TO, BUT DO NOT TERMINATE IN, THE ROCKY
MOUNTAINS--A GRIZZLY BEAR.

There is a proverb--or a saying--or at least somebody or book has told
us, that some Irishman once said--"Be aisy, or, if ye can't be aisy, be
as aisy as ye can."

Now, we count that good advice, and strongly recommend it to all and
sundry. Had we been at the side of Dick Varley on the night after his
taming of the wild horse, we would have strongly urged that advice upon
him. Whether he would have listened to it or not is quite another
question--we rather think not. Reader, if you wish to know why, go and
do what he did, and if you feel no curious sensations about the region
of the loins after it, we will tell you why Dick Varley wouldn't have
listened to that advice. Can a man feel as if his joints were wrenched
out of their sockets, and listen to advice--be that advice good or bad?
Can he feel as though these joints were trying to re-set and
re-dislocate themselves perpetually--and listen to advice? Can he feel
as if he were sitting down on red-hot iron, when he's not sitting down
at all--and listen to advice? Can he--but no! why pursue the subject?
Poor Dick spent that night in misery, and the greater part of the
following day in sleep, to make up for it.

When he got up to breakfast in the afternoon, he felt much better, but
shaky.

"Now, pup," he said, stretching himself, "we'll go and see our horse.
_Ours_, pup; yours and mine: didn't you help to catch him, eh! pup?"

Crusoe acknowledged the fact with a wag, and a playful
"bow-wow-wow-oo-ow!" and followed his master to the place where the
horse had been picketted. It was standing there quite quiet, but
looking a little timid.

Dick went boldly up to it, and patted its head and stroked its nose, for
nothing is so likely to alarm either a tame or a wild horse as any
appearance of timidity or hesitation on the part of those who approach
them.

After treating it thus for a short time, he stroked down its neck, and
then its shoulders--the horse eyeing him all the time nervously.
Gradually he stroked its back and limbs gently, and walked quietly round
and round it once or twice, sometimes approaching and sometimes going
away, but never either hesitating or doing anything abruptly. This
done, he went down to the stream and filled his cap with water and
carried it to the horse, which snuffed suspiciously and backed a little,
so he laid the cap down, and went up and patted him again. Pre