he spur just a-touching--ah! you brute!"

For, the moment the spur touched him, his left hind leg had reached
forward in a kick that struck the stirrup a smart blow. Several times,
out of curiosity, Daylight attempted the spur, and each time Bob's hoof
landed the stirrup. Then Daylight, following the horse's example of
the unexpected, suddenly drove both spurs into him and reached him
underneath with the quirt.

"You ain't never had a real licking before," he muttered as Bob, thus
rudely jerked out of the circle of his own impish mental processes,
shot ahead.

Half a dozen times spurs and quirt bit into him, and then Daylight
settled down to enjoy the mad magnificent gallop. No longer punished,
at the end of a half mile Bob eased down into a fast canter. Wolf,
toiling in the rear, was catching up, and everything was going nicely.

"I'll give you a few pointers on this whirling game, my boy," Daylight
was saying to him, when Bob whirled.

He did it on a gallop, breaking the gallop off short by fore legs
stiffly planted. Daylight fetched up against his steed's neck with
clasped arms, and at the same instant, with fore feet clear of the
ground, Bob whirled around. Only an excellent rider could have escaped
being unhorsed, and as it was, Daylight was nastily near to it. By the
time he recovered his seat, Bob was in full career, bolting the way he
had come, and making Wolf side-jump to the bushes.

"All right, darn you!" Daylight grunted, driving in spurs and quirt
again and again. "Back-track you want to go, and back-track you sure
will go till you're dead sick of it."

When, after a time, Bob attempted to ease down the mad pace, spurs and
quirt went into him again with undiminished vim and put him to renewed
effort. And when, at last, Daylight decided that the horse had had
enough, he turned him around abruptly and put him into a gentle canter
on the forward track. After a time he reined him in to a stop to see
if he were breathing painfully.

Standing for a minute, Bob turned his head and nuzzled his rider's
stirrup in a roguish, impatient way, as much as to intimate that it was
time they were going on.

"Well, I'll be plumb gosh darned!" was Daylight's comment. "No
ill-will, no grudge, no nothing-and after that lambasting! You're sure
a hummer, Bob."

Once again Daylight was lulled into fancied security. For an hour Bob
was all that could be desired of a spirited mount, when, and as usual
without