e the queerest creatures
under the blue of heaven. It ain't in the power of man to understand
them. Some minutes they are doing as you'd likely think they would; the
next thing you know they are all stampeding off by themselves, and try
as you will you cannot stop 'em. They dinna seem sometimes to have a bit
of brains."

Donald laughed.

"Aye! You may well laugh, sitting here, but it's no so funny when they
go chasing after the leaders and jumping over the face of some cliff.
Think of seeing a hundred of 'em piled up dead at your feet!"

"Did such a thing as that really ever happen, Sandy?" questioned Donald
incredulously.

"It did so. Didn't bears get after a flock on one of the ranges and
didn't the whole lot of scared creatures start running? If they had but
waited either the dogs or the herders might have driven off the bears.
But no! Nothing would do but they must run--and run they did. One after
another they leaped over the edge of the rimrock until most of the flock
was destroyed. Folks named the place 'Pile-Up Chasm.' It was a sorry
loss to the owner."

"But I don't see why----"

"No, nor anybody else," interrupted Sandy. "That's the sort of thing
they do. When they are frightened they never make a sound--they just
run. If nobody heads them off they are like to run to their death; and
when anybody does head them off it must be done carefully or the front
ones will wheel about and pile up on all those coming toward them. Lots
of sheep are killed in this way. They trample each other to death. Why,
once a man down in Glen City was driving a big flock along when around a
turn in the road came a motor-truck. The sheep got scared and the front
ones whisked straight about. That started others. Soon there was a grand
mix-up--sheep all panic-stricken and tramping over each other. The owner
lost half his herd. Now you see why we have to have leaders."

"Leaders?"

"Yes. That is one part of making up the herds. We must put some sheep
that are wiser than the rest in every flock that they may lead the
stupid ones. I dinna ken where they'd be if we didn't. We take as
leaders sheep that are 'flock-wise'--by that I mean old ewes or wethers
that have long been in the herds and know the ways. Sometimes, also, we
put in a goat or two, for a goat has the wit to find water and food for
himself. Not so the sheep! Never a bit! You have to lead sheep clean up
to grass and to water as well. They can never find anything for
th