The Log of a Cowboy - A Narrative of the Old Trail Days by Andy Adams
page 141 of 300 (47%)
page 141 of 300 (47%)
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suffering.
While waiting our turns, the accident to the horse was referred to several times, and finally Blades, who was sitting in the game, turned to us who were lounging around the fire, and asked, "Did you all notice that look he gave me as I was uncinching the saddle? If he had been human, he might have told what that look meant. Good thing he was a horse and couldn't realize." From then on, the yarning and conversation was strictly _horse_. "It was always a mystery to me," said Billy Honeyman, "how a Mexican or Indian knows so much more about a horse than any of us. I have seen them trail a horse across a country for miles, riding in a long lope, with not a trace or sign visible to me. I was helping a horseman once to drive a herd of horses to San Antonio from the lower Rio Grande country. We were driving them to market, and as there were no railroads south then, we had to take along saddle horses to ride home on after disposing of the herd. We always took favorite horses which we didn't wish to sell, generally two apiece for that purpose. This time, when we were at least a hundred miles from the ranch, a Mexican, who had brought along a pet horse to ride home, thought he wouldn't hobble this pet one night, fancying the animal wouldn't leave the others. Well, next morning his pet was missing. We scoured the country around and the trail we had come over for ten miles, but no horse. As the country was all open, we felt positive he would go back to the ranch. "Two days later and about forty miles higher up the road, the Mexican was riding in the lead of the herd, when suddenly he reined in his |
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