Beadle's Half Dime Library, No. 16 — page 27: what you’re looking at

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

——_ Robinson Crusoe. did him no more harm than ff he had thrown {ft against/the first wood: and a little after sunset when we came a wall: but it answered Friday’s end;_ for the i was|into the plain. Wemet with nothin so void of fear that he did it pa to make the bear follow him, and ** show us somé langh,”’ as he called it As soom as the bear felt the stone, and saw him, he turns about, and shuffles along at a strange rate, 80 as would put a horse toca middling gallop. Away rune Friday, and takes his course, as if he ran towards us for help ; 80 we all resolved to fire at once upon the bear, and deliver my man ; though Twas angry at him heartily for bringing the bear back upon us, when he was going about his own. business another way; and-especially - was angry that he had turned the bear upon us, and then ran away ; and I called out, ** You dog,” said I, “is this your making us langh? Come away, and take your horsé, that we may shoot the creature.’’ He hears me, and cries out, “No shoot, no shoot! Stand still: you get much ugh."’ And as the nimble creature ran two feet for the - beast’s one, he turned on a sudden, on one side of us, and seeing a great oak tree, fit for his purpose, he beck- oned us to follow, and, doubling his pace, he gets nim- bly up the tree, laying his gun down on the ground, at about five or six yards from the bottom of the tree. The bear soon came to the tree, and we followed at a distance. The first thing he did he stopped at the gun, ameit to it, but let it lie, and ap he scrambles into the tree, climbing like a cat, thongh so monstrously heavy. I was amazed at the folly, as I thought it, of my man, and could not for my life see anything to laugh at yet, till seeing the bear get upon the tree, we all rode nearer to him. When we came t> the ‘ree, there was Friday got out to the sinall end of a large limb of the tree, and the bear got half way to him; as the bear got out to that part where the limb of the tree was weaker, “Ha,”’ says he, to us, ‘‘ now you gee me teachee the bear dance :”’ so he falls a jumping, and shaking the bongh, at which the bear began to totter, but stood still and began to look be- hind him, to see how he should get back; then indeed we did laugh heartily. But Friday had not done with with him by a great deal; when he sees him stand still, he calls out to him again, as if he had supposed the bear could speak English.. ‘‘ What, yoo no come farther! Pray you come farther!” Soheleftjwmping and shakin the bough; and the bear, just as if he had understo what he said, did come'‘a little farther; then he fell a jumping again, and the bear stopped nee n. We thought now was a good time to knock him on the head, and I called.to Fri y to stand still and we would shoot the bear; but he cried out earnestly, “*O, pray! O, pray! no shoot! Me shoot by and then.” He would have said, ‘by and by.’’ However, to shorten the story, Fri. day danced so much, and the bear stood 80 ticklish, that we had paghts enough indeed, but still could not. imag- ine what the fellow would do; for first we thought he depended upon shaking the bear off, and we found the bear was too cunning for that too; for he would not out far enough to be thrown down, but clings fast with his great broad claws and feet, so that we could not imagine what would be the end of it, and where the jest would be at last. But Friday put us out of doubt quickly; for seeing the bear cling fast Yo the bough, and that he would not be ersuade come any farther, *‘ Well, well,” says Fri- ay, “ you no come farther, me go, me go; you no come to me, me come to you.” And upon this, he goes out to the smallest end of the bough, where it should bend with his weight, and gently lets himself down by it, sliding down the bough, ti}i he came near enough to jump down on his feet, and a4Way he ran to his gun, takes it up, and stands still. ‘“* Well,” said Ito him, ‘‘ Friday, what will youdo now? Why don’t you shoot him?” ‘No shoot,” says Friday, ‘“no yet, me shoot now, me no kill; me stay, give you one more laugh.’’ And, indeed, so he did, as you will see presently; for when the bear saw his enemy gone, he comes back from the bough where he stood; but did it mighty leisurely, looking behind him every step, and coming backwaras till he got into the body of the tree. Then with the same, hinder end foremost, he came down the tree, grasping it with his claws, and moving one foot ata time, very leisurely; at this juncture, and just be- fore he could set his hind feet upon the ae | stepped close to him, clapped the muzzle of his piece into his ear, and shot him dead as a stone, Then the rogue turned about to see if we did not laugh, and when he kaw we were pleased, by our looks, he falls a lau hing, himeelf, very loud. ‘*So we kill bear in m country,’’ says Friday. “So. ou kill them | said I; “why, you have no guns,”’ ‘No,’ says he, “no guns: but shoot great, much, long arrow. This was, indeed, a good diversion to us; but we were still in a wild place, and our guide very much burt, and what to do we hardly knew; the howling of wolves ran much in my head; and, inde gece e noise I once heard on the shores of Africa, of which I have said some- thing already, I never heard anything that filled me with so much horror. These things, and the approach of night, called us off, or else, as Friday would have had us, we should have cer- tainly taken the skin of this monstrous creature off, an was worth saving ; but we had three | es to go, and our guide hastened us; 80 we left him, and went for- ward on our journey. The oe was still covered with snow, though not so deep and dangerous as on the mountains; and the raven- ous creatures, as we heard afterwards, were come down into the forest and plain country, pressed by hunger, to seek for food: and had done a great deal of misc ief in the villages, where they Ags Slay the country people, killed a great many of their sheep and horses, and some people too. e had one dangerous place to pass, of which our guide told us, if there were any more wolves in the country, we should find them there; and this was & small plain, sur rounded with woods on every side; and a long, narrow defile, or lane, which we were to pass to get through the wood, and then we*should come to the village where we sre to lodge. it was within half an hour of sunset. when we entered in the first wood, except that, in a little plain, within the wood, which was not above two furlongs over, we saw five great wolves cross the road, full speed, one after another, as if they had been in chase of some prey, and had it in view. They took no notice of us, and were gone, and out of sight in a few moments. Upon this, our guide, who, by the way, was a wretched faint-hearted ellow, bade us keep in a ready posture: for he believed there were more wolves a coming. We kept our arms ae fh and our eyes about us; but we saw no more wolves till we came through that wood, which was near halfa league, and entered the plain. As sOunm a8 we came into the plain, we had occasion enough to look aboutus. The first object we met with, was a) dead horse: that isto say, a poor horse, which the wolves | had killed, and at least a dozen of vhem at work; we could not say, eating of him, but picking of his bones, rather; for they had eaten up all the flesh, before. We did not think fit to disturb them at their feast neither did they take much notice of us. Friday woul have let fly at them, but I would not suffer him by any mears: for I found we were likely 1o have more business upor cur hands than we were aware of. We were not — half over the plain, but we began to hear the wolves owl, in the wood on our left, in a frightfui manner; and presentiy after we saw about a hundred, coming on di- rectly towards us, all in a body, and most of them in a line, as regular as an army drawn up by experienced offi- cers. I scarce knew in what manner to receive them; but found, to draw ourselves in a close “age gs the only way. So we formedin a moment. Byt that we might not have too much interval, I ordered that only every other man should fire, and that the others, who had not fired, should stand ready to give them a second volley immediately, if they continued to advance upon us; and that then, those who had fired at first should not pretend to load their fusils again, but stand ready, with every one a pistol; for we were all armed with a fusil, anda pair of pistols, each man; 80 we were, by this method, able to fire six volleys, half of us at a time. However, at present, we no necessity; for, upon firing the first volley, the enemy made a full stop, being terrified, as well with the noise ag with the fire ; four of them being shot into the head Cropped; several others were wounded and went bleeding off, as we could see by the snow. I found they stopped, but did not immediately retreat ; whereupon, remembering that I had been told, that the fiercest creatures were terrified at the voice of man, caused all our company to halloo as loud as we could; and I found the notion not altogether mistaken ; for, upon our shout, they began to retire, and turn about; then I ordered a second volley to be fired in their rear, ae os put them to the gallop, and away they went to the woods. This gave us leisure to charge our pieces again, and that weedeiet lose no time, we kept going; but we had but little more than loaded our fusils, and put ourselves into a readiness, when we heard a terrible noise in the same wood on our left; only that it was farther omward, the same way wé were to go. The night was coming on, anc the light began to be dusky. which made it the worst on our side; but the noise increasing, we could easily perceive that il was the howling and yelling of those vile creatures; and, on a sudden, we perceived two or three troops of wolves, one on our left, one behind us, and one on our front; so that we seemed to be surrounded with them. However, as they did not fall upon us, we kept our bbe forward, as fast as we could make our horses go, which, the way being very rough, was only aed large trot; and in this manuer we only came in view of the entrance of the wood, through which we were to pass, at the farther side of the plain; but we were greatly surprised, when, com- ing near the lane, or pass, we saw a confased number of wolves standing just at the entrance. On a sudden, at another To of the wood, we heard the noise of a gun; and looking that way, out rushed a horse, with a saddie and bridle on him, fi g like the wind, and sixteen or seventeen wolves after him, full speed: Indeed, the horse had the heels of them ; but, as — Friday | we wappoeed that he could not hold at that rate, we not doubte that they would get up with him at last ; and no question but they did. Hore we had a most horrible sight ; for, riding up to the entrance where the horse came out, we found the carcase of another horse, and of two men, devoured by the raven ous creatures, and one of the men was no doubt the same whom we had heard fire the gun: for there lay the gun just by him fired off; but, as to the man, his bead, and the upper part of his body, were eaten up. This filled us with horror, and we knew not what course «G take; but the creatures resolved us soon, for pe gathered about us presently, in hopes of prey; afid ] verily believe there were three hundred of them. pened very much to our advantage, that at the entrance | of the wood, but a little way from it, there lay some large | timber trees, which had been cut down the summer be. | It hap |sent her, thought no 2 fore, and 1 suppose lay there for carriage. 1 drew my little troop in amo se trees, I advised them all to alight, and keeping that tree before us for a breastwork, to stand in a triangle, or three fronts, enclosing our horses in the centre. We did so; and it was well we did, for never was a more furious charge than the creatures made upon us in this place; they came on us with a growling kind of noise, and mounted the piece of timber, (which, as I said, was our breastwork,) as if they were only rushing upon their prey, and this fury of theirs, it seems, was princi- pally occasioned by their seeing our horses behind us, which was the prey they aimed at. I ordered our men to fire as before, every other man; and they took their ai so sure, that indeed they killed several wolves at the fire volley ; but there was a necessity to keep a continual . for they came on like devils, those behind pushing on those before. When we had fired the second volley of our fusils, we thought a stopped a little, and I ho they would have gone oi, but it was but a moment, for others eame forward in: so we fired two volleys of our pistols, and I believe in these four firi we killed seventeen or eighteen of them, and lamed twice as many: yet they came on again. I was loath to spend our last shot too hastily: so I called my servant, not my man Friday, for he was better employed ; for, with the greatest dexterity imaginable, he charged my fusil, and his own, while we were engaged ; but, as I said, I called my other man; and giving hima horn of owder, I bade him lay a large train. He did 80, and had but just time to get away, whee the wolves came up to it, when I oy 55 an uncharged pistol close to the powder, which set it on fire. Those that were upon the timber were scorched with it, and seven of them fell, or rather yet in among us, with the force or the fright of the fire. We dispatched these im an instant, and the rest were so frighted with the light, which the night, for now it was very near dark, made more terrible, that they drew back a little. Upon which I ordered our last pistols to be fired off im one volley, and after *hat we gave a ehont: upon this the wolves turned tail, and we sallied immediately upon near podeco lame ones, which we found struggling on the ground, and fell a cutting them with our swords, which answered our expectations ; for the crying and howling they made were better understood by their fellows, so that they all fled and left us. We had, first and last, killed about threescore of them ; and had it been daylight, we had killed many more. The field of battle being thus cleared, we made forward again, for we had still near a league to go. We heard the ravenous creatures howl and yell in the woods as we went, several times; and sometimes we fancied we saw some of them, but the snow dazzling our eyes, we were not certain: so in about an hour more we came to the town where we were to lodge, which we found in a terrible fright, and all in arms; for it seems that the night before the wolves and some bears had broken into the A tb and put them in a terrible fright ; and they were obli to keep guard, night and day, but especially in the night, to preserve their cattle, and, in- deed, their people. The next morning our guide was so ill, and his limbe so swelled with the rankling of his two wounds, that he could go no farther ; so we were obliged to take another caeee ere, and &° to Toulouse, where we found a warm climate, a fruitful, pleasant country, and no snow, no wolves, nor anything like them, But when we told our story at Toulouse they told us it was nothing but what was ordinary in the great forest, at the foot of the moun- tains, especially when the snow lay on the ground. But they inquired much what kind of a guide we had gotten, that would venture to bring us that way in such a severe season; and told us it was surprising we were Lot all devoured ; when we told them how we had placed onur- selves, and the horses in the middle, they blamed us ex- ceedingly, and told us it was fifty to one but we had all been destroyed ; for it was the sight of the horses that made the wolves so furious, seeing their prey, and that at other times they are really afraid of a gun; but they being excessively hungry. and raging on that account, the eagerness to come at the horses had made them senseless of the ye ok and that if we had not, by the continued fire, and at last by the stratagem of the train of pease: mastered them, it had been great odds but that we had been torn in pieces; whereas. we been content to have sat still on horseback, ar.d fired as horsemen, they would not have taken the horses so much for their own, when men were on their as otherwise; and, withal, pai; told us, that at last, if we had all stood to- gether, and left our horses, they would have been so er to have devoured them, that we might have come off safe, especially having our fire-arms in our hands, and 80 many in number. or my part, I never was so sensible of danger in my life; for seeing above three hundred wolves come roar- ing and open-mouthed to devour us, and having nothiug to shelter us, or retreat to, I gave myself over for lost; and, as it was, I believe I s never care to cross those mountains again; I think I would much rather goa thousand leagues by sea, though I were sure to meet with a storm once a week, I have ong, pga to take notice of in my sage through France; nothing but what other tra- vellera have given an account of, with much more ad- vantage thanican. I travelled from Toulouse to Paris and, without ay, Considerable stay, came to Calais, and anded safely at Dover, the fourteenth of January, after having had a severely cold geason to travel in. I was now come to the centre of my travels, and had, in a little time, all my new-discovered estate safe about me, the bills of exchange which I brought with me hav- ing peen very currently paid. y principal guide and privy-counselior was my good, ancient widow, who, in gratitude for the money I had ains too much, or Care too great, to employ for me, and I trusted herso entirely with every- thing, that I was perfectly easy as to the security of my effects: and, indeed, I was very happy from the begin- COMIC KOO) <S (E@)