When a boy, in the early days in the lead mines of Wisconsin, I often met
pioneers and heard them tell strange stories about hoop-snakes. In one
particular they all agreed--the snakes, in pairs, about the 15th of May
would come rolling up from Illinois. Then they would disappear, and not be
seen again until August. During that month strange sights might be seen on
lonely stretches of prairie--hundreds of them playfully chasing one
another.
They were a green snake--the males about six and the females five feet
long. About four inches from the ends of their tails grew a hard, curved
horn, from two to four inches in length.
They were considered the most dangerous snakes in the Northwest.
Wo betide the living thing that crossed their path as they rolled
noiselessly over the prairie. I heard an old hunter say he once stood by a
lone tree on the prairie and saw a hoop-snake come rolling toward the
tree. As it drew near he held his gun right across its path.
When near enough, the snake let go of its tail and struck the metal barrel
of the gun, knocking it out of his hand and making it ring like a bell.
The snake then stuck its tail into its mouth and went rolling away.
The hunter soon noticed that the gun-barrel began to swell. He watched the
gun until it swelled so big it scared him, and in terror he fled over the
prairie and never went near the spot again. Years afterward miners
prospecting for mineral found an old cannon shaped like a musket-barrel.
It was the old gun, grown to be a foot in diameter.--_Correspondence in
Chicago Inter-Ocean._