ind runnin' the buffalo somewhat difficult,"
returned the boy. "Not that I know anything about it myself, for this
is the first time I've been out; an' even now Dan won't let me use a
gun; but I've often heard the men talkin' about it! an' some o' them
have complained that they have found it uncommon difficult to load when
at full gallop--specially when the horse is hard in the mouth."

"I make no manner o' doubt you're right, lad, but I've got my sea-legs
on now, so to speak; leastwise I've got used to ridin' in the trip out
here, as well as used to steerin' wi' the tiller-ropes in front, which
seems to me right in the teeth o' natur', though I couldn't see how it
could well be otherwise. But I confess that my chief difficulty is the
ordnance, for it interferes a good deal wi' the steerin'.
Hows'ever--`never ventur' never win,' you know. I never expected to
take up a noo purfession without some trouble."

As he spoke, the seaman's horse--a large brown chestnut--put its foot in
a hole, and plunged forward with great violence, barely escaping a fall.

"Hold on!" shouted Archie in alarm.

"Hold on it is!" sang out the sailor in reply.

And hold on it was, for he had the chestnut round the neck with both
arms. Indeed he was sitting, or lying, on its neck altogether.

"It ain't an easy job," he gasped, while he struggled to regain the
saddle, "when a fellow gets hove on to the bowsprit this way, to git
fairly back on the main-deck again. But a Jenkins never was beaten in
fair fight. That's all right. Now then, Archie, you're an obleegin'
cove. Do git down an' pick up the gun for me. You see, if I git down
it's a tryin' job to git up again--the side o' this here craft bein' so
steep an' so high out o' the water. Thank'ee; why, boy, you jump down
an' up like a powder-monkey. It ain't broke, is it?"

"No. It seems all right," answered the boy, as he handed the gun to its
owner. "But if you let it go like that often, it won't be much worth
when the run's over."

"Let it go, boy?" repeated the sailor. "It was either let it or myself
go, an' when it comes to a toss up o' that sort, Fred Jenkins knows how
to look arter number one."

It will be seen from all this that our seaman was not quite so much at
home on the prairie as on the sea. Indeed, if the expression be
permissible, he was very much at sea on that undulating plain, and did
not take so kindly to the green waves of the rolling prairie as to the
h