ve ears rather sharper than
anything. Tom had given me his directions in a whisper.

So I climbed the bank and looked over the cornfield, and there in the
centre I could see a small black mass of moving things, about three
hundred yards away. I went quietly back to the river-bed, and found that
most of the fellows had dismounted and were "cinching" up their saddles.

A moment later I was told off with a vaquero (cowboy) to ride up the bed
of a creek that ran at right-angles to the river and parallel with the
cornfield. We were to try to "head" the cattle, and so prevent them from
breaking out of the field, up the hillside, and getting away into the
mountains again, where we should have had to leave them.

The creek-bed was low, and afforded us good cover for three parts of the
way. Then it shallowed, and we soon were able to see, from our horses,
the cattle in the corn. We thought we had been very quiet indeed, but we
noticed a hurried movement among the beasts, and with a cry "They're
off!" my companion dug his spurs into his horse and was off like the
wind himself. And I after him.

We dashed into the corn, and raced like mad to head the stampeding
beasts. It was the strangest sensation in the world, galloping in the
moonlight through the waving corn, which was up to our horses'
shoulders. It made me quite giddy for a second or two, but I galloped
madly on after my companion, who, with his shrill cowboy yells, helped
the roaring cattle to wake the midnight silences of the valley. I
joined in the yelling, too, and, so soon as our voices were heard, there
was a chorus in reply from where we had left the rest of our party.

"We shall never head them," I cried.

"Perhaps not, but we'll try," answered the vaquero, as we tore onward. I
thought we had not the slightest hope of heading them. Up the hillside
we tore to keep them on the flat ground, and at every leap over a rough
incline I thought my horse would break his neck and mine too. But as
surefooted as goats are those horses of the hills. At length, for some
reason or other, the cattle wheeled and went back down towards the
river, and we, of course, followed.

Suddenly, two of them broke away to the right, and I after them. I
thought I might be of some little use, even if I were not an expert
lassoer. But those two wild cattle knew too much for me. They tore
across a gully, dashed up the other side and away at full gallop into
the hills. I let them go. If I had