"Wa-ak--" began the old bull; then he stopped short, threw up his head,
sniffing the wind, and ended with a sharp snort which changed the words
to "_What? What?_"

"What's this," said the Bull Buffalo, "Pale Faces?"

"They are very young," said the young cow, the one with the _going_
look. She had just been taken into the herd that season and had the
place of the favorite next to the leader.

"If you please, sir," said Oliver, "we only wished to know where the
trail went."

"Why," said the Buffalo Chief, surprised, "to the Buffalo roads, of
course. We must be changing pasture." As he pawed contempt upon the
short, dry grass, the rattlesnake, that had been sunning himself at the
foot of the hummock, slid away under the bleached buffalo skull, and the
small, furry things dived everywhere into their burrows.

"That is the way always," said the young cow, "when the Buffalo People
begin their travels. Not even a wolf will stay in the midst of the
herds; there would be nothing left of him by the time the hooves had
passed over."

The children could see how that might be, for as the thin lines began to
converge toward the high places, it was as if the whole prairie had
turned black and moving. Where the trails drew out of the flat lands to
the watersheds, they were wide enough for eight or ten to walk abreast,
trodden hard and white as country roads. There was a deep, continuous
murmur from the cows like the voice of the earth talking to itself