Year: 1879

On those prairies where buffalo and deer
and antelope have run so many years, there
are vast quantities of old bones lying about
These old bones are of some commercial val
ne. My brother and drew in rather over
hundred tons during one winter. 1t was n
three-day trip to 90 out on the plains and
get load. While out on these trips, we
made considerable account of jack-rabbits ;
we had two greyhounds on purpose to hunt
them, and to hunt antelopes did most of
the hunting; my brother was little lame
that season from a "hoist" he had received
off o reaper. We had one of the heetest po-
MES for running have ever seen. We called
her Gilly.


would get up before sunrise, call in Sport
and Grip (the two greyhounds), then mount
Gilly, and start after jack-rabbit for break
fast. One morning we got after pretty big
jack, and ran him past an emigrant party
hauled up for the night. Two men and a
woman were stirring about; and l saw two
nice, rosy girls peering out of the back end
of wagon. They looked so inspiring that
thought would show them little fancy rid
ing. SO l touched Gilly and told her to 60.
At that she just reached out those white legs
of hers and Strengthened to it. Oh, she went
like an arrow after the hounds and past that
schooner, and away on across the prairie.
And, right in the midst of her keenest run,
she broke into a wolf hole Believe it or
not, the mare turned IA complete somersault
But wasn't in the saddle when she turned
it had gone on, and went on went on
my head, went on my knees, went every way.
| was more than fifty feet from the pony
when l finally stopped Sport and Grip
pulled up to see me go, and the jack,-he
stopped and looked. The wolf came out of
the ground and looked, too. They were all
SO interested in it, that they entirely forgot
each other And back at the wagon 1 saw
six or seven men, women and girls, standing
motonless, with their mouths open When
l. at length got up, such ''ha ha :" came
waited on the wind as l shall not soon forget
1t hurt me outrageously. got up feeling as
if were a hundred and one years old AS
for the jack, he had taken leave; and the
dogs were barking into the wolf-hole.


Another young fellow, named Adney Clark
and myself once ran a jack-rabbit under a
settlers house, which stood out by itself on
the prairie. The rabbit ran up to it and
crawled under the sill The hounds could
not get under. We went round the house
and then into it. There was no one at home.
We were determined to have that jack, any
how. So we pulled up two or three boards
of the floor, and Ad took the fire. poker and
got down under the floor to poke out the
jack He had not been down there long
when he uttered screech and came out at
one jump, with great big rattesnake hang
ing to his bootleg! I grabbed chair and
killed the snake. Ad was so weak he could
not stand alone and could scarcely speak. l
pulled off his boot But there was no mark
on him. Fortunately, the snake had only
bitten his bootleg. We then poked out the
jack and the hounds grabbed him.


And at another time, when eight or ten of
us were out racing down jacks, with as many
as thirteen hounds, we all got after one big
fellow, and at length ran him into an old de-
serted ''dig-out"


A "dig-out," or ''root-out, is n house dug
in the ground, and the floor of it is often four
or five feet below the level of the soil. The
door of this one was gone. The jack, being
pretty hard run, darted in there. In went
the whole pack of hounds after him, and
there was no end of pow-wow. Round and
about they went, yelping and growing down
there in the dark. We thought there would
MT be much left of that jack when, by and by,
out he came and leaped away, leaving all the
hounds in there tumbling over one another,
and the end of the business was that we had
to go in and haul those dogs out by the legs.
st. Nicholas for NoUember.