284 TAMING MY HORSE TAYMOUTH. 



mouth, patting his neck, "this is to be the last arranged 

 day for buffalo running on which I ride you, and you had 

 better be quiet ; I don't mind how much I take out of you, 

 but a bison you must kill ! " 



Long before we got near the herd, they saw us, and all 

 set off in their remarkable up-and-down canter. The last 

 thing I knew of Bayard, until the chase was over, was, 

 that he started when I did ; Taymouth then flew over the 

 plains, and I was soon alongside of the bisons and saw 

 nothing else. No sooner was I up with them than Tay 

 mouth swerved away, and when I checked him he began 

 fighting in that usual changing-leg way of his, which 

 rendered it, in his violent moments, so difficult to take 

 any aim from his back. I got him as near as I could to 

 some immense bulls, and fired and missed one ; reloaded 

 and fired again, but with similar effect ; reloaded a third 

 time, very angry with my fractious horse, and shot again, 

 and this time, I think, with some slight effect. There 

 were two fine old bulls going side by side, at whom I 

 fired the third shot, and I suspect that the ball must have 

 struck one of their horns, for with a sudden start they 

 both struck off from the herd and went away by them 

 selves. "Now then," I cried to my horse, "with both 

 or one of these huge bulls you shall go till I quiet you or 

 a bison ; " and at them I rode, but only at both for a 

 few strides, for now they separated, one inclining to the 

 direction of the herd, but the other, the largest of the 

 two (as fine a specimen of the giant game as could be 

 seen), kept straight away ; and this was the one I select 

 ed, on to whose traces, whithersoever he might go, I re 

 solved to attach my fractious horse. Thus, then, we 

 started the bull gaining a considerable space while I 

 pulled in sufficiently to reload my carbine ; but when 



