Years went by, and once more the emigrant army pressed upon the solitude-loving pioneer, but he was now too old for further flight.  Eighty years lay upon his frosted brow, yet with little diminished activity he pursued his old mode of life, being often absent from home for weeks on hunting expeditions.  Audubon, the famous ornithologist, met him in one of these forays, and thus pictures him:  “The stature and general appearance of this wanderer of the Western forests,” he says, “approached the gigantic.  His chest was broad and prominent; his muscular powers displayed themselves in every limb; his countenance gave indication of his great courage, enterprise, and perseverance, and, whenever he spoke, the very motion of his lips brought the impression that whatever he uttered could not be otherwise than strictly true.”

Mr. Irving tells a similar story of him in his eighty-fifth year.  He was then visited by the Astor overland expedition to the Columbia.  “He had but recently returned from a hunting and trapping expedition,” says the historian, “and had brought nearly sixty beaver skins as trophies of his skill.  The old man was still erect in form, strong in limb, and unflinching in spirit; and as he stood on the river bank watching the departure of an expedition destined to traverse the wilderness to the very shores of the Pacific, very probably felt a throb of his old pioneer spirit, impelling him to shoulder his rifle and join the adventurous band.”

Seven years afterwards he joined another band, that of the heroes who have gone to their rest.  To his last year he carried the rifle and sought the depths of the wood.  At last, in 1818, with no disease but old age, he laid down his life, after a most adventurous career, in which he had won himself imperishable fame as the most daring, skilful, and successful of that pioneer band who have dared the perils of the wilderness and surpassed the savage tenants of the forest in their own chosen arts.

PAUL REVERE’S RIDE.

It was night at Boston, the birthnight of one of the leading events in the history of the world.  The weather was balmy and clear.  Most of the good citizens of the town were at their homes; many of them doubtless in their beds; for early hours were kept in those early days of our country’s history.  Yet many were abroad, and from certain streets of the town arose unwonted sounds, the steady tread of marching feet, the occasional click of steel, the rattle of accoutrements.  Those who were within view of Boston Common at a late hour of that evening of April 18, 1775, beheld an unusual sight, that of serried ranks of armed men, who had quietly marched thither from their quarters throughout the town, as the starting-point for some secret and mysterious expedition.