"Well, I don't think there's been one seen for a good many years,"
replied the other, accommodatingly. "Time was, of course, when they need
to roam all about this region; yes, and wolves and buffalo as well; but
those were in the old days when it was called the frontier."

"Buffalo!" echoed Bandy-legs, in amazement; "why, Max, I always thought
buffalo were only found away out West on the plains, where they used to
be seen in great big droves, before Buffalo Bill cleaned them out,
supplying meat for the workers building the first railroad across the
continent."

"Well, that's where you were away off," answered the other, "because in
all the accounts in history about Daniel Boone and the early settlers
along the Ohio and in Kentucky you can read of them hunting buffalo.
Seems they went in pairs or small droves at that time. Why, they used to
get them for meat in the mountains of Pennsylvania when on the way
across to the valleys on the other side. And at that time there were
more panthers around here than you could shake a stick at."

"You'd never ketch me doing that same thing, if it was a panther,"
admitted Bandy-legs, frankly. "I'm afraid of cats of all kinds the worst
ever. Why, I always said I'd rather face six lions than one tiger, any
day."

"Sure, who wouldn't?" remarked Steve, dryly. "They'd make way with a
feller all the sooner, and end the agony. But Max says he don't believe
it could have been a panther, so make your mind easy, Bandy-legs."

They managed to talk of other things in between, but the boy with the
short legs would every little while think up some new question in