First, it becomes necessary to confide 

 in you. Fear is a very wicked companion 

 who, since nursery days, had troubled me 

 \ery little; but when I arrived out West, 

 he was waiting for me, and, so that I need 

 never be without him, he divided him- 

 self into a band of little imps. 



Each imp had a special duty, and 

 never left me until he had been crushed 

 in silent but terrible combat. There 

 was the imp who did not like to be 

 alone in the mountains, and the imp 

 who was sure he was going to be lost 

 in those wildernesses, and the imp who 

 quaked at the sight of a gun, and the 

 imp who danced a mad fierce dance 

 when on a horse. All these had been 

 conquered, or at least partially re- 

 duced to subjection, but the imp who 

 sat on the saddle pommel when there 

 was a ditch or stream to be jumped had 



