The Lebanon Express

THE SNAKE HUNTER.

HE IS AN INTERESTING INDIVIDUAL INDEED.

HIS JOB HAS BECOME AN IMPORTANT INDUSTRY

He Knows Snakes Well That If It Were Not for Him the Snake Papers Wouldn't Come Out—Thrilling Experience of One.

POISONOUS REPTILES and gruesome stories concerning them have a peculiar charm for certain classes of people. Big Indian is the name of a settlement in New York State which might appropriately be named Snakeville. All the good snake stories come from there. If it was not for Big Indian the New York Sunday papers wouldn't come out. At least that is what the snake hunters seem to imagine.

Very few people have been introduced to the snake-hunter. He is a very important individual indeed. He goes out into the swamps, gets treed by a nest of reptiles, has a thrilling escape, and hies himself away to the village, where in the seclusion of a bar room he writes up a story which will average with the one which follows:

"We came into the mountains about three weeks ago, intending to stay for a month. When we left the train at the station here we inquired for a good camping-ground, and were told to follow the stream through the Lost Clove and go over on the west slope of Balsam mountain, where, near the summit, we would find a clearing and a living spring of good water. We followed the directions and found the spring, but we also found that it was a regular rendezvous for mountain tramps, and as we wanted solitude we shifted our quarters over on Eagle mountain, which we could see across the valley. We found a good spring there and pitched our tent. Then we began to see snakes.

One morning while I was dipping water from the spring a huge black-snake sprang clear over my head out of the rocky basin and went like a streak into the woods. I yelled with fright, but finally filled my bucket and returned to camp. There I related my experience, but Wallis said he wasn't afraid of all the snakes in the Catskills. The next morning when we were boiling coffee a blacksnake over five feet in length crawled out of the bush and in the most impudent manner raised his head clear of the ground and eyed us until we were nearly paralyzed with fear. He showed no inclination to depart, so Wallis seized a stout switch and gave him a cut with it which broke his neck and killed him.

That afternoon we went out into a little clearing to pick huckleberries. While we were picking one of the boys gave a yell of fright and keeled over. We all ran up to him, and when he regained his speech the first words he said were: "Snakes! The patch is full of them!" He then said that while moving about among the bushes he had stepped on something which whisked out from beneath his foot with such rapidity as to throw him to the ground. We concluded then to give up berry picking and return to the tent, and just as we were coming in we killed another blacksnake, as we were now all armed with stout hickory switches. That same afternoon I shot a black snake from a tree where it was trying to reach a nest of young birds. It proved to be a female snake and contained a number of young ones, which crawled from the mother's mouth when she fell to the ground riddled with shot. These I killed with a switch. That same afternoon one of the other boys, who had been down into the hollow, came trooping into camp with a big rattler which he had killed while it was sunning itself on a rock. That set us to thinking that we had better make tracks, which we concluded to do early the next morning. That night, however, we were destined to a visitation from snakes that we will always remember.

Before we retired we built a big fire outside the tent to keep off the punks and gnats and went to sleep. About midnight we were awakened by an awful yell from Wallis, and at the same instant I felt something clammy glide rapidly across my face. By the glare of the firelight, which shone into the tent, we saw Wallis standing erect holding a snake in his grasp at arm's length, its head waving in front of his face with its horrible forked tongue playing like lightning, and its tail coiled about his arm.

We yelled to him to drop it, but some fascination had seized him and he couldn't let go of it. Suddenly the snake, which was a big racer, nipped him in the hand, when he dropped it and fainted in his tracks, while the serpent escaped. We brought him to, and knowing that the snake was not venomous poulticed the bite with winter-green. We then began to pack up, and in pulling up our blankets found a venomous copperhead snake underneath one of them. We killed him, finished packing our traps and started for Big Indian. We have had enough of camp life in the Catskills for one season."

The young men exhibited the rattles of the rattlesnake which they had killed. There were eight of them and several were missing, which proved that the rattlesnake must have been an old one. After they had told their story the boys boarded an Ulster and Delaware train and went over Pine Hill to Margaretville, where they intended to stay for a few days before returning home.

After the finishing touches are put on he sends the manuscript to New York, and the paper that receives it comes out as usual the following Sunday. The next week he gets a draft by mail, after cashing which he proceeds to the mountains and has another experience. Such is the result of the control exercised over the human race by the reptile family.