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The sunlight was streaming from the western skies, kissing each mountain top, clad with crimson and gold, like the morning light that dances on the heaven-kissed hills of Paradise. Mayall viewed the scene with unspeakable delight, as he thought how rich he was in everything that made life desirable to him.
Mayall took a cautious look. No Indian in his blanket stirred. All was silent, excepting the low murmuring of the Susquehanna rolling by. He noiselessly rested his gun behind a tree, and leaped like a tiger upon his prey, with his tomahawk in one hand, which he swung as fast as death could deal a blow, and his long knife gleaming by the light of the fire in the other.
Mayall lost no time in loading his gun, but the young panthers, seeing their protector and provider fall, were quickly out of reach of the fearless hunter. Mayall descended to the ground just as the sun was casting his last crimson blush on the Crumhorn hills, and kindled his camp-fire on the leaves that the panther had scraped together for his funeral pile.
Their household goods were few, and those of the plainest kind. They loaded all their goods, with their children and Mrs. Mayall, into the wagon, and Mayall and his son Esock performed the journey on foot, each one carrying his gun in readiness for any emergency, with Mayall in advance to pilot them through the forest. In their journey they had to ford streams and climb with difficulty the hills.
Mayall selected the most beautiful place he could find, on an elevated spot of ground, near a small rill fed by springs, where the creek formed a half circle like a new moon, on one side of his cottage. This fertile spot, lying in the bend, he intended to clear and cultivate.
He found many traces of beaver and other furred animals, and plenty of deer. Mayall said it so nearly resembled the Otego Creek in its wild state, shaded with the primeval forest, that it made him think of home in gone-by days. The speckled trout swarmed in the creek and its small tributaries, the feathered songsters sung their evening and morning hymn, unmolested by man.
Thinking the young panthers might return for their dam, he had placed her in a sleeping position in a conspicuous place, to draw them to her side if they came within sight. Mayall waited in sleepless anxiety, thinking that when the embers of his fire died away the young panthers might approach.
In 1861 the property came into the possession of Samuel Mayall, and he changed the name of it from Fuller house to International hotel. Col. E.C. Belote, who had formerly been the landlord of the Merchants, was the manager of the hotel. The fire broke out in the basement, it was supposed from a lamp in the laundry. The night was intensely cold, a strong gale blowing from the northwest.
They usually gave Mayall an invitation to join the fall hunt, which was his favorite amusement at that season of the year, being an expert in the game of hunting. The Indians gave Mayall his full share of the venison and furs taken.
Mayall was just the man for that place; for as quick as a flash of electricity all his presence of mind returned. The contents of his gun, with his deadly aim, brought down the first or foremost to the ground. He dropped his gun and met the second with his tomahawk, which he dispatched at a blow. The third had then reached him.
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