uarters camp near Devil's Lake, North Dakota
that night and led Benny behind the sleigh. Western air agreed with the
little calf and every time Paul looked back at him he was two feet
taller.

[Illustration]

When they arrived at camp Benny was given a good feed of buffalo milk
and flapjacks and put into a barn by himself. Next morning the barn was
gone. Later it was discovered on Benny's back as he scampered over the
clearings. He had outgrown his barn in one night.

[Illustration]

Benny was very notional and would never pull a load unless there was
snow on the ground so after the spring thaws they had to white wash the
logging roads to fool him.

Gluttony killed Benny. He had a mania for pancakes and one cook crew of
two hundred men was kept busy making cakes for him. One night he pawed
and bellowed and threshed his tail about till the wind of it blew down
what pine Paul had left standing in Dakota. At breakfast time he broke
loose, tore down the cook shanty and began bolting pancakes. In his
greed he swallowed the red-hot stove. Indigestion set in and nothing
could save him. What disposition was made of his body is a matter of
dispute. One oldtimer claims that the outfit he works for bought a hind
quarter of the carcass in 1857 and made corned beef of it. He thinks
they have several carloads of it left.

Another authority states that the body of Benny was dragged to a safe
distance from the North Dakota camp and buried. When the earth was
shoveled back it made a mound that formed the Black Hills in South
Dakota.

* * * * *

THE custodian and chaperon of Babe the Big Blue Ox was Brimstone Bill.
He knew all the tricks of that frisky giant before they happened.

[Illustration]

"I know oxen" the old bullwhacker used to say, "I've worked 'em and fed
'em and doctored 'em ever since the ox was invented. And Babe, I know
that pernicious old reptyle same as if I'd abeen through him with a
lantern."

Bill compiled "The Skinner's Dictionary", a hand book for teamsters, and
most of the terms used in directing draft animals (except mules)
originated with him. His early religious training accounts for the fact
that the technical language of the teamster contains so many names of
places and people spoken of in the Bible.

The buckskin harness used on Babe and Benny when the weather was rainy
was made by Brimstone Bill. When this harness got wet it would stretch
so much that the oxen