906

INDIAN TRAGEDIES AND ROMANCES.

   worn out fired, and killed the buck. The literary stranger was furiously mad. He abused Wallace like a pickpocket, and swore at him like a trooper for his delay in killing the beast, However, he wras so much relieved to find that he was still alive and safe, that his wrath gave way.

The next day, Wallace says, the men suffered terribly from want of water. Just when the torment became intolerable, the stranger was observed to be making notes in a blank book. These notes related to the appearance of men suffering from intense thirst. When the men found out what he was doing, they wanted to kill him, and decided that he was a maniac.

The next adventure of the stranger was more serious. While hunting for geological specimens, he was attacked by Mexican hedgehogs, which often tear men to pieces with their tusks. Scrambling up into some chaparral bushes, he began to yell, until he made himself heard at the camp. Big Foot, as usual, came to the rescue, but also resolved to have a little fun. Climbing up into a tree, he advised the stranger to drive the hogs away, as they were dangerous. We quote Big Foot's own published account of the incident:

" Said I, ' Mr. Author,' fixing myself comfortably on a limb, ' this reminds me of a scrape I once got into, and as we are comfortably fixed out here all by ourselves, I could not have a better chance of telling it to you.'

'   '' Comfortable !' he exclaimed ; ' you have strange ideas of it if you think a man can be comfortable sitting on the top of your abominable Texas chaparral, with his knees drawn up to his chin, a thorn in each leg as long as my finger, and a dozen wild hogs making lunges at them whenever he stretches them down for a moment's ease. For heaven's sake, shoot them,' he implored, ' and let me out of this nest of thorns.'

" ' I can't,' I replied; " 1 have only the bullet that is in my gun, and if I shoot one of them it will make the other ten times worse.'