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A Belated Revenge, From the Papers of Ipsico Poe
A Belated Revenge From the Papers of Ipsico Poe Author:Robert Montgomery Bird Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. Excerpt from book: Section 3vm. A FOREST MENTOB. The third night after leaving home I camped on the Catawba Creek. Toward morning, walking about for exercise (for it was cold) I caught sight of a little sparkle... more » as of a star, glimmering well down the stream. This at first I took to be no more than a jack-o'-lantern, dancing over some swampy place. But, observing that it did not move, and was moreover of a ruddy, sanguine color, whereas all the swamp- lights I had ever seen were of a pale and silvery hue, I became persuaded it was some camp-fire. Of this I was convinced when I had crept down the stream a little and saw it reflected strongly on the water, though perhaps half a mile away. While I looked, it was twice or thrice hidden, as if by some one passing before it; and presently it began to blaze up more fiercely, as if fresh fuel had just been added. By all I could learn on the Fluvanna from the man with whom I passed the night, and another who put me across the river in his canoe, there were no hostile Indians in the land ; though, this being a fine hunting-season, it was not unlikely some bands might be in the outer valleys, among the deer and elk, which abounded in the unsettled regions. I did not, therefore, expect such dangerous neighbors now, and thought the fire probably that of some outlying hunter like myself, who found the morning too cold for comfort. Still, redskins might be about, and it became me to know, that if so I might be on my guard. So I resolved to reconnoitre the spot at once, being well satisfied that my own fire, which was behind a rock, could not be seen by the strangers from their camp. I approached the light, using a hundred precautions, which were all thrown away; for when I got near enough to make my observations, I found a white man and a boy sitting by the fire, and to my amazement they p...« less