And the old soldiers that used to come round to haymaking, glad of a job to supplement their pensions, were very positive that if you bit the bullet and indented it with your teeth, it was perfectly fatal, no matter to what part of the body its billet took it.
In the midst of this talk as we moved on, I carrying the gun at the trail with the muzzle downwards, the old ramrod, long disused and shrunken, slipped half out; the end caught the ground, and it snapped short off in a second.

A terrible disaster this, turning everything to bitterness: Orion was especially wroth, for it was his right next to shoot.

However, we went down to the smithy at the inn, to take counsel of the blacksmith, a man of knowledge and a trusty friend.

'Aha!' said he, 'it's not the first time I've made a ramrod.

There's a piece of lancewood in the store overhead which I keep on purpose; it's as tough as a bow--they make carriage-shafts of it; you shall have a better rod than was ever fitted to a Joe Manton.' So we took him down some pippins, and he set to work on it that evening..