68 The King of the Thundering Herd 



Anyhow, it happened as the heap of 

 bleaching bones at the bottom of the 

 canyon testified, and away the herd 

 went, galloping madly, heedless of all 

 dangers, just as liable to plunge into 

 quagmires, or over precipices as anything 

 else. 



It was not until late September or early 

 October that the Andersons saw the buffalo 

 in any numbers. Hitherto, it had been an 

 occasional lonely bison feeding in some 

 coulee, or a solitary bull looking off across 

 the country from the crest of a swell, but 

 they now began to see them in larger num- 

 bers. 



The jolting wagon by this time had 

 pounded its weary way over the plains and 

 through the Bad Lands and the desert-like 

 portions of the prairies, where there was 

 nothing but sage-brush and sprawling cac- 

 tus, until they had reached a point near 

 the northwest corner of Missouri, what 



