Five Mile Beach weekly journal., 1908-09-18

LILIES laIG t4l6ts 10 WCh
S3QQIUAU as fire and frost. The
&444&4M4I only time I ever really
- suffered from thirst was
while hunting prong-buck.
1t was late in the summer. i was
with the ranch wagon On the way to
join a roundup, and as we were out
Of meat I started for a days hunt.
After two or three hours ride, up
winding c~oulies, and through the
scorched desolation Of patches Of Bad
Lands, / reached the rolling prairie.
The heat and drought had long burned
the short grass duh brown; the bot
toms of what had been pools were
covered with hard, dry, cracked earth
The day was cloudless, and the heat
oppressive. There were many ante
lope, but I got only one shot, breaking
a bucks leg; and though / followed 1t
for a couple Of hours I could not over
take 1t. BY this time 1t was late in
the afternoon, and I was far away
from the river; SO l pushed for a creek,
In the bed of which l had always
found pools Of water, especially to-
wards the head, as is usual with plains
watercourses. To my chagrin, how
ever, they all proved to be dry; and
though I rode up the creek bed to-
ward the head, carefully searching for
any sign of water, night closed on me
before I found any. For two or three
hours I stumbled on, leading my horse.
In my fruitless search; then a tumble
over a cut bank In the dark warned
me that l might as well stay where ]
was for the rest OF the warm night
Accordingly I unsaddled the horse,
and tied him to a sage brush; after
awhile he began to feed on the dewy
grass. At first I was too thirsty to
sleep. Finally I fell into a sumber,
and when I awoke at dawn I felt no
thirst. For an hour or two more ]
continued my search for water In the
creek bed; then abandoned 1t and rode
straight for the river. By the time
we reached 1t my thirst had come
back with redoubled force, my mouth
was parcheds and the horse was In
quite as bad a plight; we rushed down
to the brink, and It seemed as II we
Gould neither of US ever drink u I'll
Of the tepid. rather muddy water. or
course this experience was merely I'M
pleasant; thirst is not a source of real
danger in the plains country proper,
whereas In the hideous deserts that
extend from southern Idaho through
Utah and Nevada to Arizona. 1t ever
menaces with death the hunter and ex-
plorer.
In the plains the weather is apt to
be in extremes; the heat Is tropical,
the cold arctic, and the droughts are
relieved by furious floods. These are
generally more severe and lasting In
the spring, after the melting Of the
snow; and fierce local freshets follow
the occasional c~loudbursts. The large
rivers then become wholly impassa-
BILE, and ever the smaller are formi-
dable obstacles. It Is not easy to get
cattle across a swollen stream, where
the current runs like a turbid mill-race
over the bed of shifting quicksand.
Once FIVE Of us took a thousand head
of trail steers across the Little Mis-
souri, when the river was up, and 1t
was no light task. The muddy current
was boiling past the banks covered
with driftwood and foul yellow froth,
and the frightened cattle shrank from
entering 1t. At last, by hard riding,
with much loud shouting and swing
ing Of ropes. we got the leaders in, and
the whole herd followed. After them
we went in our turn, the horses swim
ming at one moment. and the e
staggering and ioundering through
the quicksand. I was riding my pet
cutting horse, Muley, which has the
provoking habit OF making great
bounds where the water is just not
deep enough for swimming; once he
tie were caught by the currents and
rolled over and over; most of these we
were able, with the help Of our ropes,
to put on their feet again; only one
was drowned, or rather choked in a
quicksand. Many swan down stream.
and In consequence struck a difficult
landing, where the river ran under a
cut bank; these we had to haul out
with our ropes.
Although ] have OFTEN had q morse
down in quicksand oil in crossing a
swollen river, and have had to work
hard to save him. l have lever myself
lost one under such circumstances
Yet once I saw the horse of of my
men drown under him directly in from
OF the ranch house. while he was try
ing to cross the river. This was In
early spring. soon after the ice had
broken.
When making long wagon trips over
the great plains, antelope often ofer
the only source Of meat supply, save
for occasional water fowl, sage fowl.
and prairie fowl - the sharp-tailed
prairie fowl, be 1t understood. This
is the characteristic grouse of the cat
tie country; the true prairie fowl is a
bird of the farming land farther east.
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