Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 August 1882 — Rattlesnake Straight. [ARTICLE]

Rattlesnake Straight.

Arizona Globe-Chronicle, January C.] The day was hot, and lying under a cedar tree, where the grateful coolness of the breeze gave a zest to my enjoyment of that blessing to a prospector, a brule gule (short pipe), 1 looked down and abroad on a landscape which, under the lambent atmosphere of Arizona, appeared exceedingly beautiful—not the beauty of cultivation and art, for as far as the eye could reach fover a hundred miles) there was no sign of man’s presence. To the right stood our green wooded Finals, with their snowy tops, which make such a refreshment to the eye when we look up from the warmth below, and against the eastern horizon towered up Mt. Turnbull, with its white peak, and the lofty neighboring ranges as a background for the long sloping valley between. Then further to the north was' plainly visible the Gila range with its lofty plateau, level, bare and square, like an artificial work. The scene to the left, shut in by the Apache mountains, rocky and barren, added another bold feature to the view. My musing on the ages of change that it must have taken to mold the scene to its present aspect were broken in upon by a large rattlesnake gliding out on a bare rock within fifty feet of the point where I was silting. He seemed to search around like a dog for a place to suit his snakeshi]), and then stretched himself out to enjoy the warmth. I was thinking if it was worth while to heave a stick at the monster, when a shadow swept down and a hawk nearly caught napping, but not quite. The snake sprung his rattle and coiled himself ready for attack, while the hawk hovered round making a dash,, now on the right and now on the left. It was quite an interesting skirmish, but at last the snake made a spring and apparently failed to strike, and before he could recoil himself the hawk seized him with both talons close behind the head. In fact, he had him on the neck, and swept into the air, while the snake struggled and twisted, away up into the Mue in wide circling sweeps, until the struggling reptile hung limp and lifeless, when the hawk came down to earth again, and alighting on a neighboring tree, made his meal on tho snake.