our right, as we neared the summit, we could see in that rarefied
atmosphere the buttes, like sentinels on duty, as they dotted the
immense tableland between the Yellowstone and the mother Missouri,
while on our left lay a thousand hills, untenanted save by the deer,
elk, and a remnant of buffalo. Another half day's drive brought us to
the shoals on the Musselshell, about twelve miles above the entrance
of Flatwillow Creek. It was one of the easiest crossings we had
encountered in many a day, considering the size of the river and the
flow of water. Long before the advent of the white man, these shoals
had been in use for generations by the immense herds of buffalo and
elk migrating back and forth between their summer ranges and winter
pasturage, as the converging game trails on either side indicated. It
was also an old Indian ford. After crossing and resuming our afternoon
drive, the cattle trail ran within a mile of the river, and had it not
been for the herd of northern wintered cattle, and possibly others,
which had passed along a month or more in advance of us, it would have
been hard to determine which were cattle and which were game trails,
the country being literally cut up with these pathways.

When within a few miles of the Flatwillow, the trail bore off to the
northwest, and we camped that night some distance below the junction
of the former creek with the Big Box Elder. Before our watch had been
on guard twenty minutes that night, we heard some one whistling in the
distance; and as whoever it was refused to come any nearer the herd, a
thought struck me, and I rode out into the darkness and hailed him.

"Is that you, Tom?" came the question to my challenge, and the next
minute I was wringing the hand of my old bunkie, The Rebel. I assured
him that the coast was clear, and that no inquiry had been even made
for him the following morning, when crossing the Yellowstone, by any
of the inhabitants of Frenchman's Ford. He returned with me to the bed
ground, and meeting Honeyman as he circled around, was almost unhorsed
by the latter's warmth of reception, and Officer's delight on meeting
my bunkie was none the less demonstrative. For nearly half an hour he
rode around with one or the other of us, and as we knew he had had
little if any sleep for the last three nights, all of us begged him to
go on into camp and go to sleep. But the old rascal loafed around with
us on guard, seemingly delighted with our company and