Shepherdstown register. [volume] (Shepherdstown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1849-1955, 1920-08-12
The Cure Of a Coward.

d
MacAilister's store was crowded with
decrepit chairs and upturned boxes,
ana manor boy-was planted firm
ly on each. IL was cold weather; too
cold for almost any work except keep
ing warm and all the old stories Of the
neigheorhood were suffering rehearsal.
But one man told a new story-new
TO almost everyone at least. Ii was,
as he said, the story of how coward
was cured.
1T was this way" he said. ale
was so timid that he could not be in.
duced TO hunt for bigger game than
rabbits, and he did all his chores be.
fore dark because he feared some ami
NAL might attack him. You see, he
had never lived in the country before,
and 1t was all strange TO him.
"One night he heard his two dogs
start making a row, and soon they
stopped under the big oak tree close
to the barnyard fence. He sat up In
bed and listened till he felt sure that,
whatever it was, it had freed in this
oak. His wife thought it was a coon :;
so he pulled on his trousers, lighted
a lantern, picked up his axe and went
outside.
About twenty yards from the tree
was big pile of brush that had been
put there by the hired man when he
cut down a tree for frewood a month
before. As the man went past this he
scratched a match and touched il to
the pile. 1t caught at once, and he
walked down to the tree and stopped to
look for the coon by the light of the
burning brush. He did not see it; so
he stepped few feet to the left. lust
as he did so he noticed a big, hori-
zontal limb change its appearance. 1t
looked as if it had suddenly grown a
huge hump, and, stranger still, the
hump moved.
while he looked at il and wondered
what it was, there sounded the meanest
snarl he ever heard. II was a panth-
er! He gripped his axe and stood still,
paralyzed by the danger. AS he hest
tated, the brute seemed to move with
little rocking motion of its hips. II
was working its hind legs into position
for a jump. He tried to run, but his
feet seemed nailed to the ground He
tried to yell, but his breath was gone.
All at once he heard the sound of air
expelled from the cats lungs as it
jumped-and here it was, coming
straight for his throat and breast. A
frenzy OF fear seized him, and he
swung that keen, double edged axe as
he had never swung it against a tree,
In one wild, despairing blow at the aw-
full thing that was coming to tear and
kill him. He felt the axe go into and
through something, and a great weight
hit him in the breast; hot fluid filled
his face and soaked his shirt, and he
was knocked rolling. AS he scrambled
to his feet he saw the body of the hor-
rible thing bouncing, jumping, rolling,
exactly as the body of chicken does
after its head is cut off. Then he
knew that his one blow had gone
home. And he walked calmly back to
the house.
when his wife saw him, she shiek-
ed, for he was soaked with blood. But
he quieted her and said: My dear,
have been through transformation to-
night. | am thankful for this expert
ence, for now am no longer a coward.
was a coward because did not know
what | could do or what my danger
was. | will no longer be timid.'
"And | will leave it to you men wheth-
er he was right That man was my
father, men,"
Every man drew deep breath and
nodded his answers, for every man
there knew that Jacks father had
died to save five women at the great
fire in Chicago in 1871. The lucky
blow that halved the head Of a panther
in the middle Of his leap had made the
elder Hardy steady, cool and daring
Westerner, instead OF timid, fearful,
scarcely transplanted clerk from an
Eastern city.