Take care, white man, don’t come nigh me,”
and strikin’ a few flourishes of the goin’ and comin’ double shuffle.
“Hurrah for Sky Lake,” says I.
“Hurrah for the Forkin’ Cypress drive,” says Jem, takin’ a drink, and cuttin’ a few pigeon-wings with his left leg. “Now mind, Chunkey, no deer or wild turkey, no hogs or cub—nothin’ but bar or panter.”
“Agreed,” says I, and then we budged.
Captin, you’ve hearn Jem say, he’s hard of hearin’? Well, he is sometimes, ’specially when he don’t want to hear; but that mornin’ he was wide awake all over, and could have hearn an old he bar grunt in a thunder-storm.
“I’ll carry the horn, Chunkey. If you blow, I can’t hear you; and when I want you, I’ll blow, and you can.”
I didn’t ’spect anything then, but you’ll see.
Well, we had our big guns, them the govenor gin us; they throw twelve to the pound, and war made by that man what lives in Louisville; what’s his name?
He promised to send me a deer-gun gratis for two young panters, but he ain’t done it.