“‘"Now run! run for your lives!  We must cross the prairy an’ get into the woods afore the rascals cut their way out.  Run! quick!”

“‘My mother took my sisters by the hand an’ led them out, an’ me an’ my brother followed her.  Father closed both the windows an’ the door, an’ fastened them on the outside.  All this while the robbers had been yellin’ an’ swearin’, an’ cuttin’ away at the cellar-door with their tomahawks; an’ we well knowed that they would soon be out an’ arter us.  Our cabin stood in a large, natural prairy, an’ we had to travel full half a mile acrost the open ground afore we come to the woods.  My father followed close behind us, with his rifle, ready to shoot the first one that come in sight, an’ kept urgin’ us to go faster.  We hadn’t gone more’n half the distance acrost the prairy, when a loud crash and yells of triumph told us, plain enough, that the villains had worked their way out of the cellar.  Then heavy blows sounded on the window-shutter, which, strong as it was, we knowed could not long hold out ag’in ’em.  In a few minutes it was forced from its hinges, an’ Mountain Tom sprang out.

“’"Here they are, boys,” he shouted.  “Come on!  We’ll l’arn ’em not to hide—­”

“‘The report of father’s rifle cut short his words, an’ Mountain Tom, throwin’ his hands high above his head, sank to the ground like a log.  By this time the rest of the band had come out, an the bullets rattled around us like hailstones.  My father and brother both fell-the latter never to rise; but father, although he had received three bullets, staggered to his feet, an’ follered along arter us, loadin’ his rifle.  Then began the race for life.  It seemed to me that we flew over the ground, but the villains gained on us at every step.  Just as we reached the woods, my father called out,

“’"Down—­down, every one of you!  They’re going to shoot again!”

“‘Obeyin’ that order was what saved my life.  I throwed myself flat into the bushes, an’ escaped unhurt; but both my sisters were shot dead, an’ my father received another ball that brought him to the ground.  My mother, instead of thinkin’ of herself, kneeled beside him, an’ supported his head in her arms.  The next minute the outlaws entered the woods, an’ one passed so close to me that I could have touched him.

“’"Wal, Bill Lawson,” said a voice that I knowed belonged to Mountain Tom, “you see I’m here again.  I s’pose you kind o’ thought you had rubbed me out, didn’t you?”

“‘"Yes, I did,” said father—­an’ his voice was so weak that I could hardly hear him.

“’"You won’t have a chance to draw a bead on me again, I guess.  We shoot consider’ble sharp—­don’t we?”

“’"I shan’t live long,” said father.  “But, whatever you do to me, be merciful to my wife an’—­”

“‘The dull thud of the tomahawk cut short my father’s dying prayer, an’ his brains were spattered on the bush where I was concealed; an’, a’most at the same moment, another of the band buried his knife in my mother’s heart.’