off the old red jacket of the rank and file and put on
the black uniform with braid looped back and forth across the front of
it, and gold hieroglyphics on the collar, Piegan Smith and I stood up
with him and Lyn and helped them get fitted to double harness. Not that
there was any lack of other folk; indeed, it seemed to me that the
official contingent of Fort Walsh had turned out en masse to attend the
ceremony. But Piegan and I were the star guests.

* * * * *

Ah, well, we can't always be young and full of the pure joy of living.
One must grow old. And inevitably one looks back with a pang, and sighs
for the vanished days. But Time keeps his scythe a-swinging, and we go
out--like a snuffed candle. We _lived_, though, we who frolicked along
the forty-ninth parallel when Civilization stood afar and viewed the
scene askance; but she came down upon us and took possession fast enough
when that wild land was partly tamed, and now few are left of those who
knew and loved the old West, its perils, its hardships, its bigness of
heart and readiness of hand. Such of us as remain are like the buffalo
penned in national parks--a sorry remnant of the days that were.

THE END.

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