Rocky Mountain Sam — page 48: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN SAM. 3g fast lis car nearer to the earth, and entered the cabin with much dignity. | “The spoiler and his prey have vanished among the mountains, and left not a trace behind,” said he, with con- siderable unction. | ‘‘Is that all you know, friend Max?” asked the colonel, — anxiously. “All that I know at present, my worthy sir,” replied the Hermit, blandly; ‘‘but I can probably easily track them at any time, with the humble assistance of my friend, the balloon out yonder. My dear sir, when I passed the icy barriers of the Antartic Ocean in the spring of the year 1848, and sweeping over the boiling hot interior sea to the very crater of the Pole into which the waters empty themselves in a stupendous cataract, I was often filled with apprehension lest 1 should lose my way, but Providence, sir, was my stay, my mentor, and my unfailing guide. Again, in my second aerial voyage to the moon in 1851, 1 found—but you are not listening, sir.” - The great services rendered by the old man were too fresh in his recollection to admit of interrupting him in his vagaries with bad temper; but Colonel Chapman’s mind was too much occupied with apprehensions of his daughter’s fate to be seriously bored by them, so he mildly cut the mad professor short by turning away from him. The sun was setting behind the mountains before the dead were all buried and the wounded properly cared for. Then, after a hearty meal, the colonel held a general council of operations in which Rocky Mountain Sam, Big Horn, and himself. were the principal spokesmen. It is true the professor offered as pungent and relative matter, a continuation of his disquisitions upon the North and South Poles, his voyage to the moon, with other suggestions of kindred nature and importance, but he was firmly and politely crowded out. The chief object in view being the recovery of the Prairie Blossom at the earliest possible moment, it was at last de- termined that Big Horn should continue his scouting ex- pedition alone, deviating so far from his originally intended route as to guide a rescuing party on the following morning well on their way in the pursuit of the renegade. He was then to push on his way to Fort Benton, make a report of GComicboo (ele)