As we sat there, cutting up our clothing for bandages, digging the
poisoned arrow-heads out of our limbs, readjusting our scalps, or
swapping them for such vagrant ones as there was nobody to identify,
we could not help smiling to think how we had frightened Old Nick. Dan
Golby, who was sinking rapidly, whispered that "it was the one sweet
memory he had to sustain and cheer him in crossing the dark river into
everlasting f----." It is uncertain how Dan would have finished that
last word; he may have meant "felicity"--he may have meant "fire." It
is nobody's business.
* * * * *
JUNIPER.
He was a dwarf, was Juniper. About the time of his birth Nature was
executing a large order for prime giants, and had need of all her
materials. Juniper infested the wooded interior of Norway, and dwelt
in a cave--a miserable hole in which a blind bat in a condition of
sempiternal torpor would have declined to hibernate, rent-free.
Juniper was such a feeble little wretch, so inoffensive in his way of
life, so modest in his demeanour, that every one was disposed to love
him like a cousin; there was not enough of him to love like a brother.
He, too, was inclined to return the affection; he was too weak to love
very hard, but he made the best stagger at it he could.
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