His
Person Was Long, Straight, And Sinewy, And There Was A Light
Springiness And Elasticity In His Step Which Would Have Suited A
Younger Man, As He Skipped Along With A Long Handspike Over His
Shoulder.
He was singing a stave from the "Enniskillen Dragoon"
when I came up with him.
"With his silver-mounted pistols, and his long carbine,
Long life to the brave Inniskillen dragoon."
His face would have been one of the most lugubrious imaginable, with
his long, tangled hair hanging confusedly over it, in a manner which
has been happily compared to a "bewitched haystack," had it not been
for a certain humorous twitch or convulsive movement, which affected
one side of his countenance, whenever any droll idea passed
through his mind. It was with a twitch of this kind, and a certain
indescribable twinkle of his somewhat melancholy eye, as he seemed
intuitively to form a hasty conception of the oddity of his
appearance to a stranger unused to the bush, that he welcomed me
to his clearing. He instantly threw down his handspike, and leaving
his "niggers" to finish their work at their leisure, insisted on our
going to his house to get something to drink.
On the way, I explained to him the object of my visit, which was
to mark out, or "blaze," the sidelines of a lot of land I had
received as part of a military grant, immediately adjoining the
beaver-meadow, and I asked him to accompany me, as he was well
acquainted with the different lots.
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of 181664
