Wolves and Wolf- Hounds. 403 



the wolf feel sicker than a stuck hog." Our shaggy ponies 

 racked along at a five-mile gait ov^r the dewy prairie 

 grass. The two big dogs trotted behind their master, 

 grim and ferocious. The track-hounds were tied in 

 couples, and the beautiful greyhounds loped lightly and 

 gracefully alongside the horses. The country was 

 fine. A mile to our right a small plains river wound in 

 long curves between banks fringed with cottonwoods. 

 Two or three miles to our left the foot-hills rose sheer and 

 bare, with clumps of black pine and cedar in their gorges. 

 We rode over gently rolling prairie, with here and there 

 patches of brush at the bottoms of the slopes around the 

 dry watercourses. 



At last we reached a somewhat deeper valley, in which 

 the wolves were harbored. Wolves lie close in the day- 

 time and will not leave cover if they can help it ; and as 

 they had both food and water within we knew it was most 

 unlikely that this couple would be gone. The valley was 

 a couple of hundred yards broad and three or four times 

 as long, filled with a growth of ash and dwarf elm and 

 cedar, thorny underbrush choking the spaces between. 

 Posting the cowboy, to whom he gave his rifle, with two 

 greyhounds on one side of the upper end, and old man 

 Prindle with two others on the opposite side, while I was 

 left at the lower end to guard against the possibility of 

 the wolves breaking back, the Judge himself rode into 

 the thicket near me and loosened the track-hounds to let 

 them find the wolves' trail. The big dogs also were un- 

 coupled and allowed to go in with the hounds. Their 

 power of scent was very poor, but they were sure to be 



