to see which side
came uppermost, and thousands of necks craned futilely.

"Don Jose will choose his starting-point," Dade called out. "But first
the two will lead their horses over the ground, so that they may make
sure that there are no holes or stones to trip them."

Even in that preliminary, they showed how differently two persons will
go about doing the same thing. Jose, trailing immense, silver
spur-rowels, walked with the bridle reins looped over his arm, his eyes
examining critically every foot of the ground as he passed.

Jack, loosening his riata as he dismounted, caught the loop over the
high horn and let the rope drop to the ground. He wore no spurs; and as
for Surry, he had no bridle and bit, but a hackamore instead.

Jack threw the reins over the neck of the horse. "Come, old fellow," he
said, quite as if he were speaking to a person, and started off. And
Surry, his neck arched, his ears perked knowingly, stepped out after him
with that peculiar, springy gait that speaks eloquently of perfect
muscles and a body fairly vibrating with energy; the riata trailed after
him, every little tendency towards a kink taken out of it.

"Dios! What a caballo is that white one!" Dade heard a Salinas man
exclaim, and flushed at the praise.

Back they came, Jack and Surry, with Jack ten feet in advance of the
horse; for Jose had chosen to remain at the southern end, with the sun
at his left shoulder. Jack, for all his eagerness to begin, found time
to shake hands with Bill and say a word to some others as he passed--and
those eyes up there that watched did not miss one single movement.

"Look, you! The gringo is telling his friends adios while he may!" some
one shouted loudly from across the arena; and a great laugh roared from
the throats that were dark, and handclapping at the witticism made the
speaker a self-conscious caballero indeed.

At the corral, which was his starting-point, Jack took up the dragging
riata, and with his handkerchief wiped off the dust while he coiled it
again; hung it over the saddle horn and waited for the signal.

He was scowling now at certain remarks that came to his ears from the
seats, with titters and chuckles to point their wit. But he sent a
cheering eye-signal to Dade, whose face was strained and noticeably
white under the tan.

Half-way down the line, among the Americans, there was a little stir,
and then a pistol barked with that loud crash which black powder makes.
Jack, o