226 MULE-HUNTING EXPEDITION. 
fastened to the stage; they are clearly unedu- 
cated—‘ wild mustangs ’ one of the insiders called 
them. They are held tightly. ‘All aboard, boys?’ 
says the driver (they call him Mose)—in we 
scramble—bang slams the door—and with an 
awful lurch away we go! Now I can under- 
stand the suspicious-looking machinery, designed, 
on the principle of life-buoys, for stage-tossed 
travellers to cling to. Holding on to these we 
swing along as hard as the beasts can gallop. 
I am told by a fellow-passenger that unless the 
‘mustangs start at a gallop, they either upset the 
stage, or kick themselves clear of the harness.’ 
On this journey they were agreeable enough to 
gallop off, so we escaped the two contingencies. 
Several times Mose shouted, ‘ Get out, boys, and 
hang on awhile.’ I discover that this means that 
we are to cling to the side of the stage, that 
our united weight may prevent its capsizing, 
when going along the side of a slope like the 
slant of a housetop. 
Near dark we are requested by ‘ Mose’ to walk 
up the last hill. A tall sallow man, with a face 
hollow and sunken, closely shaven, except a tuft 
at the chin, steps along with me, and we reach 
the top of the hill a good time before the stage. 
We are standing amidst some scrubby timber. 
