How long he slept he did not know, but waking suddenly he saw a flock of wild turkeys within a few yards of him.
Raising his gun and taking a very deliberate aim he pulled the trigger.
No explosion followed, but the clicking of the hammer was enough to put the game to flight.
Poor Tom was disheartened, but it would not do to give up, and so he carefully picked the edge of his flint with his knife and walked further into the woods.
He had not walked very far, with cautious steps, when he heard a rustling in the bushes just ahead of him.

At first he thought it must be an Indian, and drawing back he waited for further developments.

A grunt soon enlightened him as to the character of the game, and creeping through the bushes he found himself close to a fat young hog, one of the many running wild in those woods and thickets.

That was something worth having.

Levelling his gun again, he again pulled the trigger, but without effect, and opening the pan he discovered that during the rain, while in the drift cavern, the "priming," as the powder in the pan is called, had been reduced to a paste by water.