1 50 The King of the Thundering Herd 



gled with the disturbed bleatings of 

 calves. It was as though the herd shared 

 the tumult in the breast of mother na- 

 ture. 



Then came a bright flash of lightning and 

 a heavy peal of thunder and the bison began 

 massing in small compact bunches. These 

 in turn gravitated toward a common center, 

 and almost before Bennie was aware of what 

 was happening, he and Buck were in the 

 midst of a great restless multitude of bison 

 which stretched away for a dozen rods in 

 every direction. His first thought was to 

 get out of the crush, but he soon saw that 

 it was impossible, for with each passing 

 minute, new bunches joined themselves with 

 the large herd, until it was half a mile 

 across. This much Bennie saw before the 

 clouds settled over the earth so thickly that 

 he could no longer discern the herd stretch- 

 ing away in every direction. An intense ex- 

 citement ran like an electric current through 



