THE RIO GRANDE

XXXIV. BAITING A WOLF-TRAP

XXXV. EL MORO

XXXVI. ZUNI, THE HOME OF THE AZTECS

XXXVII. A PRACTICAL USE OF TRIGONOMETRY

XXXVIII. DYING OF THIRST IN THE DESERT

XXXIX. CROSSING THE SIERRA NEVADA

XL. A HOME AND TWO FATHERS

ILLUSTRATIONS.

"IT WAS A LIVE BABY"

"TWO STALWART WARRIORS SEIZED HIM BY THE ARMS AND RAISED HIM BETWEEN
THEM AS THEY SWEPT PAST"

"THE STRANGE CRAFT WAS BORNE SLOWLY DOWN STREAM"

"'HEAD FOR THAT DARK SPACE, IT MARKS A VALLEY.... IF YOU FIND WATER,
FIRE YOUR PISTOL'"

_CAMP MATES._

_A Story of the Plains._

Chapter I.

A WEARY RIDE.

Slowly and heavily the train rumbled on through the night. It was called
an express; but the year was long ago, in the early days of railroading,
and what was then an express would now be considered a very slow and
poky sort of a train. On this particular night too, it ran more slowly
than usual, because of the condition of the track. The season was such a
wet one, that even the oldest traveller on the train declared he could
not remember another like it. Rain, rain, rain, day after day, for
weeks, had been the rule of that spring, until the earth was soaked like
a great sponge. All the rivers had overflowed their banks, and all the
smaller streams were raging torrents, red, yellow, brown, and sometimes
milky white, according to the color of the clays through which they cut
their riotous way. The lowlands and meadows were flooded, so that the
last year's hay-stacks, rising from them here and there, were veritable
islands of refuge for innumerable rabbits, rats, mice, and other small
animals, driven by the waters from their homes.

And all this water had not helped the railroad one bit. In the cuts the
clay or gravel banks were continually sliding down on the track; while
on the fills they were as continually sliding out from under it. The
section gangs were doubled, and along the whole line they were hard at
work, by night as well as by day, only eating and sleeping by snatches,
trying to keep the track in repair, and the road open for traffic. In
spite of their vigilance and unceasing labor, however, the rains found
plenty of chances to work their mischief undetected.

Many a time only the keen watchfulness of an engine-driver, or his
assistant, the fireman, saved a train from dashing into some gravel
heap, beneath which the rails were buried, or from plunging into some
yawning