216 BOOK OF A HUNDRED BEARS 



you faint with weariness and thirst; nights when 

 you make a/^dry camp," and suffer with your 

 horse. No, it is not all elysian; but, when the 

 trail is just right, and your horse is your friend, 

 and you come to know his mouth, and he talks to 

 you with every twitch of his head, and tells you 

 when to pull and when to let the reins lie on 

 his back — then, believe me, there is nothing like 

 the trail. 



So my old grey and I cantered up and down, 

 over the long, barren hills, and down where the 

 little aspen thickets gather about a hidden water- 

 course till we came to Gardiner. I tied my horse 

 in front of the ^^Bucket of Blood," the most palatial 

 of Gardiner's business houses, and had a commer- 

 cial transaction with its urbane proprietor which 

 left me feeling as though I had swallowed a live 

 wire. I saw the granite ^^Gateway," that is not a 

 gateway at all, because no one ever passed through 

 it. It is a hideous structure of boulders that was 

 built solely as an excuse for someone to make a 

 speech. It is getting so in this fair land of ours 

 that anything is an excuse for a speech. When- 



