“Snakes in coorse. Durn ye, go to your bed!”
Notwithstanding the sharp rebuke, Phelim returned to the cabin apparently in high glee. If there was anything in Texas, “barrin’ an above the Indyins themselves,” as he used to say, “that kept him from slapin’, it was them vinamous sarpints. He hadn’t had a good night’s rest, iver since he’d been in the counthry for thinkin’ av the ugly vipers, or dhramin’ about thim. What a pity Saint Pathrick hadn’t paid Tixas a visit before goin’ to grace!”
Phelim in his remote residence, isolated as he had been from all intercourse, had never before witnessed the trick of the cabriesto.
He was not slow to avail himself of the knowledge thus acquired. Returning to the cabin, and creeping stealthily inside—as if not wishing to wake his master, already asleep—he was seen to take a cabriesto from its peg; and then going forth again, he carried the long rope around the stockade walls—paying it out as he proceeded.
Having completed the circumvallation, he re-entered the hut; as he stepped over the threshold, muttering to himself—
“Sowl! Phalim O’Nale, you’ll slape sound for this night, spite ov all the snakes in Tixas!”
For some minutes after Phelim’s soliloquy, a profound stillness reigned around the hut of the mustanger. There was like silence inside; for the countryman of Saint Patrick, no longer apprehensive on the score of reptile intruders, had fallen asleep, almost on the moment of his sinking down upon his spread horse-skin.
For a while it seemed as if everybody was in the enjoyment of perfect repose, Tara and the captive steeds included. The only sound heard was that made by Zeb Stump’s “maar,” close by cropping the sweet grama grass.
Presently, however, it might have been perceived that the old hunter was himself stirring. Instead of lying still in the recumbent attitude to which he had consigned himself, he could be seen shifting from side to side, as if some feverish thought was keeping him awake.
After repeating this movement some half-score of times, he at length raised himself into a sitting posture, and looked discontentedly around.