throat. A dog like Trusty was invaluable to me, and for my own preservation I dared not assuage the creature's savageness; besides, the man was dead, and it was a matter of indifference whether the buzzards devoured his body or Trusty tore it piece-meal. In the meanwhile I fastened the dead man's short Mexican escopeta, hunting-pouch, and necklace to my saddle; then I called Trusty off, mounted Czar, and rode back to my deer, as I did not dare venture into the forest, where a large number of these Weicos were very probably lying in ambush. The two had come down from the mountains to the banks of Mustang Creek, whither the great quantity of game of all descriptions had attracted them; on hearing my shot, they crept up unnoticed, had got within distance of me, and in a few seconds would doubtless have settled me, had not my faithful watcher scented them, or remarked their movements in the grass.

On coming within sight of my deer, I saw that a dozen buzzards had collected, some on the trees, others circling slowly in the air, and watching with envious glances three wolves, which had already begun greedily to share my deer. Although I hardly ever expended a bullet on these tormentors, I was annoyed at their impudence, for though they saw me coming, they did not interrupt their banquet. I shot one of them, a very old red she-wolf, took the loins and legs of the deer, hung them to my saddle, and rode home to pass the night.

My dogs inside the fort announced to the garrison the arrival of a stranger, and they were no little surprised to see me return at so unusual an hour. The gate was opened, and after Czar had been relieved of his rather heavy burden, I led him once more into the grass to let him have a good roll; and after he had been put into the stable with a feed of Indian corn, I described the events of the day at the supper-table. My news aroused the apprehensions of my men, for they knew the vengeful spirit of these Weicos, and we therefore resolved to keep watch during the night. We were still smoking and talking at midnight, when the dogs, of which I had fourteen, began making a tremendous row. They all ran out through the small apertures left for the purpose in the stockade, and stood barking on the river bank at some foe on the other side, at the spot where my maize field in the forest joined the river. It was a pitch dark and calm night. We listened attentively, and could distinctly hear the trampling of dry brushwood in the field. It might be occasioned by buffalo, which had broken through the fence, and were regaling on my maize. But these animals rarely move at night, and there was a much greater probability of Indians being there. We gently opened the gate. I took my large duck gun, which held sixteen pistol bullets in each barrel, and crawled down on my stomach to the river bank, where I lay perfectly quiet. When I arrived there, one of my dogs was yelping, and I distinctly heard the twang of a bow-string. I noticed the quarter very carefully; the river was only forty yards across, and the direction was shown me still more plainly by the crackling of brushwood. I shot one barrel there, upon which human cries and a hurried flight were audible; then I sent the second after it, and fresh groans echoed through the quiet forest and mingled with the roar of my two shots. I remained lying in the grass, as I might be easily seen against the starry sky from the other bank, which was thirty feet lower. The leaping and running through the maize retired farther and farther toward the wood, and scarce reached my ear, when suddenly a wild war yell resounded in the forest, which was answered by countless wolf howls on the prairie behind me. This was the last outbreak of fury on the part of the Indians, of whom I never saw anything more beyond the various bloody traces which they left in the field. We found several arrows sticking in the river bank, whose form led me to conclude that the assailants were Cato Indians. The damage I received from this nocturnal visit only consisted in the trampled maize and a harmless wound which one of my dogs had received from an arrow in the leg. The morning was spent in following the trail of the savages to the prairie on the other side of the forest, where a number of horses had awaited these night-wanderers and borne them away. In the afternoon I rode again to Mustang Creek with one of my people—to the spot where the second Indian had disappeared on the previous day. The entrance into the wood and the roots of the old oak were covered with blood. I sent Trusty on ahead to see whether the road was clear, and if we could penetrate into the gloom of the forest without danger. We cautiously followed the dog, who kept the blood-marked trail and reached the river, on whose bank the Weico was sleeping the last sleep. He was cold and stiff my bullet had passed through his brown sides. The wounds were stopped with grass, and his escopeta lay ready cocked close to him. He was a very young and handsome man, and death had chosen him a glorious resting-place under the dark arbour of leaves. The rapid, crystalline, icy stream laved his small, handsomely-shaped feet, and on a pillow of large ferns reposed his head, round which his raven silky hair fell, while the mossy bed beneath him was dyed by his blood, till it resembled the purple velvet of a lying-in-state.

We stood silently before this painfully-beautiful picture, and even Trusty seemed to feel that this was no longer an object for wild passion, for he lay down quietly in the grass. Death had reconciled us: the dice had fallen in my favour, and if they had been against me, I should not have found such an exquisite grave: my bones would have been bleached for years by the sun on the open prairie, and greeted with shouts of joy by passing Indians. Feelings which are rarely carried into these solitudes, and still more rarely retained there, gained the mastery over me. I could not leave this noble creation of nature to the wolves and buzzards. We therefore fastened a heavy stone round his feet, and another round his neck, and gently let him down into the clear water, where he found his last solitary resting-place between two large rocks. Taking his few traps, more as a reminiscence than as a booty, we returned to our horses, which we had left in the first thicket. They greeted us with their friendly neighing and impatient stamping while still a long distance off, and away we galloped over the open prairie, up hill and down hill, after a flying herd of buffalo, at one moment leaping across broad watercourses, at another over aged trees uprooted by storms, until several of these primæval monsters had kissed the blood-stained ground. Our melancholy thoughts had been dispersed by the light prairie breeze, and, merry and independent, like the vultures in the blue sky overhead, we returned heavily laden to our fort, whose inhabitants, down to the dogs, gave us a most hearty welcome.