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Many the story of rattlers and copperheads he had heard from fishermen and campers and the night was filled with unexpected and disturbing noises, overhead and underfoot. Of course he knew that snakes are not abroad at night, but the knowledge did not help his nerves.
"Go 'way, was it? Bully for yu!" exclaimed Skinny, tarantulas being placed at par with rattlesnakes, and he considered that he had been saved from a horrible death. "Thought yu said they wasn't no bugs over here," he added in an aggrieved tone. "They wasn't none. Yu brought 'em. I only had th' main show Gilas, rattlers an' toads," he replied, and then added, "Ain't it cussed hot up here?"
No sooner, however, had his feet touched the earth than there came that ominous rattling sound. "There, you big idiot!" howled Alf. "There it is again!" "Just your bad nerves, Alf," Tom smiled. "They're so bad that I'll overlook your lack of respect calling me an idiot!" "Don't you s'pose I know rattlers when I hear 'em?" asked Drew, sullenly.
There are also in the palace almost constantly the Wanangalavi, or drummers; Nsase, pea-gourd rattlers; Milele, flute-players; Mukonderi, clarionet-players; also players on wooden harmonicons and lap-harps, to which the players sing accompaniments; and, lastly, men who whistle on their fingers for music is half the amusement of these courts.
Copperheads were simply men who hated Lincoln. The name came from copperhead-snakes, which are worse than rattlers, for rattlers rattle and give warning. A rattler is an open enemy, but you never know that a copperhead is around until he strikes. He lies low in the swale and watches his chance. "He is the worstest snake that am."
"In that case," I asked, "what satisfaction are you getting out of your new position?" That sent the color ebbing from his face again, and he looked at me as I'd never seen him look at me before. We'd both been mauled by the paw of Destiny, and we were both nursing ragged nerves and oversensitized spirits, facing each other as irritable as teased rattlers, ready to thump rocks with our head.
Howitt whispered to his companion, "Let me open the door and talk to them, Grant. Surely they will listen to reason." But the woodsman returned, "Talk to a nest of rattlers! Jim Lane's the only man that can talk to them now. We've got to stand them off as long as we can."
He twisted the knife until tears of pain formed in his eyes. Then he fastened the knife by tucking the haft under the rope. His movements had been very deliberate, but sure, and in a few minutes he hobbled to his pony and swung into the saddle. He had seen men who had been bitten by rattlers had seen them die.
The drummers beat furiously, and the rattlers kept time to the drums, two of them advancing and receding in a stooping posture, with rattles near the ground, as if doing the chief obeisance, but still keeping time with the others. I declined to sit on the ground, and an enormous tusk was brought for me. The chief saluted courteously.
One of these contained a small coffee pot, as well as the frying pan without which camping would be a failure in the minds of most Western boys. "Look out for rattlers," advised Frank, as his chum went to the spring hole to fill the coffee pot. "They often come to such places in dry season We haven't had rain for so long now, that, when it does come, I expect a regular cloud-burst.
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