The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-02-24

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 and the canvas taken off the wagon fol
 a winding sheet. When the broken circle
 closed in around the open grave, the
 boss cleared his throat and said: Boys
 before We go any further, some one
 must make a prayer, sabe?'
 They sabed, but although every mans
 soul might be consumed with a voiceless | cry to some power above himself for the
 repose of the departed soul, and release from like fate, they were all dumb
 when confronted with the thought of 1 taking the name of God reverently. In stlnctiyely they turned to East Side. ' l Its your lead, East Side" they
 said. And East Side" groping blindly
 backward toward the memories of his
 youth, tried to recall something of a re-
 ligious import. Slowly through his des-
 sicated brain percolated a line from a
 church hymn, From Greenlands Icy
 Mountains" but although the thought was pleasant in the burning desert, the words were not to the point-besides, that was all he knew of it. He shook ! his head sorrowfully. Tn the begin
 nng"-he thought he had etruck the
 right lead therein the beginning God created" But again he was stuck and could go no further.
 Lead up. East Side'" they urged.
 Then the light broke. The backward
 groping had brought him down to the days of his childhood, to the words his grandfather had been wont to say as with bowed heads the family to the third generation and fourth generations, was
 gathered around his table on Thanks giving Day So, under the burning sun, whose only shadow cast by the hocks of carrion birds that circled above the rem nant of the outfit, they stood over the grave of their dead companion, waiting for a like fate, or death by their own hands, to be torn by coyotes perhaps before the breath was out of their bodies, the six gaunt men with bowed uncovered heads, while East Side" pronounced in solemn tones:
 >'Oh, Lord for what we are about to receive make us devoutly thankful Amen.''
 A prayer was prayer to East Side" :" Anything that began with Lord" in reverent terms and ended with amen" was prayer. His grandfather had been a godly man, and he had said it, there fore it was appropriate on this occasion. The effect was the same upon the oth- CTS, for the words slnacked of the phraseology of the wandering exhorters they had heard.
 After the passing of the Missourian there was even less to do; the men were more taciturn with each other, but there was noticeably less profanity among them, possibly because they har- bored their strength more jealously and the exertion was unnecessary, or be- cause their mouths were too dry to ar ticulate many words. It was now six weeks since they had set out across the sink" expecting to get the cattle off their hands and have little time" In the city before starting back to the camp, but the wild-eyed, sorry looking things seemed unpromising enough now even for glue factory.
 As East Side" Jay on the ground looking up through the holes in his hat
 they stood upright and walked no more than was absolutely necessary, for that required an expenditure of strength -lazily watching the flocks of birds that swooped and poised in the air above him he discovered, or thought he did, that they cast shadow against the sky tiny gray shadow and he watched for the utter lack of anything else to watch. When the birds flew lower, the shadow seemed to grow larger, but when final ly they flew away there was still the shadow. larger and darker. With wild whoop fee sprang to his feet, forgetting the value of harboring his strength as he grasped the import of that shadow. 1t was a cloud Every man sprang up at that tiny speck and went to work with white face and unsteady hands. The epeck grew larger and the men worked harder; every hole or trough that led to the basin was cleared for action so that not one precious drop might be lost. Their words were few but kindly as they scraped away with one eye on the ground and the other on the cloud slow ly but enthusiastically growing larger and coming their way.
 During the night those gun scorched dreamers dreamed of the moist winds and rain clouds foregathering over the moon, then of rain drops scattering gently until they made a soaking down. pour. But they had often dreamed that it when their parched tongues hung out of their mouths and cracked fer dryness. But this time they had grown wary. Even in their sleep they were on their guard and not to be beguiled into believing.
 When at last in the early morning the rain did come, with the first pattering drops every man forgot everything ir the world but the all- consuming paseion to slal1e his burning thirst; until their hats had caught enough to drain, they sucked their shirt sleeves. Then, because his own need for that last charge was no longer imperative, the outfit boss drew a bead on the likeliest animal in the herd, and they feasted royalty joy ously, uproariously on steak and water. And in the exuberance of their glee no one noticed that for convenience they had chosen the mound that covered the for their table,
 After the feast every man laid down in his trench, which was now filled with water, and soaked, soaked, through to the marrow, rousing himself only to drain his hat, then falling back and soaking more And when, afteftwenty four hours of soaking, they got up out of their trenches. each waterlogged man was a firm believer in the efficacy of Argonaut
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