their departure, a glorious field
of gold and green, the blades waving in the breeze like banners,
was now a mass of ruin. The tumultuous drove had plunged down over
the ridge above the field, and had fled, in one broad swath of
destruction, straight over every foot of the field, their trail
leaving a brown and torn surface on the earth, wide on both sides
of the plantation. Scarcely a trace of greenness was left where once
the corn-field had been. Here and there, ears of grain, broken and
trampled into the torn earth, hinted what had been; but for the most
part hillock, stalk, corn-blade, vine, and melon were all crushed
into an indistinguishable confusion, muddy and wrecked.

Oscar felt a shudder pass down his back, and his knees well-nigh gave
way under him as he caught a glimpse of the ruin that had been
wrought. Tears were in his eyes, and, unable to raise a shout, he
turned and wildly waved his hands to the party, who had just then
reached the door of the cabin. His Uncle Aleck had been watching the
lad, and as he saw him turn he exclaimed, "Oscar has found the buffalo
trail over the corn-field!"

The whole party moved quickly in the direction of the plantation. When
they reached the rise of ground overlooking the field, Oscar, still
unable to speak, turned and looked at his father with a face of grief.
Uncle Aleck, gazing on the wreck and ruin, said only, "A whole
summer's work gone!"

"A dearly bought buffalo-hunt!" remarked Younkins.

"That's so, neighbor," added Mr. Bryant, with the grimmest sort of a
smile; and then the men fell to talking calmly of the wonderful amount
of mischief that a drove of buffalo could do in a few minutes, even
seconds, of time. Evidently, the animals had not stopped to snatch a
bite by the way. They had not tarried an instant in their wild course.
Down the slope of the fields they had hurried in a mad rush, plunged
into the woody creek below, and, leaving the underbrush and vines
broken and flattened as if a tornado had passed through the land, had
thundered away across the flat floor of the bottom-land on the further
side of the creek. A broad brown track behind them showed that they
had then fled into the dim distance of the lands of the Chapman's
Creek region.

There was nothing to be done, and not much to be said. So, parting
with their kindly and sympathizing neighbors, the party went
sorrowfully home.

"Well," said Uncle Aleck, as soon as they were alone together, "I