242 Hunting Trips on the Prairie 



motion ; and soon came to the long wash-out, cutting 

 down like a miniature canyon for a space of two 

 or three miles through the bottom of a valley, into 

 which the cowboy said he had seen the bears go. 

 One of us took one side and one the other, and we 

 rode along up wind, but neither the bears nor any 

 traces of them could we see; at last, half a mile 

 ahead of us, two dark objects suddenly emerged 

 from the wash-out, and came out on the plain. For 

 a second we thought they were the quarry ; then we 

 saw that they were merely a couple of dark-colored 

 ponies. The cowboy's chapfallen face was a study; 

 he had seen, in the dim light, the two ponies going 

 down with their heads held near the ground, and 

 had mistaken them for bears (by no means the un- 

 natural mistake that it seems ; I have known an ex- 

 perienced hunter fire twice at a black calf in the late 

 evening, thinking it was a bear). He knew only 

 too well the merciless chaff to which he would be 

 henceforth exposed; and a foretaste of which he at 

 once received from my companion. The ponies had 

 strayed from the main herd, and the cowboy was 

 sent back to drive them to the home corral, while 

 Merrifield and myself continued our hunt. 



We had all day before us, and but twenty miles 

 or so to cover before reaching the hut where the 

 buckboard was to meet us; but the course we in- 

 tended to take was through country so rough that 

 no Eastern horse could cross it, and even the hardy 

 Western hunting-ponies, who climb like goats, 

 would have difficulty in keeping their feet. Our 



