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Show 384 THE CALIFORNIA AND OREGON TRAIL. asseverations, and insisted that two horses were certainly carried off. At this Jim Gurney declared that he was crazy; Tete Rouge indignantly denied the charge, on which Jim appealed to us. As we declined to give our judgment on so delicate a matter, the dispute grew hot between T~te Rouge and his ac. cuser, until he was directed to go to bed and not alarm the camp again if he saw the whole Arapahoe village coming. .• • .. CHAPTER XXIV. THE CHASE. " Mightiest of all the beasts of cha~e, That roam in woody Caledon, Crashing the forest in his race, The mountain Bull comes thundering on." C.A.DYOW CASTLE. THE country before us was now thronged with buffalo, and a sketch of the manner of hunting them will not be out of place. There are two methods commonly practised, 'running' and 'approaching.' The chase on horseback, which goes by the name of 'running,' is the more violent and dashing mode of the two. Indeed, of all American wild sports this is the wildest. Once among the buffalo, the hunter, unless long use has made him familiar with the situation, dashes forward in utter recklessness and self-abandonment. I-Ie thinks of nothing, cares for nothing but the game; his mind is stimulated to the highest pitch, yet intensely concentrated on one object. ln the midst of the flying herd, where the uproar and the dust are thickest, it never wavers for a moment ; he drops the rein and |
