, just as the skillful driver controls the
mettlesome horses and keeps them well in hand.

He was seated upon a large pile of wood, while near nestled a little
hump-backed, bright-eyed boy, whose eyes sparkled with delight at the
performance of the strange machine.

The speed of the steam man gradually slackened, until it came opposite
the men, when it came to a dead halt, and the grinning 'Baldy,' as he
was called, (from his having lost his scalp several years before, by
the Indians), tipped his hat and said:

'Glad to see you hain't gone under yit. How'd you git along while I
was gone?'

But the men were hardly able to answer any questions yet, until they
had learned something more about the strange creation before them.
Mickey shied away, as the timid steed does at first sight of the
locomotive, observing which, the boy (at a suggestion from Baldy),
gave a string in his hand a twitch, whereupon the nose of the
wonderful thing threw out a jet of steam with the sharp screech of the
locomotive whistle. Mickey sprung a half dozen feet backward, and
would have run off at full speed down the ravine, had not Ethan
Hopkins caught his arm.

'What's the matter, Mickey, naow! Hain't you ever heard anything like
a locomotive whistle?'

'Worrah, worrah, now, but is that the way the crather blows its nose?
It must have a beautiful voice when it shnores at night.'

Perhaps at this point a description of the singular mechanism should
be given. It was about ten feet in hight, measuring to the top of the
'stove-pipe hat,' which was fashioned after the common order of felt
coverings, with a broad brim, all painted a shiny black. The face was
made of iron, painted a black color, with a pair of fearful eves, and
a tremendous grinning mouth. A whistle-like contrivance was trade to
answer for the nose. The steam chest proper and boiler, were where the
chest in a human being is generally supposed to be, extending also
into a large knapsack arrangement over the shoulders and back. A pair
of arms, like projections, held the shafts, and the broad flat feet
were covered with sharp spikes, as though he were the monarch of
base-ball players. The legs were quite long, and the step was natural,
except when running, at which time, the bolt uprightness in the figure
showed different from a human being.

In the knapsack were the valves, by which the steam or water was
examined. In front was a painted imitation of a vest, in which a door
ope