ncamp cows and horses were given over exclusively to the
guardianship of nature, and to wander whithersoever they would, for the
Wallencamp fences had ceased to present themselves as obstacles in the
way. Indeed, some portions of them had been utterly obliterated, and this
was easily traced to a habit prevalent among the Wallencampers of
resorting to them for fuel when, on some winter night, other resources
were found to be low.

Other portions of them were decayed, or blown over in the wind, so that
there was just enough left to sit on for private soliloquy, or social
debate, and to give a picturesque charm to the landscape; yet, it was a
fact which I found worthy of notice, that, in going from one place to
another, no true Wallencamper ever walked over a broken-down part of the
fence, or went through a gap in the fence; he always selected an upright
part of the fence to climb over, even going a little out of the way, if
necessary, to effect this purpose.

The Wallencampers were staunch on the matter of individual rights; they
turned each his own horse and cow into his own door-yard. Animated,
doubtless, by something of the same principle, those attenuated animals,
having made an impartial _detour_ of the premises, congregated, as of one
accord, along the highway, especially in that part of the lane between
the Ark and the school-house.

I made my way through these new perils from day to day, in safety, until
the deepening green of the hills and fields called the herd away to wider
pastures.

Dr. Aberdeen, however, remained behind. Dr. Aberdeen, as he was termed by
the Wallencampers, was a horse of peculiar and distinguished parts. Among
his other eccentric gifts, he had a harmless habit of chasing beings of a
superior race. In what manner this propensity had first manifested
itself, I do not know, but it had been eagerly seized upon as ground for
further development by the juvenile element of Wallencamp, and especially
by the Modoc, under whose lively tuition the animal had reached an almost
strategic ability in the art.

Dr. Aberdeen was truly of the mildest disposition imaginable. He had
never been known to kick. He had never even been known to open his mouth
and snap at a fly, but the expression of his countenance, if it might be
so called, when he was on the chase, was vicious and determined in the
extreme, and by no means betrayed the purely facetious nature of his
intentions. During school hours he seldom w