"As I came off, however, I found myself in a most unpleasant neighborhood; for my good friend the wolf, hurt pretty badly by the last shot, had, as it seemed, ensconced himself among the logs, whence Bob's assault and subsequent discomfiture had somewhat suddenly dislodged him; so that, as I rolled over on the snow, I found myself within six feet of my friend, seemingly very doubtful whether to fight or fly! But, by good luck, my bullet had struck him on the hip-bone, and being of a rather large calibre, had let his claret pretty freely loose, besides shattering the bone, so that he was but in poor fighting trim; and I had time to get back to the gray--who stood snorting and panting, up to his knees in snow and rubbish, but without offering to stir--to draw my second pistol, and to give Isegrin--as the Germans call him--the coup de grace, before he could attain the friendly shelter of the dingle, to which with all due speed he was retreating. By this time all our comrades had assembled. Loud was the glee--boisterous the applause, which fell especially to me, who had performed with my own hand the glorious feat of slaying two wolves in one morning; and deep the cups of applejack, Scotch whiskey, and Jamaica spirits, which flowed in rich libations, according to the tastes of the compotators, over the slaughtered quarry.
"Breakfast was produced on the spot; cold salt pork, onions, and hard biscuit forming the principal dishes, washed down by nothing weaker than the pure ardent! Not long, however, did fat Tom permit us to enjoy our ease.
"'Come, boys," he shouted, "no lazin' here; no gormandizin'--the worst part of our work's afore us; the old lame devil is afoot, and five miles off by now. We must get back, and lay the hounds on, right stret off-- and well if the scent an't cold now! He's tuk right off toward Duckcedars'--for so Tom ever calls Truxedo Pond--a lovely crescent-shaped lakelet deep in the bosom of the Greenwoods--'so off with you, Jem, down by the road, as hard as you can strick with ten of your boys in sleighs, and half the hounds; and if you find his tracks acrost the road, don't wait for us, but stick right arter him. You, Garry, keep stret down the old road with ten dogs and all the plunder-- we'll meet at night, I reckon.'
"No sooner said than done! the parties were sent off with the relays. This was on Monday morning--Tom and I, and some thirteen others, with eight couple of the best dogs, stuck to his slot on foot. It was two hours at least, so long had he been gone, before a single hound spoke to it, and I had begun well nigh to despair; but Tom's immense sagacity, which seemed almost to know instinctively the course of the wily savage, enabling us to cut off the angles of his course, at last brought us up somewhat nearer to him. At about noon, two or three of the hounds opened, but doubtfully and faintly. His slot, however, showed that they were right, and lustily we cheered them on! Tom, marvelling the while that we heard not the cry of Jem's relay.
"'For I'll be darned,' he said, 'if he hasn't crossed the road long enough since; and that dumb nigger, Jem's not had the sense to stick to him!'
"For once, however, the fat man was wrong; for, as it appeared when we neared the road, the wolf had headed back, scared doubtless by some injudicious noise of our companions, and making a wide ring, had crossed three miles below the spot where Jem was posted. This circuit we were forced to make, as at first sight we fancied he had headed altogether back, and it was four o'clock before we got upon his scent, hot, fresh, and breast-high; running toward the road, that is, due eastward from the covert whence he had bolted in the morning. Nor were our friends inactive; for, guided by the clamors of our pack, making the forest musical, they now held down the road; and, as the felon crossed, caught a long view of him as he limped over it, and laid the fresh hounds on.
"A brilliant rally followed--we calling off our wearied dogs, and hasting to the lower road, where we found Garry with the sleighs, and dashing off in our turn through all sorts of by-paths and wood-roads to head them once again! This, with much labor, we effected; but the full winter-moon had risen, and the innumerable stars were sparkling in the frosty skies, when we flogged off the hounds--kindled our night fires-- prepared our evening meal, feasted, and spread our blankets, and slept soundly under no warmer canopy than the blue firmament--secure that our lame friend would lie up for the night at no great distance. With the first peep of dawn we were again afoot, and, the snow still befriending us, we roused him from a cedar-brake at about nine o'clock, cut him off three times with fresh dogs and men, the second day, and passed the night, some sixteen miles from home, in the rude hovel of a charcoal burner.
"Greater excitement I cannot imagine, than that wild, independent chase!--sometimes on foot, cheering the hounds through swamp and dingle, over rough cliffs and ledges where foot of horse could avail nothing. Sometimes on horseback, galloping merrily through the more open woodlands. Sometimes careering in the flying sleigh, to the gay music of its bells, along the wild wood-paths! Well did we fare, too--ay, sumptuously!--for our outskirters, though they reserved their rifles for the appropriate game, were not so sparing with the shot-gun; so that, night after night, our chaldron reeked with the mingled steam of rabbit, quail, and partridge, seethed up a la Meg Merrilies, with fat pork, onions, and potatoes--by the Lord Harry! Frank, a glorious and unmatched consummee.
"To make, however, a long tale short--for every day's work, although varied to the actors by thousands of minute but unnarratable particulars, would appear but as a repetition of the last, to the mere listener--to make a long tale short, on the third day he doubled back, took us directly over the same ground--and in the middle of the day, on Saturday, was roused in view by the leading hounds, from the same little swamp in which the five had harbored during the early winter. No man was near the hounds when he broke covert. But fat Tom, who had been detached from the party to bring up provisions from the village, was driving in his sleigh steadily along the road, when the sharp chorus of the hounds aroused him. A minute after, the lame scoundrel limped across the turnpike, scant thirty yards before him. Alas! Tom had but his double-barrel, one loaded with buck shot, the other merely prepared for partridge--he blazed away, however, but in vain! Out came ten couple on his track, hard after him; and old Tom, cursing his bad luck, stood to survey the chase across the open.
"Strange was the felon's fate! The first fence, after he had crossed the road, was full six feet in height, framed of huge split logs, piled so close together that, save between the two topmost rails, a small dog even could have found no passage. Full at this opening the wolf dashed, as fresh, Tom said, as though he had not run a yard; but as he struggled through it, his efforts shook the top rails from the yokes, and the huge piece of timber falling across his loins, pinned him completely! At a mile off I heard his howl myself, and the confused and savage hubbub, as the hounds front and rear, assailed him.