96 The Hunting Field With Horse and Hound 



also was too full to run properly, and we saw the cattleman 

 graduall}^ gaining. 



"He is going to rope the coyote," cried Mr. Petrie, and sure 

 enough around and around the cattleman's head circled the 

 open noose. No, he has missed. The rope gathered in hand 

 over hand, while the horse raced on at the top of his speed, 

 was soon cutting the air once more in circling the cattleman's 

 head. Suddenly it leaves his hand. "Done!" cries Mr. Petrie. 

 No sooner does the open noose reach its mark than the cattle- 

 man's body is thrown back in the saddle, his horse braces his 

 feet for a sudden halt. Mr. Coyote comes to the end of his 

 halter, and turns a somersault. Meantime the horseman has 

 turned his mount as if on a pivot, and from the first stride is 

 cantering him back towards the wagon, the lassoed coyote at 

 one end of his lariat, the other fast to the pommel of liis 

 saddle. 



It was, to the writer's mind, the most marvellous feat he had 

 ever seen in the saddle, and he undertook to say so, but the old 

 cattleman would have none of it. He interrupted with, "That's 

 nothing, the httle devil was so full of cow he couldn't run worth 

 a damn." 



