thar, hunting for meat and skins;
and that's pretty much the way he makes a living: and once I see'd the
creatur' have a fit--a right up-and-down touch of the falling-sickness,
with his mouth all of a foam. Thar's them that's good-natur'd that calls
him Wandering Nathan, because of his being h'yar and thar, and every
whar. He don't seem much afear'd of the Injuns; but, they say, the red
brutes never disturbs the Pennsylvany Quakers. Howsomever, he makes
himself useful; for sometimes he finds Injun sign whar thar's no Injuns
thought of, and so he gives information; but he always does it, as he
says, to save bloodshed, not to bring on a fight. He comes to me once,
thar's more than three years ago, and instead of saying, 'Cunnel, thar's
twenty Injuns lying on the road at the lower ford of Salt, whar you may
nab them,' says he, says he, 'Friend Thomas, thee must keep the people
from going nigh the ford, for thar's Injuns thar that will hurt them;'
and then he takes himself off; whilst I rides down thar with twenty-five
men and exterminates them, killing six, and driving the others the Lord
knows whar. He has had but a hard time of it amongst us, poor creatur';
for it used to make us wrathy to find thar war so little fight in him
that he wouldn't so much as kill a murdering Injun. I took his gun from
him once; for why, he wouldn't attend muster when I had enrolled him. But
I pitied the brute; for he war poor, and thar war but little corn in his
cabin, and nothing to shoot meat with; and so I gave it back, and told
him to take his own ways for an old fool."

While Colonel Bruce was thus delineating the character of Nathan
Slaughter, the latter found himself surrounded by the young men of the
Station, the butt of a thousand jests, and the victim of the insolence of
the captain of horse-thieves. It is not to be supposed that Roaring Ralph
was really the bully and madman that his extravagant freaks and
expressions seemed to proclaim him. These, like any other "actions that a
man might play," were assumed, partly because it suited his humour to be
fantastic, and partly because the putting of his antic disposition on,
was the only means which he, like many of his betters, possessed of
attracting attention, and avoiding the neglect and contempt to which his
low habits and appearance would have otherwise justly consigned him.
There was, therefore, little really hostile in the feelings with which he
approached the non-combatant; thou