y days journey to the west: there,
where the long shadows of the vast herds of bison trail slowly over the
immense plains, huge and dark against the golden west; there, where the
red man still sees in the glory of the setting sun the realization of his
dream of heaven.

Shooting the prairie plover, which were numerous around the solitary
shanty, gossipping with Mr. Connelly on Western life and Red River
experiences--I passed the long July day until evening came to a close.
Then came the time of the mosquito; he swarmed around the shanty, he came
out from blade of grass and up from river sedge, from the wooded bay and
the dusky prairie, in clouds and clouds, until the air hummed with his
presence. My host "made a smoke," and the cattle came close around and
stood into the very fire itself, scorching their hides in attempting to
escape the stings of their ruthless tormentors. My friend's house was not
a large one, but he managed to make me a shake-down on the loft overhead,
and to it he led the way. To live in a country infested by mosquitoes
ought to insure to a person the possession of health, wisdom, and riches,
for assuredly I know of nothing so conducive to early turning in and
early turning out as that most pitiless pest. On the present occasion I
had not long turned in before I became aware of the presence of at least
two other persons within the limits of the little loft, for only a few
feet distant soft whispers became fintly audible. Listening attentively,
I gathered the following dialogue:

"Do you think he has got it about him?"

"Maybe he has," replied the first speaker with the voice of a woman.

"Are you shure he has it at all at all?"

"Didn't I see it in his own hand?"

Here was a fearful position! The dark loft, the lonely shanty miles away
from any other habitation, the mysterious allusions to the possession of
property, all naturally combined to raise the most dreadful suspicions in
the mind of the solitary traveller. Strange to say, this conversation had
not the terrible effect upon me which might be supposed. It was evident
that my old friends, father and mother of Mrs. C----, occupied the loft in
company with me, and the mention of that most suggestive word,
"crathure," was sufficient to neutralize all suspicions connected with
the lonely surroundings of the place. It was, in fact, a drop of that
much-desired "crathure" that the old couple were so anxious to obtain.

About three o'clock on th