e Walter sprang forward, sitting down on the angry animal's head.

"Now get that saddle off," commanded Tad. "Come, Chunky! Do you think
we are going to wait here all day for you?"

The fat boy reluctantly obeyed the command of Tad Butler. After some
further trouble, Stacy's pony was properly saddled, but still stubborn
and ready for further trouble. The lad got on this time without
falling off, and with much laughter and joking, the party started off
toward the blue haze in the distance, the dark ridge that marked the
Guadalupes.

It was in "_The Pony Rider Boys in the Rockies_" that our readers first
learned how this little private club of youthful horsemen came to be
organized. The need of open-air life for the then sickly Walter
Perkins was one of the great factors in the organization of this
little band of rough-and-ready travelers. Our readers remember the
adventures of our young friends in the fastnesses of the Rocky
Mountains. These lads speedily fitted themselves into the stirring
life of the big game land, and had other yet more startling adventures
in which wild animals did not play so strong a part as did wild men.
The story of the discovery of Lost Claim, with its accompanying
battle with claim-jumpers, was fully told in this first volume.

It was in "_The Pony Rider Boys In Texas_" that we found the lads
learning the first rudiments of the cattle business. The thrilling
part that the young men took in the long cattle drive, with its
stampedes, the fording of swollen rivers, the games of the cowboys
and the tricks of the cattle thieves, is related in that second
volume. How the boys improved their shooting and mastered the details
of that fascinating sport of handling the lariat are all familiar
to our readers.

In "_The Pony Rider Boys in Montana_" is told the story of the long
and exciting ride over the old Custer Trail, famous in the tragic
annals of our earlier days of Indian fighting. Here the boys found
themselves drawn into the life of the sheep men, on those great
ranges where the sheep men must still defend themselves from the
prejudices, and sometimes from the extreme violence, of the cattle
men. It was in this connection that Tad Butler and his friends
discovered leading clues in the great conspiracy of certain cattle
men against the prosperity and safety of the sheep men. This state
of affairs led finally to an angry battle, at which the boys were
present. Then, too, our reader