30 ON THE FRONTIER 



to warm to the horses' backs, and for the horses to get in 

 galloping order. Then a halt and dismount. Girths were 

 tightened, loose ends made fast, .rifles unslung, and waist- 

 belts taken up a hole, for our game might be but just 

 beyond the edge of the bluff. 



Slowly and cautiously we " raised " the summit and gazed 

 across the table-land. 



What a sight was there ! The rolling prairie looked 

 as though it might have been a tumultuous sea of mon- 

 strous waves, suddenly transmuted into solid ground, and 

 covered with a brilliant carpet of green grass. It was 

 an interminable repetition of little undulating hills when 

 viewed in detail. In its totality it was a vast upland 

 plain. And there, spread all over it, were the buffaloes ; 

 the nearest, within a mile ; the farthest who could tell 

 how far away ! The whole country was alive with them. 

 They were there in troops ; in squadrons, in divisions, in 

 armies ! 



The herds of the Lord ! " The cattle upon a thousand 

 hills ! " We stood entranced. But we did not stand 

 entranced long " not much." There was more hunt than 

 poetry about us that morning; so we noticed the wind, 

 observed the lay of the ground, picked out a small herd 

 to be " rushed " ; got into the nearest hollow and 

 dismounted. 



With bridle in one hand and rifle in the other, we 

 carefully advanced, and a very winding advance it was. 

 To give any of the buffaloes our wind, was to ensure, not 

 only their making off immediately, but all the neighbouring 

 animals doing so too. To show ourselves suddenly when 



