208 A Trip on the Prairie. 



before it grows again. Already in many districts the 

 stockmen are seriously considering the best way in which 

 to take steps against them. Prairie-dogs wherever they 

 exist are sure to attract attention, all the more so because, 

 unlike most other rodents, they are diurnal and not noc- 

 turnal, offering therein a curious case of parallelism to 

 their fellow denizen of the dry plains, the antelope, which 

 is also a creature loving to be up and stirring in the 

 bright daylight, unlike its relatives, the dusk-loving deer. 

 They are very noisy, their shrill yelping resounding 

 on all sides whenever a man rides through a town. 

 None go far from their homes, always keeping close 

 enough to be able to skulk into them at once ; and as 

 soon as a foe appears they take refuge on the hillocks 

 beside their burrows, yelping continuously, and accom- 

 panying each yelp by a spasmodic jerking of the tail and 

 body. When the man comes a little nearer they disap- 

 pear inside and then thrust their heads out, for they are 

 most inquisitive. Their burrows form one of the chief 

 dangers to riding at full speed over the plains country ; 

 hardly any man can do much riding on the prairie for 

 more than a year or two without coming to grief on more 

 than one occasion by his horse putting its foot in a prairie- 

 dog hole. A badger hole is even worse. When a horse 

 gets his foot in such a hole, while going at full speed, he 

 turns a complete somersault, and is lucky if he escape 

 without a broken leg, while I have time and again known 

 the rider to be severely injured. There are other smaller 

 animals whose burrows sometimes cause a horseman to 

 receive a sharp tumble. These are the pocket-gophers, 



