clap on a
poultice of fresh dung--that draws out the poison; and then, if you have
got it, drink half a bottle of spirits. It ain't often we get bit,
because of these high boots; but the Injins get bit sometimes, and I
never heard of thar dying. The only thing as we are regular feered of
out in these plains is a little beast they call the hydrophobia cat."

"I never heard of that. What is it like, Abe?"

"It is a pretty little beast, marked black and white, and about the size
of a big weasel. It has got a way of coming and biting you when you are
asleep, and when it does it is sartin death; thar ain't no cure for it;
the best plan is to put your Colt to your head and finish it at once."

"What horrible little beasts!" Frank said; "I hope they are not common."

"No, they ain't common, and there's more danger from them down south; if
you sleeps in an old Mexican hut that's been deserted, or places of that
sort, it's best to look sharp round afore you goes to sleep."

The game most commonly met with were the black-tailed and white-tailed
deer. These were generally met with in parties of from six to twelve,
and were usually stalked, although sometimes, by dividing and taking a
wide circle, they could manage to ride them down and get within shot.
This could seldom be done with the antelope, which ran in much larger
herds, but were so suspicious and watchful that there was no getting
within shot, while, once in motion, they could leave the horses behind
with ease. The only way in which they could get them would be by acting
upon their curiosity. One or two of the hunters would dismount, and
crawl through the grass until within three or four hundred yards of the
herd; then they would lie on their backs and wave their legs in the air,
or wave a coloured blanket, as they lay concealed in the grass. The herd
would stop grazing and look on curiously, and gradually approach nearer
and nearer to investigate this strange phenomenon, until they came well
within shot, when the hunters would leap to their feet and send their
unerring bullets among them.

"You would hardly believe, now," Peter said, one day when he and Frank
had brought down two fine antelopes by this manoeuvre, "that the
coyotes are just as much up to that trick as we are. They haven't got a
chance with the deer when they are once moving, although sometimes they
may pick up a fawn a few days old, or a stag that has got injured; but
when they want deer-meat they ju