being averse to exhausting his good dog and his new
companion. Each night he encamped under the shade
of a tree or a bush when he could find one, or in the
open prairie when there were none, and, picketing his
horse to a short stake or pin which he carried with him
for the purpose, lit his fire, had supper, and lay down
to rest. In a few days Charlie became so tame and so
accustomed to his master's voice that he seemed quite
reconciled to his new life. There can be no doubt whatever
that he had a great dislike to solitude; for on one
occasion, when Dick and Crusoe went off a mile or so
from the camp, where Charlie was tied, and disappeared
from his view, he was heard to neigh so loudly that
Dick ran back, thinking the wolves must have attacked
him. He was all right, however, and exhibited evident
tokens of satisfaction when they returned.
On another occasion his fear of being left alone was
more clearly demonstrated.
Dick had been unable to find wood or water that day,
so he was obliged to encamp upon the open plain. The
want of water was not seriously felt, however, for he
had prepared a bladder in which he always carried
enough to give him one pannikin of hot sirup, and
leave a mouthful for Crusoe and Charlie. Dried buffalo
dung formed a substitute for fuel. Spreading his buffalo
robe, he lit his fire, put on his pannikin to boil, and
stuck up a piece of meat to roast, to the great delight
of Crusoe, who sat looking on with much interest.
Suddenly Charlie, who was picketed a few hundred
yards off in a grassy spot, broke his halter close by the
headpiece, and with a snort of delight bounded away,
prancing and kicking up his heels!
Dick heaved a deep sigh, for he felt sure that his
horse was gone. However, in a little Charlie stopped,
and raised his nose high in the air, as if to look for
his old equine companions. But they were gone; no
answering neigh replied to his; and he felt, probably
for the first time, that he was really alone in the world.
Having no power of smell, whereby he might have
traced them out as the dog would have done, he looked
in a bewildered and excited state all round the horizon.
Then his eye fell on Dick and Crusoe sitting by their
little fire. Charlie looked hard at them, and then again
at the horizon; and then, coming to the conclusion, no
doubt, that the matter was quite beyond his comprehension,
he quietly took to feeding.
Dick availed himself of the chance, and tried to catch
him; but he spent an hour with Crusoe in the vain
attempt, and at last they gave it up in disgust and returned
to the fire, where they finished their supper and
went to bed.
Next morning they saw Charlie feeding close at hand,
so they took breakfast, and tried to catch him again.
But it was of no use; he was evidently coquetting with
them, and dodged about and defied their utmost efforts,
for there were only a few inches of line hanging to his
head. At last it occurred to Dick that he would try
the experiment of forsaking him. So he packed up his
things, rolled up the buffalo robe, threw it and the rifle
on his shoulder, and walked deliberately away.
"Come along, Crusoe!" he cried, after walking a few
paces.
But Crusoe stood by the fire with his head up, and
an expression on his face that said, "Hallo, man! what's
wrong? You've forgot Charlie! Hold on! Are you
mad?"
"Come here, Crusoe!" cried his master in a decided
tone.
Crusoe obeyed at once. Whatever mistake there
might be, there was evidently none in that command;
so he lowered his head and tail humbly, and trotted on
with his master, but he perpetually turned his head as
he went, first on this side and then on that, to look and
wonder at Charlie.
When they were far away on the plain, Charlie suddenly
became aware that something was wrong. He
trotted to the brow of a slope, with his head and tail
very high up indeed, and looked after them; then he
looked at the fire, and neighed; then he trotted quickly
up to it, and seeing that everything was gone he began
to neigh violently, and at last started off at full speed,
and overtook his friends, passing within a few feet of
them, and, wheeling round a few yards off, stood trembling
like an aspen leaf.
Dick called him by his name and advanced, while
Charlie met him half-way, and allowed himself to be
saddled, bridled, and mounted forthwith.
After this Dick had no further trouble with his wild
horse.
At his next camping-place, which was in the midst of
a cluster of bushes close beside a creek, Dick came unexpectedly
upon a little wooden cross which marked the
head of a grave. There was no inscription on it, but the
Christian symbol told that it was the grave of a white
man. It is impossible to describe the rush of mingled
feelings that filled the soul of the young hunter as he
leaned on the muzzle of his rifle and looked at this
solitary resting-place of one who, doubtless like himself,
had been a roving hunter. Had he been young or old
when he fell? had he a mother in the distant settlement
who watched and longed and waited for the son
that was never more to gladden her eyes? had he been
murdered, or had he died there and been buried by his
sorrowing comrades? These and a thousand questions
passed rapidly through his mind as he gazed at the little
cross.
Suddenly he started. "Could it be the grave of Joe
or Henri?" For an instant the idea sent a chill to his
heart; but it passed quickly, for a second glance showed
that the grave was old, and that the wooden cross had
stood over it for years.
Dick turned away with a saddened heart; and that
night, as he pored over the pages of his Bible, his mind
was filled with many thoughts about eternity and the
world to come. He, too, must come to the grave one
day, and quit the beautiful prairies and his loved
rifle. It was a sad thought; but while he meditated
he thought upon his mother. "After all," he murmured,
"there must be happiness
without
the rifle, and youth,
and health, and the prairie! My mother's happy, yet
she don't shoot, or ride like wild-fire over the plains."
Then that word which had been sent so sweetly to him
through her hand came again to his mind, "My son,
give me thine heart;" and as he read God's Book, he
met with the word, "Delight thyself in the Lord, and he
shall give thee the desire of thine heart." "
The desireof thine heart
" Dick repeated this, and pondered it
till he fell asleep.
A misfortune soon after this befell Dick Varley which
well-nigh caused him to give way to despair. For some
time past he had been approaching the eastern slopes
of the Rocky Mountains--those ragged, jagged, mighty
hills which run through the whole continent from north
to south in a continuous chain, and form, as it were, the
backbone of America. One morning, as he threw the
buffalo robe off his shoulders and sat up, he was horrified
to find the whole earth covered with a mantle of snow.
We say he was horrified, for this rendered it absolutely
impossible any further to trace his companions either by
scent or sight.
For some time he sat musing bitterly on his sad fate,
while his dog came and laid his head sympathizingly on
his arm.
"Ah, pup!" he said, "I know ye'd help me if ye
could! But it's all up now; there's no chance of findin'
them--none!"
To this Crusoe replied by a low whine. He knew
full well that something distressed his master, but he
hadn't yet ascertained what it was. As something had
to be done, Dick put the buffalo robe on his steed, and
mounting said, as he was in the habit of doing each
morning, "Lead on, pup."
Crusoe put his nose to the ground and ran forward a
few paces, then he returned and ran about snuffing and
scraping up the snow. At last he looked up and uttered
a long melancholy howl.
"Ah! I knowed it," said Dick, pushing forward.
"Come on, pup; you'll have to
follow
now. Any way
we must go on."
The snow that had fallen was not deep enough to
offer the slightest obstruction to their advance. It was,
indeed, only one of those occasional showers common to
that part of the country in the late autumn, which
season had now crept upon Dick almost before he was
aware of it, and he fully expected that it would melt
away in a few days. In this hope he kept steadily
advancing, until he found himself in the midst of those
rocky fastnesses which divide the waters that flow into
the Atlantic from those that flow into the Pacific Ocean.
Still the slight crust of snow lay on the ground, and he
had no means of knowing whether he was going in the
right direction or not.
Game was abundant, and there was no lack of wood
now, so that his night bivouac was not so cold or dreary
as might have been expected.
Travelling, however, had become difficult, and even
dangerous, owing to the rugged nature of the ground
over which he proceeded. The scenery had completely
changed in its character. Dick no longer coursed over
the free, open plains, but he passed through beautiful
valleys filled with luxuriant trees, and hemmed in by
stupendous mountains, whose rugged sides rose upward
until the snow-clad peaks pierced the clouds.
There was something awful in these dark solitudes,
quite overwhelming to a youth of Dick's temperament.
His heart began to sink lower and lower every day, and
the utter impossibility of making up his mind what to
do became at length agonizing. To have turned and
gone back the hundreds of miles over which he had
travelled would have caused him some anxiety under
any circumstances, but to do so while Joe and Henri
were either wandering about there or in the power of
the savages was, he felt, out of the question. Yet in
which way should he go? Whatever course he took
might lead him farther and farther away from them.
In this dilemma he came to the determination of
remaining where he was, at least until the snow should
leave the ground.
He felt great relief even when this hopeless course
was decided upon, and set about making himself an encampment
with some degree of cheerfulness. When he
had completed this task, he took his rifle, and leaving
Charlie picketed in the centre of a dell, where the long,
rich grass rose high above the snow, went off to hunt.
On turning a rocky point his heart suddenly bounded
into his throat, for there, not thirty yards distant, stood
a huge grizzly bear!
Yes, there he was at last, the monster to meet which
the young hunter had so often longed--the terrible size
and fierceness of which he had heard so often spoken
about by the old hunters. There it stood at last; but
little did Dick Varley think that the first time he should
meet with his foe should be when alone in the dark recesses
of the Rocky Mountains, and with none to succour
him in the event of the battle going against him. Yes,
there was one. The faithful Crusoe stood by his side,
with his hair bristling, all his formidable teeth exposed,
and his eyes glaring in their sockets. Alas for poor
Crusoe had he gone into that combat alone! One stroke
of that monster's paw would have hurled him dead upon
the ground.
Dick's first fight with a grizzly
--
Adventure with adeer
--
A surprise
.
There is no animal in all the land so terrible and
dangerous as the grizzly bear. Not only is he the
largest of the species in America, but he is the fiercest,
the strongest, and the most tenacious of life--facts which
are so well understood that few of the western hunters
like to meet him single-handed, unless they happen
to be first-rate shots; and the Indians deem the encounter
so dangerous that to wear a collar composed
of the claws of a grizzly bear of his own killing is
counted one of the highest honours to which a young
warrior can attain.
The grizzly bear resembles the brown bear of Europe,
but it is larger, and the hair is long, the points being
of a paler shade. About the head there is a considerable
mixture of gray hair, giving it the "grizzly" appearance