A Little
Fire Of Light-Wood Cheered Me For A While, But Its
Bright Flame Soon Attracted Winged Insects In
Large Numbers.
Having made a cup of
chocolate, and eaten some of Captain Akin's chipped
beef and crackers, I continued my preparations
for the night.
Feeling somewhat nervous about
large alligators, I covered myself with a piece of
painted canvas, which was stiff and strong, and
placed the little revolver, my only weapon, under
my blanket.
As I fully realized the novelty of my strange
position in this desolate region, it was some time
before I could compose myself and sleep. It
was a night of dreams. Sounds indistinct but
numerous troubled my brain, until I was fully
roused to wakefulness by horrible visions and
doleful cries. The chuck-will's-widow, which
in the south supplies the place of our
whippoorwill, repeated his oft-told tale of "
chuckwill's-widow, chuck-will's-widow," with
untiring earnestness. The owls hooted wildly, with
a chorus of cries from animals and reptiles not
recognizable by me, excepting the snarling voices
of the coons fighting in the forest. These last
were old acquaintances, however, as they
frequently gathered round my camp at night to pick
up the remains of supper.
While I listened, there rose a cry so hideous in
its character and so belligerent in its tone, that I
trembled with fear upon my palm-leaf mattress.
It resembled the bellowing of an infuriated bull,
but was louder and more penetrating in its effect.
The proximity of this animal was indeed
unpleasant, for he had planted himself on the
river's edge, near the little bluff upon which my
camp had been constructed. The loud roar was
answered by a similar bellow from the other side
of the river, and for a long time did these two
male alligators keep up their challenging cries,
without coming to combat. Numerous
wood-mice attacked my provision-basket, and even
worked their way through the leaves of my
palmetto mattress.
Thus with an endless variety of annoyances
the night wore wearily away, but the light of the
rising sun did not penetrate the thick fog which
enveloped the river until after eight o'clock,
when I embarked for a second day's journey
upon the stream, which had now attained a width
of five or six rods. Rafts of logs blocked the
river as I approached the settlement of Trader's
Hill, and upon a most insecure footing the canoe
was dragged over a quarter of a mile of logs,
and put into the water on the lower side of the
"jam." Crossing several of these log "jams,"
which covered the entire width of the St. Mary's,
I became weary of the task, and, after the last
was reached, determined to go into camp until
the next day, when suddenly the voices of men
in the woods were heard.
Soon a gentleman, with two raftsmen,
appeared and kindly greeted me. They had been
notified of my approach at Trader's Hill by a
courier sent from Dutton across the woods, and
these men, whose knowledge of wood-craft is
wonderful, had timed my movements so
correctly that they had arrived just in time to meet
me at this point.
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