nd sky,
Mocking with graceless wing and rusty coat
His priestly presence as he trotted by.
He would have cursed the bird by bell and rote,
But other game just then was in his eye,--
A savage camp, whose occupants preferred
Their heathen darkness to the living Word.

He rang his bell, and at the martial sound
Twelve silver spurs their jingling rowels clashed;
Six horses sprang across the level ground
As six dragoons in open order dashed;
Above their heads the lassos circled round,
In every eye a pious fervor flashed;
They charged the camp, and in one moment more
They lassoed six and reconverted four.

The Friar saw the conflict from a knoll,
And sang Laus Deo and cheered on his men:
"Well thrown, Bautista,--that's another soul;
After him, Gomez,--try it once again;
This way, Felipe,--there the heathen stole;
Bones of St. Francis!--surely that makes TEN;
Te Deum laudamus--but they're very wild;
Non nobis Domine--all right, my child!"

When at that moment--as the story goes--
A certain squaw, who had her foes eluded,
Ran past the Friar, just before his nose.
He stared a moment, and in silence brooded;
Then in his breast a pious frenzy rose
And every other prudent thought excluded;
He caught a lasso, and dashed in a canter
After that Occidental Atalanta.

High o'er his head he swirled the dreadful noose;
But, as the practice was quite unfamiliar,
His first cast tore Felipe's captive loose,
And almost choked Tiburcio Camilla,
And might have interfered with that brave youth's
Ability to gorge the tough tortilla;
But all things come by practice, and at last
His flying slip-knot caught the maiden fast.

Then rose above the plain a mingled yell
Of rage and triumph,--a demoniac whoop:
The Padre heard it like a passing knell,
And would have loosened his unchristian loop;
But the tough raw-hide held the captive well,
And held, alas! too well the captor-dupe;
For with one bound the savage fled amain,
Dragging horse, Friar, down the lonely plain.

Down the arroyo, out across the mead,
By heath and hollow, sped the flying maid,
Dragging behind her still the panting steed
And helpless Friar, who in vain essayed
To cut the lasso