hey came to
some bars. They opened the bars (and forgot to put them up again) and
went into the pasture.

[Illustration]

IV

When they got inside the pasture the boys looked about for the goat.
This goat was quite a savage one, and was kept all by himself in a small
field. It did not take them long to find him. He was grazing quietly in
the shadow of a mesquite[14] tree. As Tonio had the only lasso there
was, he knew he could have the game all his own way, so he said,--

"I'll take the first turn with the lasso, Ignacio; you wave your red
serape at the goat while Juan stirs him up from behind."

The goat had his head down, eating grass, and did not notice the boys
until suddenly Juan split the air behind him with a fearful roar and
prodded his legs with a stick.

"Ah, Toro!" roared Juan at the top of his lungs just as he had heard the
matadors do at a real bull-fight, and at the same moment Ignacio shook
out his red serape.

The goat looked up, saw Tonio and the red serape, and immediately stood
up on his hind legs. Then he came down with a thump on his fore feet,
put his head down, and ran at Ignacio like a bullet from a gun. Ignacio
waved the serape and shouted, and when the goat got very near, he jumped
to one side as he had seen the matadors do, and the goat butted with all
his might right into the serape.

When he struck the serape his horn went through one end of it. Ignacio
had hold of the other end and before he knew what had happened he was
rolling backward down a little slope into a pool of water which was the
goat's drinking-place.

[Illustration]

Meanwhile the goat went bounding about the pasture with the serape
hanging from one horn. Every few minutes he would stamp on it and paw it
with his fore feet. Ignacio picked himself out of the water, and then
all three boys began a wild chase to get back the serape. It would be a
sad day for Ignacio if he went home without it.

Serapes are the most valuable things there are in a peon's hut, and were
never intended to be used by goats in this way.

Tonio couldn't lasso the goat because the serape covered his horns, so
the boys all tried to snatch off the serape as the goat went galloping
past, but every time they tried it the goat butted at them, and they had
to run for their lives.

At last the goat stood up on his hind legs and came down on the serape
so hard that there was a dreadful tearing sound, and there was the
serape torn clear in two