“By-the-way, I heard a report yesterday, to the effect that Thompson had shot, or shot at, some thieves the other night.”

“Yes, and you will hear of more shooting; mark that!  And if the thieves do not cease their operations, you will hear of some of them being shot dead pretty soon!”

At this point in the conversation, a trampling among the horses in the pasture attracted the attention of the ’Squire.

“Thieves, now!” he exclaimed; and taking down a couple of rifles, he gave one to his neighbor and retaining the other himself, the two sallied forth to ascertain what was going on.  It was a starlight night, and they could see some distance tolerably clearly.  No sooner did they come in full view of the field in which the horses were, than they espied two thieves attempting to coax the ’Squire’s favorite horse to them.  The animal, however, had always been shy of strangers, and would never suffer itself to be caught by one even in the day-time.  It was a noble animal, and the thieves, as well as the lawful owner, had set their hearts upon it.  They would approach as near as prudence dictated, and then hold out corn and salt to entice the beast; it would come near, but the moment they made the least motion to catch it, would wheel about and let fly at them with its heels in such a manner as evinced to the thieves that it was best to keep at a respectful distance.  They were yet unwilling to go without him, and made repeated attempts to win him over to their way of thinking, but he was entirely too honest to be wheedled into such bad company.

The ’Squire watched their operations until he thought it was about time to stop the play, and then fired near, but not at the rascals, at the same time calling out to them that they had better leave in short meter if they wanted to get away alive.  Supposing that he was alone and his gun empty, they returned an insolent answer, to the effect that they would leave shortly on a couple of his horses; and turned to try their hand at taking some of the others in the pasture.  To such a bold pass had the thieves arrived!

“Aim at the rascals, and fire!” said the ’Squire to his companion; and they did so.

“By jing, Bill, we’d better be moving, I believe.  That ball took a lock of hair off by my ear!”

“The devil it did!”

Everything being still at the moment, the ’Squire heard this scrap of conversation between the thieves, and called out: 

“Yes, you had better leave, or I’ll put the next ball through one of your hearts!”

“Do it, then, and be ——!” said one of them; and leveling a horse pistol at the ’Squire he fired, the ball from which struck the fence close by.  This climax of insolence aroused the ’Squire fully.  His gun was just reloaded, and taking the best aim at one of the miscreants, both of whom were now retreating rapidly, he fired.  The fellow clapped his hand to his face, but continued to run.  They were soon out of sight.