The
second match, when struck, would shine and smell, and fizz a little,
and then go out.
There would be only one match left. Death would
ensue if it failed. I should get close to the log, crawl under my
hat, strike the match, see it catch, flicker, almost go out (the
reader painfully excited by this time), blaze up, nearly expire, and
finally fire the punk, - thank God! And I said to myself, "The public
don't want any more of this thing: it is played out. Either have a
box of matches, or let the first one catch fire."
In this gloomy mood I plunged along. The prospect was cheerless; for,
apart from the comfort that a fire would give, it is necessary, at
night, to keep off the wild beasts. I fancied I could hear the tread
of the stealthy brutes following their prey. But there was one source
of profound satisfaction, - the catamount had been killed. Mr. Colvin,
the triangulating surveyor of the Adirondacks, killed him in his last
official report to the State. Whether he despatched him with a
theodolite or a barometer does not matter: he is officially dead, and
none of the travelers can kill him any more. Yet he has served them a
good turn.
I knew that catamount well. One night when we lay in the bogs of the
South Beaver Meadow, under a canopy of mosquitoes, the serene
midnight was parted by a wild and humanlike cry from a neighboring
mountain.
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