The
Cow Therefore Resumed Her Place In Our Procession.
She walked on
until we encamped, when R. firmly approaching with his enormous
English double-barreled rifle, calmly and deliberately took aim at
her heart, and discharged into it first one bullet and then the
other.
She was then butchered on the most approved principles of
woodcraft, and furnished a very welcome item to our somewhat limited
bill of fare.
In a day or two more we reached the river called the "Big Blue." By
titles equally elegant, almost all the streams of this region are
designated. We had struggled through ditches and little brooks all
that morning; but on traversing the dense woods that lined the banks
of the Blue, we found more formidable difficulties awaited us, for
the stream, swollen by the rains, was wide, deep, and rapid.
No sooner were we on the spot than R. had flung off his clothes, and
was swimming across, or splashing through the shallows, with the end
of a rope between his teeth. We all looked on in admiration,
wondering what might be the design of this energetic preparation; but
soon we heard him shouting: "Give that rope a turn round that stump!
You, Sorel: do you hear? Look sharp now, Boisverd! Come over to
this side, some of you, and help me!" The men to whom these orders
were directed paid not the least attention to them, though they were
poured out without pause or intermission. Henry Chatillon directed
the work, and it proceeded quietly and rapidly.
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