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Show 26 TEAVELS AND ADVENTURES IN THE FAR WEST. when with a sudden jerk it was thrown to the ground; the red hot iron is now applied to the fleshy part of the hip-a terrible kicking and braying ensues, but it was always the sign that the work was done effectually. In California, the most beautiful and valuable saddle horses are branded with a large unseemly mark on some prominent part of the body or neck, which would in this locality depreciate the value of the animals. I selected an Indian pony for myself; he was recommended as being a first rate buffalo horse ; that is to say, he was trained to hunt buffaloes. This animal was given into my own charge, and I only then began to realize that I had entered into duties which I was unqualified to perform. I had never saddled a horse myself. My sedentary employment -in a city, never having required me to do such offices ; and now I was to become my own ostler, and ride him to water twice a day, besides running after him on the prairie for an hour sometimes before I could catch him. This onerous duty I finally performed as well as my companions. But, dear reader, follow me to a camp on the mountains of snow, where I exchanged my horse for a mule, at daylight, with the thermometer 20° below zero. Do you see, far away on the hill-side, an animal moving slowly ? that is my mule ; he is searching among the deep snows for a bite of blighted grass or the top of some wild bush to break his fast on. How will you get him ? I will go for him ; watch me while I tramp through the frozen snow. My mule sees me, and knowing that my errand is to prepare him for his day's journey, without first giving him provender to enable him to perform it, prefers to eat his scanty breakfast first, and moves leisurely along; his lariat, about thirty feet in length, trails along the |