e bowling of those who were not quite dead, that the deer and
elk were in every direction struggling to rise and fly [see note 1]. We
had been employed more than four hours in our work of destruction, when
we returned to the camp, tired and hungry. Roche had kicked up a
bear-cub, which the doctor skinned and cooked for us while we were
taking our round to see how our proteges were going on. All those that
had been brought up to the water-hole were so far recovered that they
were grazing about, and bounded away as soon as we attempted to near
them. My stag was grazing also, but he allowed me to caress him, just
as if we had been old friends, and he never left the place until the
next morning, when we ourselves started.

The doctor called us for our evening meal, to which we did honour, for,
in addition to his wonderful culinary talents, he knew some plants,
common in the prairies, which can impart even to a bear's chop a most
savoury and aromatic flavour. He was in high glee, as we praised his
skill, and so excited did he become, that he gave up his proposal of the
"Gold, Emerald, Topaz, Sapphire, and Amethyst Association, in ten
thousand shares," and vowed he would cast away his lancet and turn cook
in the service of some bon vivant, or go to feed the padres of a Mexican
convent, he boasted that he could cook the toughest old woman, so as to
make the flesh appear as white, soft, and sweet as that of a spring
chicken; but upon my proposing to send him, as a cordon bleu, to the
Cayugas, in West Texas, or among the Club Indians of the Colorado of the
West, he changed his mind again, and formed new plans for the
regeneration of the natives of America.

After our supper, we rode our horses to the lake, to water and bathe
them, which duty being performed, we sought that repose which we were
doomed not to enjoy; for we had scarcely shut our eyes when a tremendous
shower fell upon us, and in a few minutes we were drenched to the skin.
The reader may recollect that, excepting Gabriel we had all of us left
our blankets on the spot where we had at first descried the prairie was
in flames, so that we were now shivering with cold, and, what was worse,
the violence of the rain was such, that we could not keep our fire
alive. It was an ugly night, to be sure; but the cool shower saved the
panting and thirsty animals, for whose sufferings we had felt so much.
All night we heard the deer and antelopes trotting and scampering
towa