Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 1152 — page 1: what you’re looking at

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

» “ony (1M eee ae SS. Se >» * tantly 4 i=? -=\= i ess ee y -_ i; pap pllallall allel alia) Seats at en Wt fod Wo) an * \ We NN NS \ Y Sr UL! me a . Ths. pay “ sen oi ” Tent sea Copyricat, 1878, By BeapLe & Apams, wee FT. oe -—-— No. 1452. —_——-—-—- —-. en Published Every Month. The Phantom Princess. BY CAPT. J. F. C. ADAMS, AUTHOR oF ‘OREGON SOL,” ‘‘ GLASS EYE,” ETC, CHAPTER I. A **CONDEMNED DIFFIKILTY.” ‘‘ Herr I am in a condemned diffikilty ag’in,” routtered Nick Whiffles, as he seated himself on a broad, flat rock, on the bank of the Elk river, far up in Oregon, close to the boundary line be- tween that then wild territory and British America. The eccentric old trapper had spent many years in roaming through the vast solitudes of the North-west, sometimes in the service of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and some- times in the employ of the North-west Fur Company, but perhaps more frequently entirely alone. A manof his culiar temperament and astes was sure to be widely known, both at the far- scattered trading-posts and among the numerous trap- pers and hunters that wan- dered through the vast wil- i} derness, which, at that com- ae) paratively recent day, knew mt Neva scarcely any thing of the ad- ! VA pit vantages of civilization. NET as As was the invariable cus- tom of Nick, when in a quan- dary, he relieved himself by self-communing. “The Whiffles family was always noted for the wa ey, d of getting into dif- fiki ty. The first thing I re- s=rember was getting spanked on account of some condemn- ed diffikilty that I had got into with my mother, and the next thing was the measles and ape, oe Nae, cee and then when If got fairly over them and a dozen other disoases, our house took fire and burned down, and about the time the old gent got it rebuilt, it took fire and burn ef down ag’in. Wal, he didn’t say nothin’, but when the. cabin went the third time, he got mad and said that thing was getting rather monotonous, and he would like, by way of variety, to gee it shook down by an airth- quake, or carried away by a hurricane; butof course none ‘ j 1 ee they come to read hs we found the lawyer bestead of boing, Nick Whib ‘fles, Esq., it was Old Nick, so I didn’t 4h) i wh ) ff AAAY A YS y | WAS WOK SAO NRA SAAN . \ NAAR A. WQNX' MMMM AMM v —— ee el fe cl ar! eet ei! eel st et el al lam =~ et ASS FE en SE AAS a i er re he ee ee ovanatartedevahevat erect Ava,, 1004, — - —— ss — Mi, J. HY blisher J. IVERS & CO., Publishers, (JAMES SULLIVAN, PROPRIETOR), 379 Pearl Street, New York. —|- Sy Ee —_ et the bequest at all, but then, as everything else had been willed away already, I didn’t lose much after all. My older brother got the house, but, afore he could move into it, there came a bi freshet that carried it down-stream, and tha was the last of that. ‘¢There was no end to my diffikilties. When I got to be a young man, I spent a whole sum- mer’s earnings in buyin had got to be a little tender on a cross-eyed girl that lived about a half-mile off, and, as soon as I could stow myself away in my new suit, I started out to ses her. She gave me a hint that she wa’n’t particklerly anxious, as; when I went to go in the house, she set her dog on me, and the very first dash he made, he ripped out the whole seat of my pants and run away with it, so that there was no chance of putting the miss- ing cloth back ag’in. ‘Wal, Nick Whiffles has seen a good deal in ti a >it ye ee — eee 7” ie as Te is “/ A ie - f | NED Hazel, Yuk BOY TRAPPER, - eS 4 | | a suit of clothes. I | : be ~ . ° ma : Co uaer?! teem > v2. Bs 5 ye r . Ps < : —- o tes o} teyrees . — >. ott - . 7 “4 > ; . a5 . - = f = ‘ie ~ cae = 9°) > : - . R -3 -~ 0 é = ran cay Ser “s 4 ~ an AD adie oe \ A a an o> Pie Pale os . a ay, a ae ‘ > » 2 ”~ a3 i r,t Soe ‘ LeMelteleitle Mle lel! lalla Es me id . -_——- ee es PRICE 5 CENTS. yy 50c. a year. () . ° a oe ne ee the way of diffikilty since them days, but, some how or other, the good Lord has b t him through all right, and, although I bear a goed many scars, I’m yet sound in limb and and able to eat my usual hunk of venison, folle# the trail of an inemy, or run my eye along old Humbug here in a way that’ll make her bite when she barks; and for all this I’m thankful.” The old trapper was silent a few moments, as if in deep reverie. Near by, his horse, known aa | Shagbark, was lazily cropping the grass in @ way that showed he was in no f ng condi tion, to say the least. At the feet of Nick Whiffles flowed the Elk river, qs and unrufiled by the slightest ri of wind, On the other side, and as far as eye could reach, stretched the Oregon wooda. There were woods on every hand, and far off im the distance could be seen the white peaks of the Rocky Mountains, their tops covered with the snow of centuries, It was one vast solitude, such as it had stood at “ crea- yee morn,” and looking up- on the figure of the as he half-sat and halts. clined upon the stone, it would have been easy to imagine him some statue cut from the rock itself, F But, as nies remarked, _ 1e Opening of our story, he was as a Roidenmned 1. kilty ’— nothing very seri- ous, it is true, bat enough te cause him some annoyance, and to occasion him consid. ane communing with him. self, Three days before, he had cronsed the sine into British merica, and was i his way toward the Reaiae chewan, when he turned out of his path, somewhat, te call at Fort Wilbur to see some of bis old friends, when he earned that the brigade of the Oregon De t of the Hudson Bay Comm was expected in wi & week; it had divided up into several companies, ane twol of the canoes were on their »in the possession of a of Blackfeet; whose was on the northern bank of