198 IX THE CYPRESS SWAMPS. 



To ward noon we emerged upon the Kissimmee prairie, 

 and then could tell with tolerable certainty the course to 

 take. Abandoning all hope of reaching the river, we 

 struck for the old military road, hoping to reach it 

 before night. Faint and weary as we were, he would 

 not rest, but pressed insanely on, with but one idea to 

 reach a settler s cabin before night set in. As for me I 

 did not care. I was at the mercy of my guide, and 

 could do nothing with him in his present state. 



To turn my back upon Lake Okeechobee, and give 

 over all hope of seeing it, required a hard struggle. But 

 I had to yield to necessity, and so every hour saw us 

 further and further away. Toward noon we stopped at 

 a brackish pool to quench our thirst, and here I ate my 

 dinner, though I didn t mean to, as it consisted of two 

 small fish, which went down alive in the muddy water 

 and met an untimely death. On and on we rushed. 

 The deer sprang up from their noonday rest and skip 

 ped away, with their Avhite banners waving tantalizingly 

 near. Sand-hill cranes flew screaming from under our 

 very noses. Thousands of cattle now appeared dotting 

 the prairie. In the midst of plenty we had passed 

 nearly twenty-four hours without food. In the after 

 noon I grew weary of the continual striking of my sad 

 dle-bags against my legs, and lightened ship by throw 

 ing over the heaviest of my treasures. A bottle of 

 arsenic went first, then five pounds of shot, a lot of car 

 tridges, and everything not actually necessary 



The finder will be suitably rewarded. 



Just before we reached the trail we were seeking, a 

 beautiful fox sprang up, and, stopping a minute too long 

 to look at the first men he probably ever met, I gave 

 him a flying shot from the saddle that tumbled him over. 



