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March 30, 1910. THE
and then fared ourselves in true cowboy
style on hard-tack and jerked beef. After
this, we unloosed each his blanket from
the saddle, rolled up in it, and, stretching
out on the sand, courted slumber.
All was quiet for a time, only I heard
the munching of the ponies and the cry
of cicadas in a nearby clump of mesquite
trees.
rru? ?- ?A * ?...
i iic Biiii a were strangely ongnt In
heaven. I peeped from under my blanket
and took a look at them shining in
the black vault of night. They seemed
so many great tearful eyes looking down
at me. I remembered that they looked
this way to me once long before when I
was a child, as I watched them from my
cradle through the window of my early
home. I could not sleep, for it was of
home, home that I was thinking.
Mayfield, I supposed, had been long
asleep, but in that I was mistaken.
Hoorlno mo "T
-*???& olii , tic eaueu uui. 1 ocxj* ,
Penn, are you asleep?"
"No," I answered; "I'm not even
sleepy."
"Neither am I; let's sit up."
I made a quick and favorable response,
suiting the action to the words. So up
we sat, making each a sort of rug of his
blanket. There was silence between us
for a considerable time. Meanwhile the
weight of the darkness multiplied itself
a million times over. Unable to keep
down his strongest thought, Mayfield at
last broke the silence: "How far do you
reckon it is to Tennessee, Penn?"
I studied a moment ajid then answered
with all the indifference I could simuInfo*
"nil T ounrvAOA oViAiif o fhAiiaon/1 or
two miles. Why do you ask?"
"Oh, no reason at all," returned Mayfield,
but in a tone that betrayed his inveracity.
"I was just thinking?but, by
Jupiter! I haven't enough green to get
back on if I wanted to. I am glad of it,
though. It's Sapio Ranch, Peon, or?
or?bust."
It must have been near midnight?possibly
a trifle later?and we were still sitting
bolt upright, trying to beguile the
dark and heavy hours with scraps of
conversation, between which was occasionally
sandwiched snatches of song
or a memory of "home, sweet home."
Mavfipld hart iust finished humming: the
lines of "Carry Me Back to Tennessee,"
when our ears were assailed by a series
of such soul-pricking and fear-begetting
sounds as neither of us had ever before
heard. They came apparently from a
clump of mesquite trees not forty paces
rway They ran the gamut of sniveling,
snarling, yelping insolence. They
simulated the giblngs, shriekings and
bowlings of an imp. Gehennah
aeemed to have broken loose i.n
the desert. The night echoed to
every quaver and change of the
hideous sounds. -Of whatever creatures
they were that produced them, there
seemed a multitude, though I now know
that there was but a single one. At the
first outbreak we sprang with one impulse
to our feet, seizing our carbines.
"Panthers!" cried Mayfleld, without
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE SOU'.
feeling that he needed a moment more
for certainty.
"No; they are not panthers," I objected,
but with the greatest effort to
keep my teeth from chattering.
"Well, then, they are coo?coo?what
do you call those other things?" struggled
May field.
"Cougars," I was at last able to suggest.
"Yes; that's what it is."
"No," I objected again; "cougars don't
go in packs, and, besides, they don't yelp
like dogs. It ufust be wolves?coyotes."
"Coyotes! That's what they are," asserted
Mayfield as confidently as before;
"and if there's one of them, there's a
thousand, I'll wager."
I was in no wise able to dispute the
correctness of the estimate. In fact, I
was disposed to believe it myself. "What
are we to do, Mayfield?" I asked in a
tone which clearly betrayed my sense of
helplessness.
The fact that I appealed to him, and
that he for the moment was to think for
US both seemed tr> snrincr Vi?r?i ?
r, wwii, unu nc
called out nervously: "Why, you tool,
use our Winchesters, of course. If they
attack us and we can't fight them off,
we'll kill one of the ponies, and while
they're eating that we'll escape on the
other and make our way back to old
Benito's hut. I'd give fifty acres of Uncle
Green's White Creek farm to be
there now."
No quicker said than done; and with
our carbines, each fully chambered and
held ready in hand, we lassoed one of
the pqnies in an open space in front of
us, with a chaparral thicket supporting
our backs, and awaited the attack.
It did not come; but what followed
carried us through the heroics of defeat
and victory. By turns we felt our flesh
ground and macerated between the iaws
of hungry packs, or we saw heaps of the
lank creatures strewing the sands, laid
low by our deadly repeaters; while we,
after our cartridge was gone, fled double
on our one broncho, pursued by the survivors.
These emotions were intensified when
we heard what appeared to be an anSpring
Is due to the debllitatlns
and to the Impure, im|
condition of the blood ci
flnement, too little outdc
heavy diet during the wi
It is cured by the great
Hood's Sai
Which effects It^wnrrtprhilonKio nnl ?li
but because it combines the utmost re
different ingredients. There is no ree
If urged to buy any preparation said to
is inferior, costs less to make, and yields
rH. 403
swering pack from a chaparral some fifty
yards from the point from which the
first sounds arose. They seemed to be
springing out of the earth, and we should
hardly have been surprised if the very
sands at our loot r>o,i
_ - ? uou icapeu 1IH.O packs
of fanged and bristling curs.
What first gave us a little confidence
was that our ponies were no more disturbed
by the sounds than they would
have been by the mew of a house cat.
"Horses know when dangerous animals
are about," suggested Mayfield.
"That's so," I replied. "I have heard
that the cry of a panther will stampede
a pen of cattle and drive a horse mad.
These ponies of ours were raised on
these plains, and if these creatures were
dangerous they'd know and show some
sign of fear."
We looked at the pony before us and
could see by the uncertain starlieht thn*
he was blinking his eyes lazily and turning
his tongue over in an effort to find a
stray grain of chops from his evening repast.
The argument was conclusive, and
so our nerves began to be steadied not a
little.
Another half hour passed, though it
seemed much longer, during which time
the beastly cries recurred only at intervals,
but always fainter and farther
away. At length they died out altogether.
In our judgment the pack had taken
fright, had probably smelled gunpowder
and retreated; though I now recall that
there was not a grain of saltpeter in our
equipage, our Winchester cartridges being
percussions of dynamite. After a time
our agitation passed off entirely, we felt
braver, and finally fell to jesting over
our situation. When we again rolled into
our blankets and stretched ourselves
on the sand, it was to sleep and dream
ua suiuy as u we had been in bed in
the old White Creek farmhouse.
(To Be Continued.)
There are many with whom I can talk
about religion; but alas! I find few with
whom I can talk religion itself; but,
blessed be the Lord, there are some that
love to feed on the kernel rather than
the shell.?David Brainerd.
Debility
; weather ofthe season,
poverished, devitalized
aused by too close con>or
air and exercise, too
nter.
t constitutional remedy
rsaparilla
mpiy because It contains sarsaparllla,
medial values of more than twenty
il substitute for Hood's Sarsaparilla.
be " just as good," you may be sure it
the dealer a larger profit. 100 Doses $1.