hat the animal leaped and
kicked in its frantic efforts to throw this intolerable burden
would be a tame manner of expressing what took place. Words cannot
adequately describe the scene. It reared, plunged, shrieked, vaulted
into the air, stood straight up on its hind legs, and then almost as
straight upon its fore ones; but its rider held on like a burr. Then
the mustang raced wildly forwards a few paces, then as wildly back,
and then stood still and trembled violently. But this was only a brief
lull in the storm, so Dick saw that the time was now come to assert
the superiority of his race.

"Stay back, Crusoe, and watch my rifle, pup," he cried, and raising
his heavy switch he brought it down with a sharp cut across the
horse's flank, at the same time loosening the rein which hitherto he
had held tight.

The wild horse uttered a passionate cry, and sprang forward like the
bolt from a cross-bow.

And now commenced a race which, if not so prolonged, was at least as
furious as that of the far-famed Mazeppa. Dick was a splendid rider,
however--at least as far as "sticking on" goes. He might not have come
up to the precise pitch desiderated by a riding-master in regard to
carriage, etc., but he rode that wild horse of the prairie with as
much ease as he had formerly ridden his own good steed, whose bones
had been picked by the wolves not long ago.

The pace was tremendous, for the youth's weight was nothing to that
muscular frame, which bounded with cat-like agility from wave to wave
of the undulating plain in ungovernable terror. In a few minutes the
clump of willows where Crusoe and his rifle lay were out of sight
behind; but it mattered not, for Dick had looked up at the sky and
noted the position of the sun at the moment of starting. Away they
went on the wings of the wind, mile after mile over the ocean-like
waste--curving slightly aside now and then to avoid the bluffs that
occasionally appeared on the scene for a few minutes and then swept
out of sight behind them. Then they came to a little rivulet. It was a
mere brook of a few feet wide, and two or three yards, perhaps, from
bank to bank. Over this they flew so easily that the spring was
scarcely felt, and continued the headlong course. And now a more
barren country was around them. Sandy ridges and scrubby grass
appeared everywhere, reminding Dick of the place where he had been
so ill. Rocks, too, were scattered about, and at one place the horse
dashed with