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west. On
this side, if you are one man's friend, you are the next man's enemy;
and I had no mind to answer questions."

"You seem to answer them now mighty freely."

"That is true. I am like a letter that tells all it knows as soon as
it gets to the right hand; but it does not want to be opened before
that."

"And how do you know that you have got to the right hand now?"

"Because I know where I am."

"And where are you?"

"Just at the foot of the Devil's-Backbone," replied the youth.

"Were you ever here before?"

"Never in my life."

"How do you know then where you are?" asked the mountaineer.

"Because the right way to avoid questions is to ask none. So I took
care to know all about the road, and the country, and the place,
before I left home."

"And who told you all about it?"

"Suppose I should tell you," answered the young man, "that Van
Courtlandt had a map of the country made, and gave it to me."

"I should say you were a traitor to him, or a spy upon us," was the
stern reply.

At the same moment, a startled hum was heard from the crowd, and the
press moved and swayed for an instant, as if a sort of spasm had
pervaded the whole mass.

"You are a good hand at questioning," said the youth, with a smile,
"but without asking a single question, I have found out all I wanted
to know."

"And what was that?" asked the other.

"Whether you were friends to the Yorkers and Yankees, or to poor old
Virginia."

"And which _are_ we for?" added the laconic mountaineer.

"For _old Virginia forever_," replied the youth. . . . . It was echoed
in a shout, . . . . their proud war-cry of "_old Virginia forever_."

DAVID CROCKETT.

~1786=1836.~

This renowned hunter and pioneer, commonly called Davy Crockett, was
born in Limestone, Green County, Tennessee. His free and wild youth
was spent in hunting. He became a soldier in the war of 1812: he was
elected to the Tennessee Legislature in 1821 and 1823, and to Congress
in 1829 and 1833. His eccentricity of manners, his lack of education,
and his strong common sense and shrewdness made him a marked figure,
especially in Washington. In 1835 he went to Texas to aid in the
struggle for independence; and in 1836, was massacred by General Santa
Anna, with five other prisoners, after the surrender of the Alamo,
these six being the only survivors of a band of one hundred and forty
Texans. See Life by Edward S. Ellis.

WORKS.

 Autobiography.
 A Tour to the North and Down East.
 Life of Van Buren, Heir-Apparent to the Government.

Crockett's autobiography was written to correct various mistakes in an
unauthorized account of his life and adventures, that was largely
circulated. His books are unique in literature as he is in human
nature, and they give us an original account of things. As to literary
criticism of his works and style, see his own opinion in the extract
below.

SPELLING AND GRAMMAR--HIS PROLOGUE.

(_From A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, of the State of
Tennessee. Written by Himself. 1834._)

[Illustration: ~Alamo, San Antonio, Texas.~]

I don't know of anything in my book to be criticised on by honourable
men. Is it on my spelling?--that's not my trade. Is it on my
grammar?--I hadn't time to learn it, and make no pretensions to it.
Is it on the order and arrangement of my book?--I never wrote one
before, and never read very many; and, of course, know mighty little
about that. Will it be on the authorship of the book?--this I claim,
and I'll hang on to it, like a wax plaster. The whole book is my own,
and every sentiment and sentence in it. I would not be such a fool, or
knave either, as to deny that I have had it hastily run over by a
friend or so, and that some little alterations have been made in the
spelling and grammar; and I am not so sure that it is not the worse of
even that, for I despise this way of spelling contrary to nature. And
as for grammar, it's pretty much a thing of nothing at last, after all
the fuss that's made about it. In some places, I wouldn't suffer
either the spelling, or grammar, or anything else to be touch'd; and
therefore it will be found in my own way.

But if anybody complains that I have had it looked over, I can only
say to him, her, or them--as the case may be--that while critics were
learning grammar, and learning to spell, I, and "Doctor Jackson,
L. L. D." were fighting in the wars; and if our books, and messages,
and proclamations, and cabinet writings, and so forth, and so on,
should need a little looking over, and a little correcting of the
spelling and grammar to make them fit for use, it's just nobody's
business. Big men have more important matters to attend to than
crossing their _t's_ and dotting their _i's_--, and such like small
things.

ON A BEAR HUNT.

(_From the Life of David Crockett. Written by Himself. 1834._)

It was mighty dark, and was difficult to see my way or anything else.
When I got up the hill, I found I had passed the dogs, and so I turned
and went to them. I found, when I got there, they had treed the bear
in a large forked poplar, and it was setting in the fork. I could see
the lump, but not plain enough to shoot with any certainty, as there
was no moonlight; and so I set in to hunting for some dry brush to
make me a light; but I could find none.

At last I thought I could shoot by guess, and kill him; so I pointed
as near the lump as I could, and fired away. But the bear didn't come;
he only clomb up higher, and got out on a limb, which helped me to see
him better. I now loaded up again and fired, but this time he didn't
move at all. I commenced loading for a third fire, but the first thing
I knowed the bear was down among my dogs, and they were fighting all
around me. I had my big butcher in my belt, and I had a pair of
dressed buckskin breeches on. So I took out my knife, and stood,
determined, if he should get hold of me, to defend myself in the best
way I could. I stood there for some time, and could now and then see a
white dog I had, but the rest of them, and the bear, which were dark
coloured, I couldn't see at all, it was so miserable dark. They still
fought around me, and sometimes within three feet of me; but, at last,
the bear got down into one of the cracks that the earthquake had made
in the ground, about four feet deep, and I could tell the biting end
of him by the hollering of my dogs. So I took my gun and pushed the
muzzle of it about, till I thought I had it against the main part of
his body, and fired; but it happened to be only the fleshy part of his
foreleg. With this, I jumped out of the crack, and he and the dogs had
another hard fight around me, as before. At last, however, they forced
him back into the crack again, as he was when I had shot. . .

I made a lounge with my long knife, and fortunately stuck him right
through the heart; at which he just sank down, and I crawled out in a
hurry. In a little while my dogs all come out too, and seemed
satisfied, which was the way they always had of telling me that they
had finished him. . . .

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