ade known that he had mounted his
pony and started off for assistance.

But help was no nearer than Fort Meade, and, as the Indians naturally
thought, it could not possibly arrive before the morrow. If this were
so, abundant time remained in which to encompass the destruction of the
defenders. The Sioux decided to maintain watch, but to defer the
decisive assault until late at night.

And it was this decision that saved the little party. Within the
following two hours the friendly scouts reported the situation to the
lieutenant of cavalry, who began his arrangements for an immediate
attack upon the hostiles.

The latter, however, were as watchful as their enemies, and were quick
to learn their new danger. They withdrew and disappeared after the
exchange of a few shots, fired under such circumstances that no harm was
done on either side.

The rescued whites were conducted to the foot of the ridge on the other
side, where they were so disposed among their friends that all were
furnished with transportation, and the journey to Fort Meade was begun,
or rather resumed so far as they were concerned.

Not far away they met the young rancher, breathless and in an agony of
distress. His joy may be imagined upon learning the happy truth. All
were saved without so much as a hair of their heads being harmed.

The next day Warren returned for his pony, and found him so much better
that he was able to walk with little trouble. The youth was too
considerate to ask him to carry any load, and the two made the journey
with the rider on foot.

And so it came about that Providence mercifully extricated our friends
from the danger which threatened more than once the ruin of all.

THE END.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Young Ranchers, by Edward S. Ellis

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YOUNG RANCHERS ***

***** This file should be named 28331.txt or 28331.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/2/8/3/3/28331/

Produced by David Edwards, Mary Meehan and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive)

Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(