Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 October 1875 — Our Young Folks. [ARTICLE]

Our Young Folks.

A BRAVE BOY. A TRUE STORY.' A little white farm-house stands all alone on one of the Berkshire hills in Massachusetts. It is built close upon the edge of a wood, so that the barn and all the fields are on the other side of the road in front of the house. Here lived Farmer Scott, his wife, their prettydaughter Hattie, and Ben, their son, who was twelve years of age, and a very handsome boy spite of freckles, sunburn, and neverending scratches on his face and hands; for his eyes shone large and bright, with an honest, fearless look, and his wellshaped mouth disclosed teeth so white and even tliat it was quite delightful to see him laugh. Ben wore neither stockings nor shoes in summer, and, except on Sunday, with regard to his clothes he was a perfect ragamuffin. His father was a hard-flawed farmer, who meant that Ben should earn his own living, and had no intention of wasting good clothes upon him every day until he could earn enough to pay for them. So Ben drove the oxen, crying: “ Whoa! haw, there!” for hours together, and he went after the cows and helped to milk them. He caught the old gray horse when he chose to kick up his heels tandrace wildly around the field, preferring to eat clover to plowing up the ten-acre lot, And Ben helped- bind up the thistly wheat, and get in the hay, and the harvesting of the corn and oats, and worked as hard as anybody on threshing days. And in the winter he went to school, and chopped wood in the early mornings and late afternoons, and helped to kill the pigs—which last was such horrible work that the supper of delicious tenderloins hardly paid for it; and all this he did so cheerfully and steadily that at last even his father admitted that he hail earned a suit of “ store clothes,” while his mother and Hattie, who loved him dearly, had thought so for a very long time. So one happy afternoon early in October Ben arrayed himself in his well-worn, home-made Sunday clothes, which had been pieced down in the legs of the trousers and sleeves of the jacket more than once. They were to become an everyday suit as soon as the “ store clotlies” were finished, and he was going this afternoon through the woods "to the village, four miles away, to be measured by the tailor, to whom his father had given him an order. “ But look here, mother,” said Ben, “ I ought to have new boots, too, oughtn’t I ? My Sunday boots are going to split very soon.” “ Yes, my lad, and here’s the money to buy them,” and she took down the old cracked.teapot in which she kept her own private egg and butter money and took three dollars out of it. “ Mind, Ben,” she said, “to buy a stout, double-soled pair with plenty of squeak in ’em; and here are ten cents besides for peanuts, and be sure you are back by sundown.” Ben thanked his mother, giving her a hearty h*ug and kiss, and started off barefooted and as happy as a bird in spring. He went whistling through the woods, stopping sometimes to eat checkerberries or chew birch bark: He chased a little chipmunk up into a tree and carefully avoided stepping upon abig spider because old Miss Lucindy Tuckey said if you killed one it was sure to bring rain. He took out his jack-knife and cut down a sapling and carved his name on the side of it, and at last he arrived at the village, four miles away. Ben soon reached the tailor’s shop. He found him with his back to the door, sitting on the counter cross-legged, like a Turk, stitching on a coat and keeping time with his needle to such a funny old sopg that the boy crouched down on the door-step to listen. The last line of every verse was repeated and bawled out in a long, slow way, and then the needle gave solemn flourishes in the air, only to go on faster at the next verse. This is the song: In good old colony times, When we lived under the King, Three roguish chaps fell into mishaps Because they could not sing— Because—they— could—not— sing! The one he was a miller, And the other he was a weaver, And the third he was a little tai-tor. And three great rogues together! And—three—great—rogues—together! The miller he stole wheat, And the weaver he stole yarn, And the little tail-or he stole broadcloth, To keep these three rogues warm— To—keep—these—three—rogues—warm!

The miller—was drowned in his dam! And the weaver—was hung in his yarn! And the Sheriff clapped his claw on the little With the broadcloth under his arm! With—the —broadcloth—u nder—his—arm! And the tailor, in making an extra flourish, kicked the scissors ofl the counter, and, jumping down to get them, he spied Ben with his nands over his ifiouth bursting with laughter. “ Halloo!” he cried, “ who’d a thought of seeing you, my fine young Scott! Come in, and tell all you know. How’s your pretty sister ?” The tailor was dreadfully in love with Hattie, so there was a great deal of talking to do before Ben’s measure was taken. “I’ll make you a tip-top fit, Ben,” he said; “you’ll cut a greater dash than old Deacon Button, for whom I am just finishing this coat,” which speech caused the boy to shake his curly head and laugh, for Deacon Button was a grandfather, and had a bald head as white and smooth as a billiard-ball. After Ben had been measured, and had promised to take the tailor’s kind regards to his sister, he went to the store to get his boots. Of course you all know that a village jitore is a sort of omnium gatherum, where calicoes and codfish, mackerel and muslins, boots, butter, blacking, sugar, silk, soap, peanuts,' pails, tea, teacups and everything else is, or ought to be, for sale. Here the dapper clerk fitted Ben with a famous pair of boots that almost screamed, they squeaked so loud, and advised him to wear them home, “ so’s to limber ’em,” he said, which seemed to be such capital advice that after buying the peanuts Ben, or rather his boots, screamed out of the store like a pair of hoarse, quarreling pld katydids. Now, all this buying and measuring and talking had taken a great deal of time and it was late in the afternoon when Ben entered the wood for his four-mile walk home. He knew every step of the way, besides which there was a narrow footpath which went straight through from fine end to the other, and the boy would not have minded R growing dark so rapidly if he iqad not promised his mother that he would be home by sundown. So the good little fellow hurried on and on, while the sun sank low behind the grand Berkshire hills and in a little while more bade that part of the world good-night. Outside of the wood it« was still light, for gold and crimson clouds were sailing across the sky, but before

long Ben could not see the end of his own nose and soon all sorts of queer sounds came to keep company with the quarreling old katydids in his boots. The coons scuttled past him into the thickets; the bats whizzed to and fro; and a great gog-gle-eyed owl sat in the fork of a tree and cried “Tu whit! tu whoo!” at Ben as he hurried along. But never a bit did he care for any of them. They were all old acquaintances, and he Just kept his hands in his pockets and walked as fast as he could, whistling “We’ll rally round the flag, boys!” to cheer him on his way. “ At last, through a long vista in the trees, Ben caught a tiny gleam of light. He gave a glad hurrah, for he knew that it was a candle which his kind mother had lighted for him and placed in a window of the farm-house. “ Almost home!" he joyfully shouted, when he stepped upon something soft, yielding, wriggling. A strangled hiss—a sharp, quick, angry rattle! The boy’s face turned to an ashen white, and his heart almost stopped beating. He stood perfectly still, not daring to move lest the rattlesnake—for it was one of those terrible reptiles—should instantly bite him to death. He knew by the suffocated sound of the hiss that his foot was upon the snake’s head, round which its body was tightly coiled. He tried to cry out but his voice was gone—his mouth dry and parched. Home so near; the light in the window gleaming a welcome, and his mother, he knew, waiting for him with a nice supper, while he stood there so helpless in this deadly peril. If he could only have seen, but it was pitchy dark. Only God could save him; and folding together his trembling hands he simply said: “O God, help me, help me! Show me what to do!”

As if in instant answer to his prayer his only way of escape from almost certain death came like a voice to him, and he acted at once upon its counsel. Drawing his other foot up carefully, he planted it firmly close |o the first, and now both were holding down the snake, which had never ceased to sound its dreadful rattles, and now redoubled them. Taking out his jack-knife and steadying himself by feeling for and grasping tightly a stout twig, Ben leaned over. It was so utterly dark that he could only hope that the snake’s head was not free enough to make a dart at his hand. He could see nothing whatever, and he knew not where to begin. Clasping the knife firmly, he cut down and round both feet, through and through, round and round, until the rattles faltered, grew faint and fainter, and then ceased. Great drops of perspiration fell from his brow, and when it was over, and he felt that his enemy was vanquished and dead, he could scarcely raise himself upright, for he was so sick and dizzy. The knife dropped from his hand and a great sob broke from his breast. But with a violent effort he darted forward and in five minutes more he was at the edge of the wood, and in the house, and the next instant lie had thrown himself upon his mother’s neck in a passion of tears. “Why, Ben!” she exclaimed, terribly frightened, “ what has happened?” “I’m ashamed to ciy, I just am,” said the boy, struggling with his sobs, and at last laughing and crying together—“ but when a fellow steps on a rattlesnake in the dark and has got to kill it or be killed I tell you it’s no joke!” “Oh, oh!” screamed his mother hugging him tight, “are you sure it did not bite you?” “Not a bite,” he answered; “thanks to you, mother, for my new boots saved me.” “But why did you not come home earlier?” z - “ Oh, because the tailor kept me so long talking about Hattie, and he sent his kind regards to her.” “Well,” said Hattie, “I never could bear him, and now I hate him! But come, Ben, and eat your supper.” What a fine supper he had, to be sure! for several extra goodies were added—on account of the rattlesnake adventure—and his mother was so proud of him!—his father, too, though he did not know how to show it. The next morning the whole family went into the woods to see the dead reptile. There it lay, cut four times through, with Ben’s knife, which he had dropped, resting upon its ugly head. It had nineteen rattles, which indicated that it was quite old, as the rattles increase with the years. You may be sure that if my friend Ben lives to grow up and have children and grandchildren he will tell them this story many times; and you maybe equally sure that the rattlesnake will never tell it once to anybody.— Fanny Barrow, in Christian Union.