us all about it; the legend first, and your own experience afterward.
Pass him over the bottle, Jack."

"Well, as to the legend," began Dick. "It seems that the niggers have
had it handed down to them that Sasassa Valley is haunted by a frightful
fiend. Hunters and wanderers passing down the defile have seen its
glowing eyes under the shadows of the cliff; and the story goes
that whoever has chanced to encounter that baleful glare has had his
after-life blighted by the malignant power of this creature. Whether
that be true or not," continued Dick, ruefully, "I may have an
opportunity of judging for myself."

"Go on, Dick--go on," cried Tom. "Let's hear about what you saw."

"Well, I was groping down the valley, looking for that cow of Madison's,
and I had, I suppose, got half-way down, where a black craggy cliff juts
into the ravine on the right, when I halted to have a pull at my
flask. I had my eye fixed at the time upon the projecting cliff I have
mentioned, and noticed nothing unusual about it. I then put up my flask
and took a step or two forward, when in a moment there burst, apparently
from the base of the rock, about eight feet from the ground and
a hundred yards from me, a strange, lurid glare, flickering and
oscillating, gradually dying away and then reappearing again. No, no;
I've seen many a glow-worm and firefly--nothing of that sort. There it
was, burning away, and I suppose I gazed at it, trembling in every limb,
for fully ten minutes. Then I took a step forward, when instantly it
vanished, vanished like a candle blown out. I stepped back again; but it
was some time before I could find the exact spot and position from
which it was visible. At last, there it was, the weird reddish light,
flickering away as before. Then I screwed up my courage, and made for