Down the Ravine

f the Cumberland Mountains. The sky, still crimson and amber, stretched vast a

-gear. A young mountaineer down the ravine was reminded, by the sharp, abrupt sound, of a

low, a tawny streak against the gray rock. Swift though he was, a jet of red light flashing out in the dusk was yet swifter. The echoing cr

d Tim Griggs. "The contrairy beastis couldn't hev fund a more

clared the boy who still held the rifle. "That thar fo

; ef ye try ter climb up this hyar b

ntered and fissured, with many ledges, and here and there a tuft of weeds or a stunted bush growing in a niche, it was very steep, and would afford precarious foothold. The sunset was f

r money!" he exclai

ore spoken, gave a sudden la

, jes' ter pleasure you-uns, thar wouldn't be enough scalps an' ea

he called a "jubious time." Spring is the season for stripping the trees of their bark, which is richer in tannin when the sap flows most freely, and the mule was needed to haul up the piles of bark from out the depths of the woods to the tanyard. Then, too, Jubal Perkins had his own crops to put in. As he often remarked in the course of the negotiation, "I don't eat tan bark - nor yit raw hides." Although the mule was a multifarious animal, and ploughed and worked in the bark-mill, and hauled from the woods, and went long journeys in the wagon

essential as the mule himself. As Providence had failed to furnish the tanner with a son for t

he limited circuit, his mind was far away. He anxiously canvassed the future. He cherished fiery, ambitious schemes, - often scorched, poor fellow, by their futility. With his time thus mortgag

laugh determined him not to relinquish the price set upon the fox's head. He took off his

y hair, small gray eyes, set much too close together, and a sharp, pale, freckled face. Tim seemed only a mild repet

rfed huckleberry bush, nourished in a fissure, lifted him up like a helping hand. He quaked as he heard the roots strain and creak, for he was a pretty heavy fellow for sixteen years of age. They did not give way, however, and up and up he went, ever

y had already started homeward, and presently their voices died in the distance. Birt f

rded here. The "lick," as such places are called in Tennessee, was nearly two acres in extent, and in the centre of the depression the brackish water stood to the depth of six feet or more. Birt looked down at it, thinking of the old times when, according to tradition, it was the stampin

high above the jagged summit of the cliff that sharply serrated the zenith, he saw the earliest star, glorious in the crimson and amber sky. Below, a point of silver light quivered, refl

a gravelly spot where he had fallen, and he saw in a moment that it was the summer-dried channel of a mountain rill. As he pulled himself up on one elbow,

is eyes glowing in the contempl

e in 1831, when the rich earth flung largess from its hidden wealth along the romantic bank

two ears imperatively required by the statute, in order that the wily hunter may not be tempted to prese

ituted the house. An old hound had half climbed the fence, but as he laid his fore-paw on the topmost rail, his deep-mouthed bay was hushed, - he was recognizing the approaching step of his master. The yellow curs were still insisting upon a marauder theory. One of them barked defiance as he thrust his head between the rails of the

withdrew its head from between the rails and came trot

igure distinct in the firelight that came flickering

ad a-twixt the rails ter watch fur her brother, she'll git cotc

t," he said, a trifle ashamed of his ready championship of his l

ed with big horn buttons, descended almost to her feet. Her straight, awkwardly cropped hair was of a nondescript shade

werful peart," Birt used to say so often

she was a silent child, with the single marked characteristic of great affec

re she could walk she'd crawl along the floor arter ye, an' holler like a squeech-owel ef ye went off an' lef' her. An' ye air plumb

iar an object at the tanyard as the bark-mill itself. When he wielded the axe, she perched on one end of the woodpile. But so far, she had passed safely through her varied adventures, and gratifyi

ame irksome to him. Her trusting, insistent affection

r! he learned it

nd the skillet and the hoe, on the live coals drawn out on the broad hearth. The tow-headed childre

hand on his shoulder, for she could reach it as he knelt, held her head close to his, and looked at them too with wide black eyes. His mother placed the su

his pockets ter sag 'em down and tear 'em out fur me ter sew in ag'in. Waal, waal! Sol'mon say ef ye spare the rod ye spile the child - mos' ennybody c