Beadle's Dime Novels No. 127: Bald Eagle — page 29: what you’re looking at

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

-_—_— TOLERANCE NO LONGER. 81 Was not unfrequently employed by Washington upon missions Of importance, and by whom he was esteemed also as a true and unfailing guide. Ramapaugh waged a ceaseless and deadly war against the Cowboys, whose atrocities would have been even greater than they were but for the vigilance of the heroic savage. Strange as it may seem, a rude and not un- admiring companionship existed between Ramapaugh and young Richard Smith, or Black Dick, as we have seen, the leader of the Cowboys, who, though so often encountering each other in deadly hostility, had each found in the other a foeman so worthy of his steel, that a sort of amiable delight in the prowess’ of the other had grown into the minds of €ach, and they had been known, after some fierce combat, €ach to call off their followers, and the two men descend to- gether the banks of the river, and there, side by side, with jeer and jest, wash from their persons the sanguinary stains of battle. : More than once the war-plume of Ramapaugh had been Shot away in some solitary mountain pass, when even the keen instincts of the savage could detect no indications of the © Presence of a foe, and Richard Smith as often had felt the bullet or the arrow graze his ear, severing away the black Curls that clustered above his black, fiery eyes. These were but pastimes to men familiar with blood, who held their lives lightly as the wind that stirred the old woods. over their — heads, All this tolerance on the part of the Bald Eagle of a cruel man on nccount of his courage, ceased from the time of the atrocious murder of the unhappy David Gurney. Inasmuch as Black Dick had seen fit to revenge the death of his father, by taking the life of Gurney, his taking off did not conflict With his savage sense of retribution ; but it was the “method Of revenge which filled his primitive soul with disgust and horror, David Gurney was a brave man, worthy to be met, foot to foot, by the bravest warrior of any people. He had & right to die in the presence of brave men, under the over- hanging heavens, with a chance for his life. It was infamous to be butchered in the presence only of “ squaws” (women) at Midnight, and with the odds of ten to one. With views like these the Bald Eagle in his turn had de- commicbooks. com