“Mass’ George shoot um, and Pomp cut um head off,” cried the boy, proudly.
“Yes,” I said; “Pomp found him asleep, and fetched me. Morgan, I want it on that stump.”
“No, no, sir,” said Morgan. “I’ll get the hammer and a big spike-nail, and drive it through the back of the skin into that big tree at the bottom.”
“Capital!” I cried.
“But it will be a nuisance,” said my father.
“Oh no, sir. It’s full in the hot sun, and the flies will clean it. Before a week’s out it will be dry.”
Hannibal fetched the short ladder, and held the head, while Morgan drove in the nail so that the great head with its propped open jaws hung there grinning at the bottom of the garden; the skin soon shrinking away so that the head hung as it were by a skin loop; and before a month was past it was perfectly inoffensive, and had preserved in drying its natural appearance in a wonderful way.