storm
in earnest, rain, hail, sleet, and the clouds seemed to touch the earth
and gather in their inpenetrable embrace every thing thereon. For a long
time I rode on in the direction of home, but as I could not see fifty
yards ahead it was a case of going it blind. After riding for many weary
hours through the storm I came across a little log cabin on the Palidore
river. I rode up to within one hundred yards of it where I was motioned
to stop by an old long haired man who stepped out of the cabin door with
a long buffalo gun on his arm. It was with this he had motioned me to
stop.

I promptly pulled up and raised my hat, which, according to the custom
of the cowboy country, gave him to understand I was a cowboy from the
western cow ranges. He then motioned me to come on. Riding up to the
cabin he asked me to dismount and we shook hands.

He said, when I saw you coming I said to myself that must be a lost
cowboy from some of the western cow ranges. I told him I was lost all
right, and I told him who I was and where from. Again we shook hands, he
saying as we did so, that we were friends until we met again, and he
hoped forever. He then told me to picket out my horse and come in and
have some supper, which very welcome invitation I accepted.

His cabin was constructed of rough hewn logs, somewhat after the fashion
of a Spanish block house. One part of it was constructed under ground, a
sort of dug out, while the upper portion of the cabin proper was
provided with many loop holes, commanding every direction.

He later told me these loop holes had stood him in handy many a time
when he had been attacked by Indians, in their efforts to capture him.
On entering his cabin I was amazed to see the walls covered with all
kinds of skins, horns, and antlers. Buffalo skins in great numbers
covered the floor and bed, while the walls were completely hidden behind
the skins of every animal of that region, including large number of
rattle snakes skins and many of their rattles.

His bed, which was in one corner of the dug out, was of skins, and to
me, weary from my long ride through the storm, seemed to be the most
comfortable place on the globe just then. He soon set before me a
bounteous supper, consisting of buffalo meat and corn dodgers, and
seldom before have I enjoyed a meal as I did that one. During supper he
told me many of his experiences in the western country. His name was
Cater, and he was one of the oldest buffalo hunt