“That’s just what I say,” replied the hunter; “and I have as much respect for sich whining hypercrites as I have for a hissing adder: that’s why I never took much to meetin’s, I suppose. What I gits, I gits honest–don’t I, pet?” and he caressed his rifle as if it were a living thing, and understood what he said. “I brings home what the good Lord sends inter the woods an’ over the prairies fur me. ‘The cattle upon a thousand hills are his’–that’s Scripter, I believe; and it means, I take it, that the deer, and the elk, and the bear, and the geese and the hens, belong to him: nobody ken say, ‘I owns them all,’ and keep them for his own use; and when Billy, here,”–patting his gun,–“brings down a fat buck, we feel honest about it–don’t we, Bill? ’Tisn’t like standing behind the counter with a smerk on yer face, as yer cheat in weight an’ measure, or sell sanded sugar for the genuine. Many an’ many’s the time I’ve known this done, by them that lives in fine houses, and wears fine clothes, an’ goes reg’lar to church; an’ if they passed Joseph Jones, wouldn’t deign to speak to the old hunter. Not that I care about that; I don’t deign to speak to them; and if heaven is for them, I had just as lieves stay a while outside, for they an’ I could never git along together here, and we couldn’t be expected to there. But did you want anything perticular of me?” 68
“I was told,” said the missionary, “that none of the settlers understood so well about the land, and where to find the section and quarter section stakes as you; and I thought, if it wouldn’t be taking too much of your time, that perhaps you would show me around a little.”
“Nothin’ would suit my feelings better,” said the hunter. “Was there any perticular direction you wish to go to?”
“Brother Smith tells me that here is a fine quarter section still unclaimed;” and the clergyman took from his note-book a roughly-sketched map of the vicinity, purporting to show what was taken up and what was not.
“Did he give you that?” asked the hunter, as he ran his eye over the paper.
“Yes; as looking up land is new to me, I was thankful to get some sort of a guide,” replied the missionary.
“I don’t see much to be thankful for on that drawin’.”
“Why, isn’t that quarter section free?” inquired the minister, perplexed.
“Yes; an’ we’ll go an’ see it. But are yer goin’ afoot?”
The missionary replied affirmatively.