A THUNDERSTORM. 181 



guide or any of his Boh-hoys approach me. George 

 then waited on me, and very soon the half of a prairie 

 grouse, very well dressed, and some broiled bacon, 

 with a potatoe, were set before me, flanked by some 

 excellently baked and lightly raised soda rolls ; and I 

 made an excellent dinner. 



After dinner, at dusk, I took my gun and Brutus, and 

 walked round the little covert for the chance of a rabbit, 

 hare, or any beast that the approach of night might put 

 on foot ; but ere I had gone 300 yards, twilight, of which 

 in those latitudes there is very little, had closed in, and 

 the horizon became intensely black, though illumined 

 every instant with lightning ; the little wind there had 

 been then fell, and I knew a storm was coming. Closely 

 attended by Brutus, who seemed to think that additional 

 care and vigilance on his part were necessary, I returned 

 to my camp, and having chained Brutus up immediately 

 beneath me, I took out my note-book to jot down the in 

 cidents of the day's march, and called for a lantern. The 

 lantern, like everything else the care of which had been 

 entrusted to Mr Canterall, was forgotten, so a candle did 

 its duty, stuck up in a piece of old tin. This, however, 

 at once, on that still eve of an approaching thunder-storm, 

 and on that hot night, became so attractive to moths 

 moths which in size might have been the great-great-grand 

 mothers of any I had 'seen in England that to write in 

 comfort or keep the candle in was out of the question, so I 

 put out the light arid prepared for bed. " Bed ! " Oh ! how 

 I longed for one, and how much I regretted that among the 

 wonderful tales told me by English and American friends, 

 who pretended to know all about the necessities of prairie 

 life, not one had suggested to me an officer's tent and a 

 camp-bed with sheets and pillow, nor even to take with me 



