“ ‘The bar-hunter of Ameriky!’ Doc, you know whether I war ernin’ the name when I war ruined. There is not a child, white, black, Injun, or nigger, from the Arkansas line to Trinity, but what has heard of me, and I were happy when”—here a tremor of his voice and a tear glistening in the glare of the fire told the old fellow’s emotion—“when—but les take a drink—Doc, I found I was dying—I war gettin’ weaker and weaker—I nude your truck warn’t what I needed, or I’d sent for you. A bar-hunt war the medsin that my systum required, a fust-class bar-hunt, the music of the dogs, the fellers a screaming, the cane poppin’, the rifles crackin’, the bar growlin’, the fight hand to hand, slap goes his paw, and a dog’s-hide hangs on one cane and his body on another, the knife glistenin’ and then goin’ plump up to the handle in his heart! Oh! Doc, this was what I needed, and I swore, since death were huggin’ me, any how, I mite as well feel his last grip in a bar-hunt.
“I seed the boys goin’ long one day, and haled them to wait awhile, as I believed I would go along too. I war frade if I kept out of a hunt much longer I wood get outen practis. They laughed at me, thinkin’ I war jokin’; for wat cood a sick, old, one-legged man do in a bar-hunt? how cood he get threw the swamp, and vines, and canes, and back-water? and s’pose he mist the bar, how war he to get outen the way?
“But I war ’tarmined on goin’; my dander was up, and I swore I wood go, tellin’ them if I coodent travel ’bout much, I could take a stand. Seein’ it war no use tryin’ to ’swade me, they saddled my poney, and off we started. I felt better right off. I knew I cuddent do much in the chase, so I told the fellers I would go to the cross-path stand, and wate for the bar, as he would be sarten to cum by thar. You have never seed the cross-path stand, Doc. It’s the singularest place in the swamp. It’s rite in the middle of a cane-brake, thicker than har on a bar-hide, down in a deep sink, that looks like the devil had cummenst diggin’ a skylite for his pre-emption. I knew it war a dangerous place for a well man to go in, much less a one-leg cripple; but I war ’tarmined that time to give a deal on the dead-wood, and play my hand out. The boys gin me time to get to the stand, and then cummenst the drive. The bar seemed ’tarmined on disappinting me, for the fust thing I heard of the dogs and bar, they was outen hearing. Everything got quiet, and I got so wrathy at not being able to foller up the chase, that I cust till the trees cummenst shedding their leaves and small branches, when I herd them lumbrin’ back, and I nude they war makin’ to me. I primed old ‘bar death’ fresh, and rubbed the frizin, for it war no time for rifle to get snappin’. Thinks I, if I happen to miss, I’ll try what virtue there is in a knife—when, Doc, my knife war gone. Oh! bar, for God’s sake have a soft head, and die easy, for I can’t run!
“Doc, you’ve hearn a bar bustin’ threw a cane-brake, and know how near to a harrycane it is. I almost cummenst dodgin’ the trees, thinkin’ it war the best in the shop one a comin’, for it beat the loudest thunder ever I heard; that ole bar did, comin’ to get his death from an ole one-legged cripple, what had slayed more of his brethren than his nigger foot had ever made trax in the mud. Doc, he heerd a monstrus long way ahead of the dogs. I warn’t skeered, but I must own as I had but one shot, an’ no knife, I wud have prefurd they had been closer. But here he cum! he bar—big as a bull—boys off h—llwards—dogs no whar—no knife—but one shot—and only one leg that cood run!
“The bar ’peered s’prised to see me standin’ ready for him in the openin’; for it war currently reported ’mong his brethren that I war either dead, or no use for bar. I thought fust he war skeered; and, Doc, I b’leve he war, till he cotch a sight of my wooden leg, and that toch his pride, for he knew he would be hist outen every she bear’s company, ef he run from a poor, sickly, one-legged cripple, so on he cum, a small river of slobber pourin’ from his mouth, and the blue smoke curlin’ outen his ears. I tuck good aim at his left, and let drive. The ball struck him on the eyebrow, and glanced off, only stunnin’ him for a moment, jes givin’ me time to club my rifle, an’ on he kum, as fierce as old grizzly. As he got in reach, I gin him a lick ’cross the temples, brakin’ the stock in fifty pieces, an’ knockin’ him senseless. I struv to foller up the lick, when, Doc, I war fast—my timber toe had run inter the ground, and I cuddent git out, though I jerked hard enuf almost to bring my thigh out of joint. I stuped to unscrew the infurnal thing, when the bar cum too, and cum at me agen. Vim! I tuck him over the head, and, cochunk, he keeled over. Oh! but I cavorted and pitched. Thar war my wust enemy, watin’ for me to giv him a finisher, an’ I cuddent git at him. I’d cummense unacrewin’ leg—here cum bar—vim—cochunk—he’d fall out of reach—and, Doc, I cuddent git to him. I kept workin’ my body round, so as to unscrew the leg, and keep the bar off till I cood ’complish it, when jes as I tuck the last turn, and got loose from the pesky thing, here cum bar, more venimous than ever, and I nude that war death to one out, and comin’ shortly. I let him get close, an’ then cum down, with a perfect tornado on his head, as I thought; but the old villain had learnt the dodge—the barrel jes struck him on the side of the head, and glanst off, slinging itself out of my hands ’bout twenty feet ’mongst the thick cane, and thar I war in a fix sure. Bar but little hurt—no gun—no knife—no dogs—no frens—no chance to climb—an’ only one leg that cood run. Doc, I jes cummenst makin’ ’pologies to ole Master, when an idee struck me. Doc, did you ever see a piney woods nigger pullin’ at a sassafras root? or a suckin’ pig in a tater patch arter the big yams? You has! Well, you can ’magin how I jurkt at that wudden leg, for it war the last of pea-time with me, sure, if I didn’t rise ’fore bar did. At last they both cum up, ’bout the same time, and I braced myself for a death struggle.
“We fit all round that holler! Fust I’d foller bar, and then bar would chase me! I’d make a lick, he’d fend off, and showin’ a set of teeth that no doctor, ’cept natur, had ever wurkt at, cum tearin’ at me! We both ’gan to git tired, I heard the boys and dogs cumin’, so did bar, and we were both anxshus to bring the thing to a close ’fore they cum up, though I wuddent thought they were intrudin’ ef they had cum up some time afore.
“I’d worn the old leg pretty well off to the second jint, when, jest ’fore I made a lick, the noise of the boys and dogs cummin’ sorter confused bar, and he made a stumble, and bein’ off his guard I got a fair lick! The way that bar’s flesh giv in to the soft impresshuns of that leg war an honour to the mederkal perfeshun for having invented sich a weepun! I hollered—but you have heered me holler an’ I won’t describe it—I had whipped a bar in a fair hand to hand fight—me, an old, sickly, one-legged bar-hunter! The boys cum up, and, when they seed the ground we had fit over, they swore they would hav thought, ’stead of a bar-fight, that I had been cuttin’ cane and deadenin’ timber for a corn-patch, the sile war so worked up, they then handed me a knife to finish the work.
“Doc, les licker, it’s a dry talk—when will you make me another leg? for bar-meat is not over plenty in the cabin, and I feel like tryin’ another!”
XXIV.
COLONEL CROCKETT’S RIDE ON THE BACK OF A BUFFALO.
About ten years ago I fell in with a camp of Konzas, a good piece off the north fork of the Canadian. The Injuns a kyind a sorter give me a sorter tanyard grin, and the old chief specially puckered up his pictur like a green persimmon; but there were three raal roarers from Salt River with me, so I didn’t care a picayoon if it cum to skulpin. Besides I was tetotaciously tired, and I slepp so sound that I wish my rifle may hang fire for ever if I don’t think it would have took something rougher than an earthquake to wake me. So I lay till after daylite, and then one of me comrades shook me, to tell me the Injun boys had found a huraah’s neest. I took up old Kill-devil, and out I went, and about a hundred yards from the camp there war an old buffalo bull with a hundred little screeching imps about him, with their bows and arrows. They’d stuck so many arrows in him that he looked as thorny as a honey locus or a porky-pine; but they hadn’t got deep enough to touch the rite spot. First the old Turk would go arter one full chizzle; but then another would stick an arro into his posterity, saving your presence, and round he would turn and arter the little torment like an ate-horse baggage waggin. I railly pitied the old cretur, and sez I, “It are railly a shame to let this uncircumsised Fillistin defy the army of Israel in this ridiculous way. I’ll let him know there’s a warrant out arter him,” and I wur gwine to blaze away; but an old Injun kort me elbow, and axed me if it were the way in Kentuck to hinder the children from having a little dust of diversion that did no harm to no one.