David Crockett

CHAPTER VIII.

Life on the Obion.

Hunt­ing Ad­ven­tures.–The Voy­age up the Riv­er.–Scenes in the Cab­in.–Re­turn Home.–Re­moval of the Fam­ily.–Crock­ett’s Rich­es.–A Per­ilous En­ter­prise.–Rea­sons for his Celebri­ty.–Crock­ett’s Nar­ra­tive.–A Bear-​Hunt.–Vis­it to Jack­son.–Again a Can­di­date for the Leg­is­la­ture.–Elec­tion­eer­ing and Elec­tion.

The next day af­ter build­ing the cab­in, to which Crock­ett in­tend­ed to move his fam­ily, it be­gan to rain, as he says, “rip-​roar­ious­ly.” The riv­er rapid­ly rose, and the boat­men were ready to re­sume their voy­age. Crock­ett stepped out in­to the for­est and shot a deer, which he left as food for Abram Hen­ry and his lit­tle boy, who were to re­main in the cab­in un­til his re­turn. He ex­pect­ed to be ab­sent six or sev­en days. The stream was very slug­gish. By pol­ing, as it was called, that is, by push­ing the boat with long poles, they reached the en­cum­brance caused by the hur­ri­cane, where they stopped for the night.

In the morn­ing, as soon as the day dawned, Crock­ett, think­ing it im­pos­si­ble for them to get through the fall­en tim­ber that day, took his ri­fle and went in­to the for­est in search of game. He had gone but a short dis­tance when he came across a fine buck. The an­imal fell be­fore his unerring aim, and, tak­ing the prize up­on his shoul­ders, he com­menced a re­turn to the boat.

He had not pro­ceed­ed far be­fore he came up­on the fresh tracks of a herd of elks. The temp­ta­tion to fol­low their trail was to a vet­er­an hunter ir­re­sistible. He threw down his buck, and had not gone far be­fore he came up­on two more bucks, very large and splen­did an­imals. The beau­ti­ful crea­tures, though man­ifest­ing some timid­ity, did not seem dis­posed to run, but, with their soft, wom­an­ly eyes, gazed with won­der up­on the ap­proach­ing stranger. The bul­let from Crock­ett’s ri­fle struck be­tween the eyes of one, and he fell dead. The oth­er, his com­pan­ion, ex­hib­it­ed al­most hu­man sym­pa­thy. In­stead of tak­ing to flight, he clung to his life­less as­so­ciate, look­ing down up­on him as if some in­com­pre­hen­si­ble calami­ty had oc­curred. Crock­ett rapid­ly reload­ed his ri­fle, and the oth­er buck fell dead.

He hung them both up­on the limb of a tree, so that they should not be de­voured by the wolves, and fol­lowed on in the trail of the elks. He did not over­take them un­til near­ly noon. They were then be­yond ri­fle-​shot, and kept so, lur­ing him on quite a dis­tance. At length he saw two oth­er fine bucks, both of which he shot. The in­tel­lec­tu­al cul­ture of the man may be in­ferred from the fol­low­ing char­ac­ter­is­tic de­scrip­tion which he gives of these events:

“I saw two more bucks, very large fel­lows too. I took a bliz­zard at one of them, and up he tum­bled. The oth­er ran off a few jumps and stopped, and stood there un­til I load­ed again and fired at him. I knocked his trot­ters from un­der him, and then I hung them both up. I pushed on again, and about sun­set I saw three oth­er bucks. I down’d with one of them, and the oth­er two ran off. I hung this one up al­so, hav­ing killed six that day.

“I then pushed on till I got to the hur­ri­cane, and at the low­er edge of it, about where I ex­pect­ed the boat was. Here I hollered as hard as I could roar, but could get no an­swer. I fired off my gun, and the men on the boat fired one too. But, quite con­trary to my ex­pec­ta­tions, they had got through the tim­ber, and were about two miles above me. It was now dark, and I had to crawl through the fall­en tim­ber the best way I could; and if the read­er don’t know it was bad enough, I am sure I do. For the vines and briers had grown all through it, and so thick that a good fat coon couldn’t much more than get along. I got through at last, and went on to near where I had killed my last deer, and once more fired off my gun, which was again an­swered from the boat, which was a lit­tle above me. I moved on as fast as I could, but soon came to wa­ter; and not know­ing how deep it was, I halt­ed, and hollered till they came to me with a skiff. I now got to the boat with­out fur­ther dif­fi­cul­ty. But the briers had worked on me at such a rate that I felt like I want­ed sewing up all over. I took a pret­ty stiff horn, which soon made me feel much bet­ter. But I was so tired that I could scarce­ly work my jaws to eat.”

The next morn­ing, Crock­ett took a young man with him and went out in­to the woods to bring in the game he had shot. They brought in two of the bucks, which af­ford­ed them all the sup­ply of veni­son they need­ed, and left the oth­ers hang­ing up­on the trees. The boat­men then pushed their way up the riv­er. The progress was slow, and eleven toil­some days passed be­fore they reached their des­ti­na­tion. Crock­ett had now dis­charged his debt, and pre­pared to re­turn to his cab­in. There was a light skiff at­tached to the large flat-​bot­tomed boat in which they had as­cend­ed the riv­er. This skiff Crock­ett took, and, ac­com­pa­nied by a young man by the name of Flav­ius Har­ris, who had de­cid­ed to go back with him, speed­ily pad­dled their way down the stream to his cab­in.

There were now four oc­cu­pants of this lone­ly, drea­ry hut, which was sur­round­ed by forests and fall­en trees and briers and bram­bles. They all went to work vig­or­ous­ly in clear­ing some land for a corn field, that they might lay in a store for the com­ing win­ter. The spring was far ad­vanced, and the sea­son for plant­ing near­ly gone. They had brought some seed with them on their pack-​horse, and they soon had the plea­sure of see­ing the ten­der sprouts push­ing up vig­or­ous­ly through the lux­uri­ant vir­gin soil. It was not nec­es­sary to fence their field. Crock­ett writes:

“There was no stock nor any­thing else to dis­turb our corn ex­cept the wild varmints; and the old ser­pent him­self, with a fence to help him, couldn’t keep them out.”

Here Crock­ett and his three com­pan­ions re­mained through the sum­mer and in­to the au­tumn, un­til they could gath­er in their har­vest of corn. Dur­ing that time they lived, as they deemed, sump­tu­ous­ly, up­on game. To kill a griz­zly bear was ev­er con­sid­ered an achieve­ment of which any hunter might boast. Dur­ing the sum­mer, Crock­ett killed ten of these fe­ro­cious mon­sters. Their flesh was re­gard­ed as a great del­ica­cy. And their shag­gy skins were in­valu­able in the cab­in for beds and bed­ding. He al­so shot deer in great abun­dance. The small­er game he took, of fat turkeys, par­tridges, pi­geons, etc., he did not deem worth enu­mer­at­ing.

It was a very lazy, loung­ing, in­do­lent life. Crock­ett could any morn­ing go in­to the woods and shoot a deer. He would bring all the de­sir­able parts of it home up­on his shoul­ders, or he would take his pack-​horse out with him for that pur­pose. At their glow­ing fire, out­side of the cab­in if the weath­er were pleas­ant, in­side if it rained, they would cook the ten­der steaks. They had meal for corn bread; and it will al­so be re­mem­bered that they had sug­ar, and ten gal­lons of whiskey.

The deer­skins were eas­ily tanned in­to soft and pli­ant leather. They all knew how to cut these skins, and with tough sinews to sew them in­to hunt­ing-​shirts, moc­casins, and oth­er need­ed gar­ments. Sit­ting In­di­an-​fash­ion on mat­tress­es or cush­ions of bearskin, with just enough to do gen­tly to in­ter­est the mind, with no anx­iety or thought even about the fu­ture, they would loi­ter list­less­ly through the long hours of the sum­mer days.

Oc­ca­sion­al­ly two or three In­di­ans, on a hunt­ing ex­cur­sion, would vis­it the cab­in. These In­di­ans were in­vari­ably friend­ly. Crock­ett had no more ap­pre­hen­sion that they would trou­ble him than he had that the elk or the deer would make a mid­night at­tack up­on his cab­in. Not un­fre­quent­ly they would have a vis­it from Mr. Owen’s house­hold; or they would all go up to his hut for a carouse. Two or three times, dur­ing the sum­mer, small par­ties ex­plor­ing the coun­try came along, and would rest a day or two un­der Crock­ett’s hos­pitable roof. Thus with these men, with their pe­cu­liar habits and tastes, the sum­mer prob­ably passed away as pleas­ant­ly as with most peo­ple in this world of care and trou­ble.

Ear­ly in the au­tumn, Crock­ett re­turned to Cen­tral Ten­nessee to fetch his fam­ily to the new home. Up­on reach­ing his cab­in in Giles Coun­ty, he was met by a sum­mons to at­tend a spe­cial ses­sion of the Leg­is­la­ture. He at­tend­ed, and served out his time, though he took but lit­tle in­ter­est in leg­isla­tive af­fairs. His thoughts were else­where, and he was im­pa­tient for re­moval, be­fore cold weath­er should set in, to his far-​dis­tant home.

Late in Oc­to­ber he set out with his lit­tle fam­ily on foot, for their long jour­ney of one hun­dred and fifty miles through al­most a path­less for­est. His pover­ty was ex­treme. But the pe­cu­liar char­ac­ter of the man was such that he did net seem to re­gard that at all. Two pack-​hors­es con­veyed all their house­hold goods. Crock­ett led the par­ty, with a child on one arm and his ri­fle on the oth­er. He walked gay­ly along, singing as mer­ri­ly as the birds. Half a dozen dogs fol­lowed him. Then came the hors­es in sin­gle file. His wife and old­er chil­dren, fol­low­ing one af­ter the oth­er in sin­gle file along the nar­row trail, closed up the rear. It was a very sin­gu­lar pro­ces­sion, thus wind­ing its way, through for­est and moor, over hills and prairies, to the silent shores of the Mis­sis­sip­pi. The event­ful jour­ney was safe­ly ac­com­plished, and he found all things as he had left them. A rich har­vest of gold­en ears was wav­ing in his corn-​field; and his com­fort­able cab­in, in all re­spects as com­fort­able as the one he had left, was ready to re­ceive its in­mates.

He soon gath­ered in his har­vest, and was thus am­ply sup­plied with bread for the win­ter. Fu­el, di­rect­ly at his hand, was abun­dant, and thus, as we may say, his coal-​bin was full. Game of ev­ery kind, ex­cept­ing buf­faloes, was rang­ing the woods, which re­quired no shel­ter or food at his ex­pense, and from which he could, at plea­sure, se­lect any va­ri­ety of the most de­li­cious an­imal food he might de­sire. Thus his larder was full to re­ple­tion. The skins of an­imals fur­nished them with warm and com­fort­able cloth­ing, eas­ily dec­orat­ed with fringes and some bright col­or­ing, whose beau­ty was taste­ful to ev­ery eye. Thus the fam­ily wardrobe was am­ply stored. Many might have deemed Crock­ett a poor man. He re­gard­ed him­self as one of the lords of cre­ation.

Christ­mas was draw­ing nigh. It may be doubt­ed whether Crock­ett had the slight­est ap­pre­ci­ation of the sa­cred char­ac­ter of that day which com­mem­orates the ad­vent of the Son of God to suf­fer and die for the sins of the world. With Crock­ett it had ev­er been a day of jol­li­fi­ca­tion. He fired salutes with his ri­fle. He sung his mer­ri­est songs. He told his fun­ni­est sto­ries. He in­dulged him­self in the high­est ex­hil­ara­tion which whiskey could in­duce.

As this hol­iday ap­proached, Crock­ett was much trou­bled in find­ing that his pow­der was near­ly ex­pend­ed, and that he had none “to fire Christ­mas guns.” This seemed re­al­ly to an­noy him more than that he had none to hunt with.

In the mean time, a broth­er-​in-​law had moved to that re­gion, and had reared his cab­in at a dis­tance of six miles from the hut of David Crock­ett, on the west­ern bank of Ruther­ford’s Fork, one of the trib­utaries of Obion Riv­er. He had brought with him a keg of pow­der for Crock­ett, which had not yet been de­liv­ered.

The re­gion all around was low and swampy. The fall rains had so swollen the streams that vast ex­tents of ter­ri­to­ry were in­un­dat­ed. All the riv­er-​bot­toms were cov­ered with wa­ter. The mead­ows which lined the Obion, where Crock­ett would have to pass, were so flood­ed that it was all of a mile from shore to shore.

The en­er­gy which Crock­ett dis­played on the dif­fi­cult and per­ilous jour­ney, il­lus­trates those re­mark­able traits of char­ac­ter which have giv­en him such wide renown. There must be some­thing very ex­traor­di­nary about a man which can make his name known through­out a con­ti­nent. And of the forty mil­lions of peo­ple in the Unit­ed States, there is scarce­ly one, of ma­ture years, who has not heard the name of David Crock­ett.

When Crock­ett told his wife that he had de­cid­ed to go to his broth­er’s for the pow­der, she earnest­ly re­mon­strat­ed, say­ing that it was at the im­mi­nent haz­ard of his life. The ground was cov­ered with snow. He would have to walk at least a mile through icy wa­ter, up to his waist, and would prob­ably have to swim the chan­nel. He then, with drip­ping clothes, and through the cold win­try blast, would have to walk sev­er­al miles be­fore he could reach his broth­er’s home. Crock­ett per­sist­ed in his de­ter­mi­na­tion, say­ing, “I have no pow­der for Christ­mas, and we are out of meat.”

He put on some woollen wrap­pers and a pair of deer­skin moc­casins. He then tied up a small bun­dle; of clothes, with shoes and stock­ings, which he might ex­change for his drip­ping gar­ments when he should reach his broth­er’s cab­in. I quote from his own ac­count of the ad­ven­ture.

“I didn’t be­fore know how much a per­son could suf­fer and not die. The snow was about four inch­es deep when I start­ed. And when I got to the wa­ter, which was on­ly about a quar­ter of a mile off, it looked like an ocean. I put in, and wad­ed on till I came to the chan­nel, where I crossed that on a high log. I then took wa­ter again, hav­ing my gun and all my hunt­ing tools along, and wad­ed till I came to a deep slough, that was wider than the riv­er it­self. I had of­ten crossed it on a log; but be­hold, when I got there no log was to be seen.

“I know’d of an is­land in the slough, and a sapling stood on it close to the side of that log, which was now en­tire­ly un­der wa­ter. I know’d fur­ther, that the wa­ter was about eight or ten feet deep un­der the log, and I judged it to be three feet deep over it. Af­ter study­ing a lit­tle what I should do, I de­ter­mined to cut a forked sapling, which stood near me, so as to lodge it against the one that stood on the is­land. In this I suc­ceed­ed very well. I then cut me a pole, and then crawled along on my sapling till I got to the one it was lodged against, which was about six feet above the wa­ter.

“I then felt about with the pole till I found the log, which was just about as deep un­der the wa­ter as I had judged. I then crawled back and got my gun, which I had left at the stump of the sapling I had cut, and again made my way to the place of lodg­ment, and then climbed down the oth­er sapling so as to get on the log. I felt my way along with my feet in the wa­ter about waist-​deep, but it was a mighty tick­lish busi­ness. How­ev­er, I got over, and by this time I had very lit­tle feel­ing in my feet and legs, as I had been all the time in the wa­ter, ex­cept what time I was cross­ing the high log over the riv­er and climb­ing my lodged sapling.

“I went but a short dis­tance when I came to an­oth­er slough, over which there was a log, but it was float­ing on the wa­ter. I thought I could walk it, so I mount­ed on it. But when I had got about the mid­dle of the deep wa­ter, some­how or some­how else, it turned over, and in I went up to my head. I wad­ed out of this deep wa­ter, and went ahead till I came to the high­land, where I stopped to pull of my wet clothes, and put on the oth­ers which I held up with my gun above wa­ter when I fell in.”

This ex­chang­ing of his drip­ping gar­ments for dry clothes, stand­ing in the snow four inch­es deep, and ex­posed to the win­try blast, must have been a pret­ty se­vere op­er­ation. Hardy as Crock­ett was, he was so chilled and numbed by the ex­ces­sive cold that his flesh had scarce­ly any feel­ing. He tied his wet clothes to­geth­er and hung them up on the limb of a tree, to drip and dry He thought he would then set out on the full run, and en­deav­or thus to warm him­self by pro­mot­ing the more rapid cir­cu­la­tion of his blood. But to his sur­prise he could scarce­ly move. With his ut­most ex­er­tions he could not take a step more than six inch­es in length. He had still five miles to walk, through a rough, path­less for­est, en­cum­bered with snow.

By great and painful ef­fort he grad­ual­ly re­cov­ered the use of his limbs, and toil­ing along for two or three hours, late in the evening was cheered by see­ing the light of a bright fire shin­ing through the chinks be­tween the logs of his broth­er’s lone­ly cab­in. He was re­ceived with the ut­most cor­dial­ity. Even his hardy pi­oneer broth­er lis­tened with as­ton­ish­ment to the nar­ra­tive of the per­ils he had sur­mount­ed and the suf­fer­ings he had en­dured. Af­ter the re­fresh­ment of a warm sup­per, Crock­ett wrapped him­self in a bearskin, and ly­ing down up­on the floor, with his feet to the fire, slept the sweet, un­trou­bled sleep of a babe. In the morn­ing he awoke as well as ev­er, feel­ing no bad con­se­quences from the hard­ships of the pre­ced­ing day.

The next morn­ing a freez­ing gale from the north wailed through the snow-​whitened for­est, and the cold was al­most un­en­durable. The earnest per­sua­sions of his broth­er and his wife in­duced him to re­main with them for the day. But, with his ac­cus­tomed en­er­gy, in­stead of en­joy­ing the cosey com­fort of the Fire­side, he took his ri­fle, and went out in­to the woods, wad­ing the snow and breast­ing the gale. Af­ter the ab­sence of an hour or two, he re­turned tot­ter­ing be­neath the load of two deer, which he had shot, and which he brought to the cab­in on his shoul­ders. Thus he made a very lib­er­al con­tri­bu­tion to the food of the fam­ily, so that his vis­it was a source of prof­it to them, not of loss.

All the day, and dur­ing the long win­try night, the freez­ing blasts blew fierce­ly, and the weath­er grew more severe­ly cold. The next morn­ing his friends urged him to re­main an­oth­er day. They all knew that the wa­ter would be frozen over, but not suf­fi­cient­ly hard to bear his weight, and this would add great­ly to the dif­fi­cul­ty and the dan­ger of his re­turn. It seemed im­pos­si­ble that any man could en­dure, on such a day, ford­ing a swollen stream, a mile in breadth, the wa­ter most of the way up to his waist, in some places above his head, and break­ing the ice at ev­ery step. The prospect ap­palled even Crock­ett him­self. He there­fore de­cid­ed to re­main till the next morn­ing, though he knew that his fam­ily would be left in a state of great anx­iety. He hoped that an ad­di­tion­al day and night might so add to the thick­ness of the ice that it would bear his weight.

He there­fore shoul­dered his mus­ket and again went in­to the woods on a hunt. Though he saw an im­mense bear, and fol­lowed him for some dis­tance, he was un­able to shoot him. Af­ter sev­er­al hours’ ab­sence, he re­turned emp­ty-​hand­ed.

An­oth­er morn­ing dawned, lurid and chill, over the gloomy for­est. Again his friends en­treat­ed him not to run the risk of an at­tempt to re­turn in such fear­ful weath­er. “It was bit­ter cold,” he writes, “but I know’d my fam­ily was with­out meat, and I de­ter­mined to get home to them, or die a-​try­ing.”

We will let Crock­ett tell his own sto­ry of his ad­ven­tures in go­ing back:

“I took my keg of pow­der and all my hunt­ing tools and cut out. When I got to the wa­ter, it was a sheet of ice as far as I could see. I put on to it, but hadn’t got far be­fore it broke through with me; and so I took out my tom­ahawk, and broke my way along be­fore me for a con­sid­er­able dis­tance.

“At last I got to where the ice would bear me for a short dis­tance, and I mount­ed on it and went ahead. But it soon broke in again, and I had to wade on till I came to my float­ing log. I found it so tight this time, that I know’d it couldn’t give me an­oth­er fall, as it was frozen in with the ice. I crossed over it with­out much dif­fi­cul­ty, and worked along till I came to my lodged sapling and my log un­der the wa­ter.

“The swift­ness of the cur­rent pre­vent­ed the wa­ter from freez­ing over it; and so I had to wade, just as I did when I crossed it be­fore. When I got to my sapling, I left my gun, and climbed out with my pow­der-​keg first, and then went back and got my gun. By this time, I was near­ly frozen to death; but I saw all along be­fore me where the ice had been fresh broke, and I thought it must be a bear strug­gling about in the wa­ter. I there­fore fresh-​primed my gun, and, cold as I was, I was de­ter­mined to make war on him if we met. But I fol­lowed the trail till it led me home. Then I found that it had been made by my young man that lived with me, who had been sent by my dis­tressed wife to see, if he could, what had be­come of me, for they all be­lieved that I was dead. When I got home, I wasn’t quite dead, but mighty nigh it; but had my pow­der, and that was what I went for.”

The night af­ter Crock­ett’s re­turn a heavy rain fell, which, to­ward morn­ing, turned to sleet. But there was no meat in the cab­in. There were at that time three men who were in­mates of that low­ly hut–Crock­ett, a young man, Flav­ius Har­ris, who had tak­en up his abode with the pi­oneer, and a broth­er in-​law, who had re­cent­ly em­igrat­ed to that wild coun­try, and had reared his cab­in not far dis­tant from Crock­ett’s. They all turned out hunt­ing. Crock­ett, hop­ing to get a bear, went up the riv­er in­to the dense and al­most im­pen­etra­ble thick­ets, where the gi­gan­tic for­est had been swept low by the hur­ri­cane. The oth­er two fol­lowed down the stream in search of turkeys, grouse, and such small game.

Crock­ett took with him three dogs, one of which was an old hound, faith­ful, saga­cious, but whose most vig­or­ous days were gone. The dogs were es­sen­tial in hunt­ing bears. By their keen scent they would find the an­imal, which fact they would an­nounce to the hunter by their loud bark­ing. Im­me­di­ate­ly a fierce run­ning fight would en­sue. By this at­tack the bear would be great­ly re­tard­ed in his flight, so that the hunter could over­take him, and he would of­ten be driv­en in­to a tree, where the unerring ri­fle-​bul­let would soon bring him down.

The storm of sleet still raged, and noth­ing could be more gloomy than the as­pect of drea­ri­ness and des­ola­tion which the wrecked for­est pre­sent­ed with its dense growth of briers and thorns. Crock­ett toiled through the storm and the brush about six miles up the riv­er, and saw noth­ing. He then crossed over, about four miles, to an­oth­er stream. Still no game ap­peared. The storm was grow­ing more vi­olent, the sleet grow­ing worse and worse. Even the bears sought shel­ter from the piti­less win­try gale. The bush­es were all bent down with the ice which clung to their branch­es, and were so bound to­geth­er that it was al­most im­pos­si­ble for any one to force his way through them.

The ice up­on the stream would bear Crock­ett’s weight. He fol­lowed it down a mile or two, when his dogs start­ed up a large flock of turkeys. He shot two of them. They were im­mense­ly large, fat, and heavy. Ty­ing their legs to­geth­er, he slung them over his shoul­der, and with this ad­di­tion­al bur­den pressed on his toil­some way. Ere long he be­came so fa­tigued that he was com­pelled to sit down up­on a log to rest.

Just then his dogs be­gan to bark fu­ri­ous­ly. He was quite sure that they had found a bear. Ea­ger­ly he fol­lowed the di­rec­tion they in­di­cat­ed, as fast as he could force his way along. To his sur­prise he found that the three dogs had stopped near a large tree, and were bark­ing fu­ri­ous­ly at noth­ing. But as soon as they saw him ap­proach­ing they start­ed off again, mak­ing the woods re­sound with their bay­ing. Hav­ing run about a quar­ter of a mile, he could per­ceive that again they had stopped. When Crock­ett reached them there was no game in sight. The dogs, bark­ing fu­ri­ous­ly again, as soon as they saw him ap­proach­ing plunged in­to the thick­et.

For a third time, and a fourth time, this was re­peat­ed. Crock­ett could not un­der­stand what it meant. Crock­ett be­came an­gry at be­ing thus de­ceived, and re­solved that he would shoot the old hound, whom he con­sid­ered the ringlead­er in the mis­chief, as soon as he got near enough to do so.

“With this in­ten­tion,” he says, “I pushed on the hard­er, till I came to the edge of an open prairie; and look­ing on be­fore my dogs, I saw about the biggest bear that ev­er was seen in Amer­ica. He looked, at the dis­tance he was from me, like a large black bull. My dogs were afraid to at­tack him, and that was the rea­son they had stopped so of­ten that I might over­take them.”

This is cer­tain­ly a re­mark­able in­stance of an­imal sagac­ity. The three dogs, by some in­ex­pli­ca­ble con­fer­ence among them­selves, de­cid­ed that the en­emy was too formidable for them to at­tack alone. They there­fore sum­moned their mas­ter to their aid. As soon as they saw that he was near enough to lend his co­op­er­ation, then they fear­less­ly as­sailed the mon­ster.

The sight in­spired Crock­ett with new life. Through thick­ets, briers, and bram­bles they all rushed–bear, dogs, and hunter. At length, the shag­gy mon­ster, so fierce­ly as­sailed, climbed for refuge a large black-​oak tree, and sit­ting among the branch­es, looked com­pos­ed­ly down up­on the dogs bark­ing fierce­ly at its foot. Crock­ett crept up with­in about eighty yards, and tak­ing de­lib­er­ate aim at his breast, fired. The bul­let struck and pierced the mon­ster di­rect­ly up­on the spot at which it was aimed. The bear ut­tered a sharp cry, made a con­vul­sive move­ment with one paw, and re­mained as be­fore.

Speed­ily Crock­ett reload­ed his ri­fle, and sent an­oth­er bul­let to fol­low the first. The shag­gy brute shud­dered in ev­ery limb, and then tum­bled head-​long to the icy ground. Still he was not killed. The dogs plunged up­on him, and there was a tremen­dous fight. The howl­ing of the bear, and the fren­zied bark­ing of the dogs, with their sharp cries of pain as the claws of the mon­ster tore their flesh, and the death­ly strug­gle wit­nessed as they rolled over and over each oth­er in the fierce fight, pre­sent­ed a ter­rif­ic spec­ta­cle.

Crock­ett has­tened to the aid of his dogs. As soon as the bear saw him ap­proach, he for­sook the in­fe­ri­or, and turned with all fury up­on the su­pe­ri­or foe. Crock­ett was hur­ry­ing for­ward with his tom­ahawk in one hand and his big butch­er-​knife in the oth­er, when the bear, with eyes flash­ing fire, rushed up­on him. Crock­ett ran back, seized his ri­fle, and with a third bul­let pen­etrat­ed the mon­ster’s brain and he fell dead. The dogs and their mas­ter seemed to re­joice alike in their great achieve­ment.

By the route which Crock­ett had pur­sued, he was about twelve miles from home. Leav­ing the huge car­cass where the an­imal had fall­en, he en­deav­ored to make a straight line through the for­est to his cab­in. That he might find his way back again, he would, at ev­ery lit­tle dis­tance, blaze, as it was called, a sapling, that is, chip off some of the bark with his hatch­et. When he got with­in a mile of home this was no longer nec­es­sary.

The oth­er two men had al­ready re­turned to the cab­in. As the wolves might de­vour the valu­able meat be­fore morn­ing, they all three set out im­me­di­ate­ly, notwith­stand­ing their fa­tigue and the still rag­ing storm, and tak­ing with them four pack-​hors­es, has­tened back to bring in their trea­sure. Crock­ett writes:

“We got there just be­fore dark, and struck a fire, and com­menced butcher­ing my bear. It was some time in the night be­fore we fin­ished it. And I can as­sert, on my hon­or, that I be­lieve he would have weighed six hun­dred pounds. It was the sec­ond largest I ev­er saw. I killed one, a few years af­ter, that weighed six hun­dred and sev­en­teen pounds. I now felt ful­ly com­pen­sat­ed for my suf­fer­ings in go­ing back af­ter my pow­der; and well sat­is­fied that a dog might some­times be do­ing a good busi­ness, even when he seemed to be bark­ing up the wrong tree.

“We got our meat home, and I had the plea­sure to know that we now had a plen­ty, and that of the best; and I con­tin­ued through the win­ter to sup­ply my fam­ily abun­dant­ly with bear-​meat, and veni­son from the woods.”

In the ear­ly spring, Crock­ett found that he had a large num­ber of valu­able skins on hand, which he had tak­en dur­ing the win­ter. About forty miles south­east from Crock­ett’s cab­in, in the heart of Madi­son Coun­ty, was the thriv­ing lit­tle set­tle­ment of Jack­son. Crock­ett packed his skins on a horse, shoul­dered his ri­fle, and tak­ing his hardy lit­tle son for a com­pan­ion, set off there to barter his pel­tries for such ar­ti­cles of house­hold use as he could con­vey back up­on his horse. The jour­ney was ac­com­plished with no more than the or­di­nary dif­fi­cul­ties. A suc­cess­ful trade was ef­fect­ed, and with a rich store of cof­fee, sug­ar, pow­der, lead, and salt, the fa­ther and son pre­pared for their re­turn.

Crock­ett found there some of his old fel­low-​sol­diers of the Creek War. When all things were ready for a start, he went to bid adieu to his friends and to take a part­ing dram with them. There were three men present who were can­di­dates for the State Leg­is­la­ture. While they were hav­ing a very mer­ry time, one, as though ut­ter­ing a thought which had that mo­ment oc­curred to him, ex­claimed, “Why, Crock­ett, you ought to of­fer your­self for the Leg­is­la­ture for your dis­trict.” Crock­ett replied, “I live at least forty miles from any white set­tle­ment.” Here the mat­ter dropped.

About ten days af­ter Crock­ett’s re­turn home, a stranger, pass­ing along, stopped at Crock­ett’s cab­in and told him that he was a can­di­date for Leg­is­la­ture, and took from his pock­et a pa­per, and read to him the an­nounce­ment of the fact. There was some­thing in the style of the ar­ti­cle which sat­is­fied Crock­ett that there was a lit­tle dis­po­si­tion to make fun of him; and that his nom­ina­tion was in­tend­ed as a bur­lesque. This roused him, and he re­solved to put in his claim with all his zeal. He con­se­quent­ly hired a man to work up­on his farm, and set out on an elec­tion­eer­ing tour.

Though very few peo­ple had seen Crock­ett, he had ob­tained very con­sid­er­able renown in that com­mu­ni­ty of back­woods­men as a great bear-​hunter. Dr. But­ler, a man of con­sid­er­able pre­ten­sions, and, by mar­riage, a nephew of Gen­er­al Jack­son, was the ri­val can­di­date, and a formidable one. In­deed, he and his friends quite amused them­selves with the idea that “the gen­tle­man from the cane,” as they con­temp­tu­ous­ly des­ig­nat­ed Crock­ett, could be so in­fat­uat­ed as to think that there was the least chance for him. The pop­ula­tion of that wilder­ness re­gion was so scarce that the dis­trict for which a rep­re­sen­ta­tive was to be cho­sen con­sist­ed of eleven coun­ties.

A great po­lit­ical gath­er­ing was called, which was to be held in Madi­son Coun­ty, which was the strongest of them all. Here speech­es were to be made by the ri­val can­di­dates and their friends, and elec­tion­eer­ing was to be prac­tised by all the arts cus­tom­ary in that rude com­mu­ni­ty. The nar­ra­tive of the events which en­sued in­tro­duces us to a very sin­gu­lar state of so­ci­ety. At the day ap­point­ed there was a large as­sem­bly, in ev­ery va­ri­ety of back­woods cos­tume, among the stumps and the low­ly cab­ins of Jack­son. Crock­ett min­gled with the crowd, watch­ing events, lis­ten­ing to ev­ery­thing which was said, and keep­ing him­self as far as pos­si­ble un­known.

Dr. But­ler, see­ing a group of men, en­tered among them, and called for whiskey to treat them all. The Doc­tor had once met Crock­ett when a few weeks be­fore he had been in Jack­son sell­ing his furs. He how­ev­er did not rec­og­nize his ri­val among the crowd. As the whiskey was pass­ing freely around, Crock­ett thought it a fa­vor­able mo­ment to make him­self known, and to try his skill at an elec­tion­eer­ing speech. He was a good-​look­ing man, with a face beam­ing with fun and smiles, and a clear, ring­ing voice. He jumped up­on a stump and shout­ed out, in tones which sound­ed far and wide, and which speed­ily gath­ered all around him.

“Hal­lo! Doc­tor But­ler; you don’t know me do you? But I’ll make you know me mighty well be­fore Au­gust. I see they have weighed you out against me. But I’ll beat you mighty bad­ly.”

But­ler pleas­ant­ly replied, “Ah, Colonel Crock­ett, is that you? Where did you come from?”

Crock­ett re­joined, “Oh, I have just crept out from the cane, to see what dis­cov­er­ies I could make among the white folks. You think you have great­ly the ad­van­tage of me, But­ler. ‘Tis true I live forty miles from any set­tle­ment. I am poor, and you are rich. You see it takes two coon­skins here to buy a quart. But I’ve good dogs, and my lit­tle boys at home will go to their death to sup­port my elec­tion. They are mighty in­dus­tri­ous. They hunt ev­ery night till twelve o’clock. It keeps the lit­tle fel­lows mighty busy to keep me in whiskey. When they gets tired, I takes my ri­fle and goes out and kills a wolf, for which the State pays me three dol­lars. So one way or oth­er I keeps knock­ing along.”

Crock­ett per­haps judged cor­rect­ly that the can­di­date who could fur­nish the most whiskey would get the most votes. He thus adroit­ly in­formed these thirsty men of his readi­ness and his abil­ity to fur­nish them with all the liquor they might need. Strange as his speech seems to us, it was adapt­ed to the oc­ca­sion, and was re­ceived with roars of laugh­ter and ob­streper­ous ap­plause.

“Well, Colonel,” said Dr. But­ler, en­deav­or­ing to clothe his own coun­te­nance with smiles, “I see you can beat me elec­tion­eer­ing.”

“My dear fel­low,” shout­ed out Crock­ett, “you don’t call this elec­tion­eer­ing, do you? When you see me elec­tion­eer­ing, I goes fixed for the pur­pose. I’ve got a suit of deer-​leather clothes, with two big pock­ets. So I puts a bot­tle of whiskey in one, and a twist of to­bac­co in t’oth­er, and starts out. Then, if I meets a friend, why, I pulls out my bot­tle and gives him a drink. He’ll be mighty apt, be­fore he drinks, to throw away his to­bac­co. So when he’s done, I pulls my twist out of t’oth­er pock­et and gives him a chaw. I nev­er likes to leave a man worse off than when I found him. If I had giv­en him a drink and he had lost his to­bac­co, he would not have made much. But give him to­bac­co, and a drink too, and you are mighty apt to get his vote.”

With such speech­es as these, in­ter­lard­ed with fun and anec­dote, and a lib­er­al sup­ply of whiskey, Crock­ett soon made him­self known through all the grounds, and he be­came im­mense­ly pop­ular. The back­woods­men re­gard­ed him as their man, be­long­ing to their class and rep­re­sent­ing their in­ter­ests.

Dr. But­ler was a man of some cul­ture, and a lit­tle proud and over­bear­ing in his man­ners. He had ac­quired what those poor men deemed con­sid­er­able prop­er­ty. He lived in a framed house, and in his best room he had a rug or car­pet spread over the mid­dle of the floor. This car­pet was a lux­ury which many of the pi­oneers had nev­er seen or con­ceived of. The Doc­tor, stand­ing one day at his win­dow, saw sev­er­al per­sons, whose votes he de­sired, pass­ing along, and he called them in to take a drink.

There was a ta­ble in the cen­tre of the room, with choice liquors up­on it. The car­pet be­neath the ta­ble cov­ered on­ly a small por­tion of the floor, leav­ing on each side a va­cant space around the room. The men cau­tious­ly walked around this space, with­out dar­ing to put their feet up­on the car­pet. Af­ter many so­lic­ita­tions from Dr. But­ler, and see­ing him up­on the car­pet, they ven­tured up to the ta­ble and drank. They, how­ev­er, were un­der great re­straint, and soon left, man­ifest­ly not pleased with their re­cep­tion.

Call­ing in at the next log house to which they came, they found there one of Crock­ett’s warm friends. They in­quired of him what kind of a man the great bear-​hunter was, and re­ceived in re­ply that he was a first-​rate man, one of the best hunters in the world; that he was not a bit proud; that he lived in a log cab­in, with­out any glass for his win­dows, and with the earth alone for his floor.

“Ah!” they ex­claimed with one voice, “he’s the fel­low for us. We’ll nev­er give our votes for such a proud man as But­ler. He called us in­to his house to take a drink, and spread down one of his best bed-​quilts for us to walk on. It was noth­ing but a piece of pride.”

The day of elec­tion came, and Crock­ett was vic­to­ri­ous by a ma­jor­ity of two hun­dred and forty-​sev­en votes. Thus he found him­self a sec­ond time a mem­ber of the Leg­is­la­ture of the State of Ten­nessee, and with a celebri­ty which caused all eyes to be turned to­ward “the gen­tle­man from the cane.”