THE PRAIRIE. 45 



the traveler might have imagined himself wandering 

 among the ruins of some deserted city. 



Getting down was bad ; getting up again was worse. 

 Guns, baggage, and horse furniture had to be carried in 

 the hand, while the animals scrambled up as they could. 

 One of them struck against a piece of rock that stuck 

 out upon the path, and was hurled down by the shock a 

 distance of near twenty feet, fulling right upon his back. 

 Of course he was given up for lost ; but, thank you, 

 Dobbin had ao idea of that. He just got up again, 

 himself a shake, and then trying it a second time, 

 marched up as steadily as any of them. The passage of 

 this ravine took them five or six hours ; by the middle of 

 the afternoon i accomplished it, and were restored 



to the upper world. Continuing their route on the plain, 

 they found that bj MB they had left the c-h; 



few hundred yards behind them, not the slightest trace 

 of its 'existence was to be .- 



It is into chasms such M that the mounted In- 



dians, spurring their half-wild horses to their u: 

 speed, drive the immense herds of buffaloes, when they 

 come upon them in a situation suitable for this purpose. 

 Urged onward by the yells and rapid hoof-trampling be- 

 hind them, headlong, and tumbling over each other go 

 the huge terror-stricken brutes, p, dark avalanche of 

 -life, bounding from crag to crag in the rugged de- 

 scent, till, at the very bottom of the canon, lies a writh- 

 ing, swelling heap of carcases, a rich spoil for their sa- 

 vage pursuers to gloat over. 



The bow and arrow is a formidable weapon for the 

 destruction of buffalo, in the hands of an Indian. Some 



