comm on and
my rife three feet out Of my reach,
where it fell as I slid over the pile.
"The buck had left for parts unknown
at the noise of the rocks rollin' around,
and I heard the sound of his crashin'
through the brush far up the mountain,
but I wasn't botherin' my head about
deer then.
'"The canon bed was pretty smooth
below me, { although it pitched down
hill pretty much, and sort o'trail came
down to the water about twenty-five or
thirty feet ahead O. me, and I tell you,
was scared half to death for fear
some big grizzly or cinnamon would
come amblin' down that trail and inves-
tigate me and my tight fix with set
Of claws four inches long. You see, I
forgot that there were other beasts on
those mountains that might take advan-
tage of a poor, defenseless white man in
a hard place."
The old man paused to stir up the fire.
and sent a shower of sparks glowing up
through the darkness.
Reflling his pipe with tobacco, gentle
reader, not hop), Jackson resumed:
ct tried yellin' a while, just as a mat
ter of form. I knew darn we'll there
was nobody in that canon close enough
to hear any hollers I might put up, but
the noise kept me from gettfn' lonely.
"I got tired O. that pretty soon, and
then set about figurin' out some way to
get hold of my rifle, lying just three
feet ahead of me as I laid there on my
side. I didn't need the gun particular
right then, but it would have been
mighty good company.
ct had been layin' there about half
an hour, judgin' from the sun, though
it seemed like half day, when I heard
a little rustic in the brush in the trail
that came down to the water.
cit sounded about fifty feet above me
on the mountain side, and it kept gettin'
nearer I knew that no grizzly nor
cinnamon could move that quiet down a
trail as narrow as the one runnin' into
the canon in front of me, so I laid there,
expectin' to see a deer poke it's pretty
head out O. the bushes at the bottom Of
the trail.
Instead Of deer, out sneaked big,
home1y mountain lion, about five feet
long and thinner n a rail. [ had shot
dozens Of the beasts, and never saw one
that would fight a grasshopper if the
hopper would get up on his, hind legs
and show fight, so I didn't feel worried
about this specimen.
"The specimen stood in the open,
snifin' the air, and pretty soon the
lnno yellow tail began to Snan back and