n unpleasant, lowering day, for that time of the
year, with a cold wind--Walt spoke thus to Whitey:

"I'm havin' some stock cut out, t'day, t' send to your dad. How'd ye
like t' go out on th' range an' take a look at it?"

"Is that the business Bill sent me on?" asked Whitey.

"Partly," Walt answered. "What d'ye say? You might as well do that as
loaf around here."

"I'll go," said Whitey.

"All right. You c'n go with Hank Dawes. He's startin' pretty soon, an'
he'll get you a hoss."

It was some relief to Whitey to be galloping over the prairie, though
Hank Dawes was not the man he would have chosen as a companion. Hank's
cruelty to his horse turned Whitey against him. Whitey had seen many
animals treated unfeelingly, but he never could understand how a man
could enjoy torturing one, as Hank seemed to. Finally, after an outburst
on Hank's part that included quirting and spurring and swearing, Whitey
could hold in no longer.

"If you'd treat your horse better he'd behave better," he said angrily.
"You ought to know that."

For a moment Hank looked blankly at Whitey, then burst out laughing. He
could not understand any one's having consideration for a horse, and
the boy's anger struck him as being funny. Whitey turned from him in
disgust, baffled by such a lack of understanding and feeling.

The writer knows many men in the West, and, having been born and raised
there, naturally thinks Westerners the finest men in the world. But for
him to deny that there are good and bad among them would be idle. As
idle to deny that some of them were cruel to their horses. Among these
the Indians and Mexicans bear the worst reputations with those who are
supposed to know. But, for the sake of truth, the author wishes to say
that he found the Indians uniformly kind to their horses. And as for the
Mexicans, not only were they always kind and considerate to their
mounts, but they were among the greatest horsemen in the world.

Whitey and Hank rode for a time in a silence broken only by Hank's
occasional profane mutterings at his patient horse, then Whitey descried
two objects moving toward him from the west. At first he mistook them
for two horsemen, then discovered that one horse was being led, then
that the rider was Injun, and the led horse was Monty. With a whoop of
astonishment and joy Whitey galloped toward them.

"Hello, Injun, what's all this?" yelled Whitey when within speaking
distance, so glad that he was almost read