“Do you see any, Sneak?” asked Joe, now grasping his rod and anxious for the fray.
“I see a few—about forty, I guess, lying in the sun at the edge of the water.”
“Sneak, there’s too many of them,” said Joe.
“Dod—you ain’t a going to back out now, I hope. Don’t you see your pony snuffing at ’em? He wants to dash right in among ’em.”
“No he don’t,” said Joe—“he don’t like the smell, nor I either—faugh!”
“Why, it smells like May-apples—I like it,” said Sneak; “but there ain’t more than one or two copper-heads there—they’re most all racers. Come on, Joe—we must gallop right through and mash their heads with our sticks as we pass. Then after a little while we must turn and dash back agin—that’s the way to fix ’em.”
“You must go before,” said Joe.
The number that Sneak mentioned was not exaggerated. On the contrary, additions were constantly made to the number. The surface of the pool was continually agitated by the darting serpents striking at the tadpoles and frogs, while on the margin many were writhing in various fantastic contortions in their sports. Nearly all of them were large, and some could not have been less than eleven feet long. They were evidently enjoying the warm rays of the sun, and at times skipped about with unwonted animation. Now one of the largest would elevate his black head some four feet from the ground, while the others wrapped themselves around him, and thus formed the dark and horrid spectacle of a pyramid of snakes! Then falling prostrate with their own weight, in less than a twinkling they were dispersed and flying over the smooth short grass in every direction, their innumerable scales all the time emitting a low buzzing sound as they ran along. Every moment others glided into the area from the tall grass, and those assembled thither rushed towards them in a body to manifest a welcome.
“Now’s the time!” cried Sneak, rushing forward, followed by Joe. When Joe’s eyes fell upon the black mass of serpents, he made a convulsive grasp at the reins with an involuntary resolution to retreat without delay from such a frightful scene. But the violence of his grasp severed the reins from the bit, and the pony sprang forward after the steed, being no longer subject to his control! There was no retreating now! Sneak levelled his rod at a cluster just forming in a mass two feet above the ground, and crushed the hydra at a blow! Joe closed his eyes, and struck he knew not what—but Sneak knew, for the blow descended on his head—though with feeble force. In an instant the horsemen had passed to the opposite side of the area and halted in the tall grass. Looking back, they beheld a great commotion among the surviving snakes. Some glided into the pool, and with bodies submerged, elevated their heads above the surface and darted out their tongues fiercely. Others raced round the scene of slaughter with their heads full four feet high, or gathered about the dead and dying, and lashed the air with their sharp tails, producing sounds like the cracking of whips. The few copper-heads and rattlesnakes present coiled themselves up with their heads in the centre in readiness to strike their poison into whatever object came within their reach.
So sudden had been the onset of the horsemen that the surprised serpents seemed to be ignorant of the nature of the foe, and instead of flying to the long grass to avoid a recurrence of bloodshed, they continued to glide round the pool, while their number increased every moment.