Mike went off and sharpened up his shooting eye by practicing on wolves skulking around the woods near his family‘s log cabin. The wolves were low-slung, shifty fellows, hunting for a farmer‘s fat duck or even a skinny chicken. The government paid money for wolf skins, because wolves were a nuisance to the settlers. Mike banged and boomed at the wolves until he had about fifty skins. He took the skins to town and got enough money to enter the shooting match.

On Sunday, Mike dressed up in his best buckskin, stuck a wild-turkey feather in his cap, and marched off to Farmer Neal‘s place. The silver trimmings on his rifle stock were polished like glass.

At the shooting contest, the field was crowded with people. The men trying for the prize were soldiers and hunters, Indian scouts, and boatmen, all of them the best shots in the country. They grinned and winked at seeing young Mike there, and one said:

"You‘d better let me lift you up so you can see the target, Sonny."

"I can jump higher than a Plymouth Rock rooster and yell louder," Mike said. He gave a loud crow, jumped, waved his heels, and fired at a passing bee. The bee flipped over, closed its eyes, and landed at Mike‘s feet. But in a second, the bee sat up and buzzed.

"You didn‘t kill that bee, young fellow," a man said. "Didn‘t plan to," Mike said and held up the bee. "I just snipped off his stinger so he won‘t bother me when I’m aiming at the target."

Everyone was silent after that, though each really believed Mike had been merely lucky. When his turn came, Mike stepped up to the firing line and got set to take his first shot. The target was a round, white piece of paper tacked to a board on a distant oak tree. At the very centre of the paper was a small circle called the bull‘s-eye.