isn't likely that he dreamed, but if he did it might have been of being
tied to the handle of a trunk in an overland limited baggage car; of the
train's stopping for water at a lonely tank; of the earthy, wholesome
country smell that came through the door, left open for coolness.

There had been a stirring in the grass near the track. A glimpse of an
animal that looked something like a fox and something like a wolf, and
wasn't either one, a wild animal that was sneaking around the train for
the odd bits of food that were sometimes left in its wake. As the
pungent scent of this beast reached the bulldog's snub nose, the leash
that held him to the trunk became a thing of little worth. With a
violent lurch he broke it, leaped from the door, landed sprawling
alongside the track, and was off in pursuit of the strange animal.

Now, any one who knows how a bulldog is built and how a coyote is built
can imagine how much chance the first has to catch the second. The dog
followed by sight, not by scent. With his head held as high as his short
neck would allow he dashed on. The coyote didn't bother very much. After
getting a good start he doubled on his tracks for a little way, turned
aside, and sat down. And if he wasn't too mean to laugh, he may at
least have smiled as his enemy rushed forward toward nowhere.

Then that bulldog ran and ran until he couldn't run any more. Then he
walked till he couldn't walk any farther. Then he slept all night, while
other coyotes howled dismally near by. And in the morning he started off
again, thinking he was going toward the train and his sorrowful master,
really going in the opposite direction. But there was one thing that man
hadn't taught him to do in all the years, and that was to quit, so he
kept on. And at last, as any one will who keeps going long enough, he
had to arrive somewhere and he reached the Bar O Ranch.