days, and
there was quite enough in the look of things to make men thoughtful.
They knew nothing about the Nez Perces and the grasshoppers and the
wicked old mule, but the tall man in front only looked around for one
moment before he exclaimed,

"I'd call it--Been some kind of Injins here lately. No game, I reckon,
or they'd ha' stayed."

"No kind of game'd stay long in such a burned-up country as this is,"
added a squarely made, gray-headed man who rode up alongside of him.
"We've nothing to do but to push on. We must get out of this or we'll
lose our whole outfit."

"Sure as shootin'! I move we just unhitch long enough for a feed and a
good drink, and lay in what water we can carry, and go on all night.
There's a good moon to travel by, and it'll be cooler work for the
critters."

"It's our best hold. Sile, don't you gallop that horse of yours one rod.
There's work enough before him. Save him up."

"All right, father. But isn't this the camp? He can rest now."

"No he can't, nor you either. It's an all-night job."

Sile was not gray-headed. He was very nearly red-headed. Still, he
looked enough like his father in several ways. He was broadly and
heavily built, strong and hearty, with something in his merry, freckled
face which seemed to indicate a very good opinion of himself. Boys of
fourteen, or thereabout, who can ride and shoot, and who have travelled
a little, are apt to get that kind of expression, and it never tells
lies about them.

Sile's horse was a roan, and looked like a fast one under a light weight
like his. Just large enough not to be called "ponyish," and with signs
of high spirit. The moment the youngster sprang from the saddle and
began to remove it it became manifest that there was a good
understanding between horse and boy. Any intelligent animal is inclined
to make a pet of its master if it has a fair chance.

"Now, Hip, there isn't any grass, but you can make believe. I'll bring a
nose-bag as soon as you've cooled off and have had a drink of water."

He was as good as his word, and there were oats in the nose-bag when he
brought it, and Hip shortly left it empty, but in less than two hours
from that time the two tilted wagons were once more moving steadily
onward towards the West and the mountains.

There had been a hearty supper cooked and eaten, and there was not a
human being in the party who seemed much the worse for fatigue. The
spare horses and mules had taken the places of t