, Sandy shouted, "Kill him! Kill him, quick!"

The reptile was about five feet long, very thick, and of a dark
mottled color. Instantly, each lad had armed himself with a big stick
and had attacked him. The snake, stopped in his attempt to get away,
turned, and opening his ugly-looking mouth, made a curious blowing
noise, half a hiss and half a cough, as Charlie afterward described
it.

"Take care, Sandy! He'll spring at you, and bite you in the face! See!
He's getting ready to spring!"

And, indeed, the creature, frightened, and surrounded by the agile,
jumping boys, each armed with a club, seemed ready to defend his life
with the best weapons at his command. The boys, excited and alarmed,
were afraid to come near the snake, and were dancing about, waiting
for a chance to strike, when they were startled by a shot from behind
them, and the snake, making one more effort to turn on himself,
shuddered and fell dead.

Mr. Howell, hearing the shouting of the boys, had run out of the camp,
and with a well-directed rifle shot had laid low the reptile.

"It's only a blow-snake," he said, taking the creature by the tail and
holding it up to view. "He's harmless. Well! Of course a dead snake is
harmless, but when he was alive he was not the sort of critter to be
afraid of. I thought you had encountered a bear, at the very least, by
the racket you made."

"He's a big fellow, anyhow," said Oscar, giving the snake a kick, "and
Sandy said he was a rattlesnake. I saw a rattler once when we lived in
Dixon. Billy Everett and I found him down on the bluff below the
railroad; and he was spotted all over. Besides, this fellow hasn't any
rattles."

"The boys have been having a lesson in natural history, Charlie," said
Mr. Howell to his brother-in-law, as they returned with him to camp,
loaded with firewood; Sandy, boy-like, dragging the dead blow-snake
after him.

CHAPTER V.

TIDINGS FROM THE FRONT.

Supper was over, a camp-fire built (for the emigrants did their
cooking by a small camp-stove, and sat by the light of a fire on the
ground), when out of the darkness came sounds of advancing teams.
Oscar was playing his violin, trying to pick out a tune for the better
singing of Whittier's song of the Kansas Emigrants. His father raised
his hand to command silence. "That's a Yankee teamster, I'll be
bound," he said, as the "Woh-hysh! Woh-haw!" of the coming party fell
on his ear. "No Missourian ever talks to his cattle li