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Maori Messenger : Te Karere Maori, Volume 4, Issue 87, 22 April 1852, Page 4

Terrible Story.—Wolf-hunting with traps has its dangers and its inconveniences, and the Traquenard must be used with great caution. Every morning it should be visited 'and shut; otherwise a man, a horse, a dog, or some other animal, may fall into it and be taken. In order, therefore, as much as possible to prevent accidents, our peasants, farmers, and poachers, when using this kind of trap, always tie stone?, or little pieces of dead wood, to the bushes and branches of the trees near the spot in which it is set; they likewise place the same kind of signal at the extremity of the pathway which lends to the trap, as a warning to those who may walk that way ; and the peasants, who know what these signals dancing in the nir with every puff of wind mean, turn aside, and take care how they proceed on their road. In spite of all these precautions, however, very sad occurrences will sometimes happen in our forests. Some years ago a trap was placed in a deserted footway, and the usual precautions were taken, of hanging stone 3 and bits of wood in the approach to the path at either end. The same day, a young man of the neighbourhood, full of love and imprudence—upon the eve in fact of being entangled in the conjugal " I will," ■ —anxious to present to some turtledoves and pigeons with rosy beaks, with whose whereabouts he was acquainted, left his home a little before sunset to surprise the birds on their nest; but lie was late, the night closed in rapidly, and with the intention of shortening the road, instead of following the beaten one, he took his way across the forest. Without in the least heeding tin- brambles and bushes which caught his legs, or the ditches and streams he was obliged to cross, ho pressed on ; and after a continued and sanguinary battle with the thorns, the stumps, the roots, and the long wild roses, came exactly on the path where the trap was set. The night was now nearly dark, and, in his agitation and hurry, thinking only of bis doves and the loved ono, he failed to observe that several pieces of string were swinging to and fro in the brefzo from the branches of the thicket r.ear him. Dreadful, indeed, was it for him that he did not; for suddenly he felt a terrible shock, accompanied by most intense pain, the bones of flis leg being apparently crushed to pieces—he was caught in a wolf-trap! The first few moments of pain and suffering over, comprehending at once the danger of his position, he with great presence of mind collected all the strength he had, and by n determined effort endeavoured to open the serrated iron jaws which held him fast 5 but though despair is said to double the strength of a roan, the trap refused to give up its prey; aud as at the

least movement the iron teeth buried themselves deeper nnd deeper with agonising pain into his leg, and grated nearly on the bone, his suffrrintis liecame so intense that in n »ery fe»v minutes he ceased from making any further attempts to release himself. Feeling this In be the case, he benno to shout for help, but noiono replied; and as the night drew in he urns silent, fearing that his cries would attract the notice of s»me of the wolves that might be prowling in the neighbourhood, and resolved to wait patiently with fortitude what fate willed —what he could not avert. lie had under his coat n little hatchet, a weapon which the Movini.tns constantly carry about, with them, and thus in the event of his being attacked by the dreadful animals, he trusted to it to defend himself; but he was still not without hope that the wolves would not make their appearance. The night lengthened; the moon rose, and Bhcd In r pale light over the forest. Immovable, with his eyes and ears on the qui f/rc, his body in the mo-t dreadful agony, he listened and waited ; when, all at once, far—very far oil) a confused murmur of indistinct sounds was heard. Approaching with rapidity, these murmurs became cries and yells ; they were those of wolves—and not only wolves, hut wolves on the track, which must ere a few minutes could elapse he upon him. A pang of horror, and a cold prespiration poured from-Ids face ; but, fear was not part ot his nature, and by nlmoU super-human efforts, nnd in such an awful moment, forgetting all pain he dragged hiinsell and the trap towards an oak tree, against which he placed his back. Here, leaning with his left .hand upon a stout stall* he had with him when he fell, and having in his rinlit hand his h.-.tchct ready to strike, the young man, full ot couraue, after having offered up 'i short prayer to l>is God, nnd embraced, as it were, in his mind his poor old mother nnd his bride, nw.iited the horrible result, determined to show himself a true child of the forest, and meet his fate like a man. A lew minutes more, mid lie was ns if surtounded by a cordon of yellow ilauirs, which like so many Will-o'-the-wisps, danced nbout in all dirrctions. These weie the eye* of the monsters; the animals them-selv-s. which he could not see. set forth their horrible yells full in his face, and the smell of their honible cnrcisc was borne to him on the wind. Alas! the dvnaitemciit of the tragedy approached. The wolves had hit upon the scented line of earth, nnd fo'lowii.g it, hungry and enraged, were bounding here and then), and exciting each other. They had arrived at the bailed spot. * * What passed after this no one can tell—no eye saw hut His above but on the following- morning nhen the Pere Soguine, for he was the unfortunate person who set the Ttaqucnmd, came to examine it, he found the trap at the foot of the oak deluged with blood, the bone of a human leg upright between the iron teeth, nnd all around, scattered nbout the turf nnd the path, a (inutility of human lemains ; bits of hair, bones, — red and niuisl, as if the ilesh had been recently torn Iroin them, shreds of a coat, and other adicles of clothing were also discovered near the spot; with the assistance of some dogs that were put on the scent, thiee wolves, their heads and bodies cut open with a hatche*, were found dyinfc in the adjacent thickets. The bones of their \ictim were carried to the nearest church ; und on the following day, these mournful fragments, which had only a few hours helore been lull of life, and youth, nod hcnlth, were committed to the earth.— l,c Moivan ; its Wild Sports and Forests.