357 



CHARLEY 



It is nearly seventy years since an American, named 

 Catlin, set out from his home in Wyoming to travel 

 westwards through the great country which was then 

 only inhabited by Indians and wild animals, but is now 

 full of nourishing towns. 



In the course of one of these journeys Catlin fell very 

 ill, and it was many weeks before he was fit to leave his 

 bed. When, however, he got better again, he sent for 

 his horse, Charley, which had grown fat on prairie grass 

 — and looked very unlike his master — and the tw T o pre- 

 pared to start for the Eiver Missouri, more than five 

 hundred miles away. 



Catlin' s heavy luggage was sent by steamer to meet 

 him at St. Louis, on the Mississippi, but there was still a 

 good deal left for Charley to carry. A bear-skin and a 

 buffalo robe were spread across his saddle, a coffee-pot 

 and a teacup were tied to it, a small portmanteau was 

 fastened somewhere else, and in the portmanteau was a 

 supply of hard biscuits ; while Catlin sat in any space 

 that was left, with a little compass in his pocket to show 

 him which way to go, and a gun and a pair of pistols in 

 his belt, in case man or beast should attack him. 



So day after day Charley and his master rode on 

 toward the north, through plains of grass all covered 

 with flowers. Every night when the sun set Catlin 

 jumped off and unloaded his horse, which he tied up, or 

 ' picketed,' with a long rope, so that Charley should have 

 plenty of room for feeding. Then he lit a fire to keep off 



