rolling
prairie. The boy stood entranced at the sight. More, more, and yet
more of the herds were slowly moving into sight and then disappearing
in the gullies below. The dark brown folds seemed to envelop the face
of the earth. Sandy wondered where so many creatures could find
pasturage. Their bodies appeared to cover the hills and valleys, so
that there could not be room left for grazing. "They've got such big
feet," he soliloquized aloud, "that I should think that the ground
would be all pawed up where they have travelled." In the ecstasy of
his admiration, he walked to and fro on the hill-top, talking to
himself, as was his wont.

"I wonder if the other fellows can see them as I do?" he asked. "I
don't believe, after all, that it is one-half so entertaining for them
as it is for me. Oh, I just wish the folks at home could be here now,
and see this sight. It beats all nature, as Father Dixon used to say.
And to think that there are thousands of people in big cities who
don't have meat enough to eat. And all this buffalo-meat running
wild!" The boy laughed to himself at the comicality of the thought.
"Fresh beef running wild!"

The faint report of a gun fired afar off now reached his ear and he
saw a blue puff of smoke rising from the crest of a timber-bordered
hill far away. The herd in that direction seemed to swerve somewhat
and scatter, but, to his intense surprise, there was no hurry in their
movements; the brown and black folds of the great mass of animals
still slowly and sluggishly spread out and flowed like the tides of
the sea, enveloping everything. Suddenly there was another report,
then another, and another. Three shots in quick succession.

"Now they are getting in their work!" shouted the boy, fairly dancing
up and down in his excitement. "Oh, I wish I was there instead of here
looking on!"

Now the herds wavered for a moment, then their general direction was
changed from the northward to the eastward. Then there was a swift and
sudden movement of the whole mass, and the vast dark stream flowed in
a direction parallel with the Fork instead of toward it, as
heretofore.

"They are coming this way!" shouted Sandy, to the empty, silent air
around him. "I'll get a shot at 'em yet!" Then, suddenly recollecting
that his gun had been exchanged for his brother's, he added, "And
Charlie's gun is no good!"

In truth, the herd was now bound straight for the hill on which the
boy maintained his solitary wat