The Scalp Hunters | Page 9

hundred yards nearer than the
main heights. Towards this I pricked the foaming bull in a last stretch,
and he brought me cleverly within a hundred yards of its base.
It was now time to take leave of my dusky companion. I could have
slaughtered him as I leaned over his back. My knife rested upon the
most vulnerable part of his huge body. No! I could not have slain that
buffalo for the Koh-i-noor.
Untwisting my fingers from his thick fleece, I slipped down over his
tail, and without as much as saying "Goodnight!" ran with all my speed
towards the knoll. I climbed up; and sitting down upon a loose boulder
of rock, looked over the prairie.

The moon was still shining brightly. My late companion had halted not
far from where I had left him, and stood glaring back with an air of
extreme bewilderment. There was something so comical in the sight
that I yelled with laughter as I sat securely on my perch.
I looked to the south-west. As far as the eye could see, the prairie was
black, and moving. The living wave came rolling onward and toward
me; but I could now observe it in safety. The myriads of glancing eyes,
sparkling like phosphoric gleams, no longer flashed terror.
The drove was still half a mile distant. I thought I saw quick gleams,
and heard the report of firearms away over its left border; but I could
not be certain. I had begun to think of the fate of my comrades, and this
gave me hopes that they were safe.
The buffaloes approached the butte on which I was seated; and,
perceiving the obstacle, suddenly forked into two great belts, and swept
right and left around it. What struck me at this moment as curious was,
that my bull, my particular bull, instead of waiting till his comrades had
come up, and falling in among the foremost, suddenly tossed up his
head, and galloped off as if a pack of wolves had been after him. He ran
towards the outside of the band. When he had reached a point that
placed him fairly beyond the flank, I could see him closing in, and
moving on with the rest.
This strange tactic of my late companion puzzled me at the time, but I
afterwards learned that it was sound strategy on his part. Had he
remained where I had parted with him, the foremost bulls coming up
would have mistaken him for an individual of some other tribe, and
would certainly have gored him to death.
I sat upon the rock for nearly two hours, silently watching the sable
stream as it poured past. I was on an island in the midst of a black and
glittering sea. At one time I fancied I was moving, that the butte was
sailing onward, and the buffaloes were standing still. My head swam
with dizziness, and I leaped to my feet to drive away the strange
illusion.

The torrent rolled onward, and at length the hindmost went straggling
past. I descended from the knoll, and commenced groping my way over
the black, trodden earth. What was lately a green sward now presented
the aspect of ground freshly ploughed, and trampled by droves of oxen.
A number of white animals, resembling a flock of sheep, passed near
me. They were wolves hanging upon the skirts of the herd.
I pushed on, keeping to the southward. At length I heard voices; and, in
the clear moonlight, could see several horsemen galloping in circles
over the plain. I shouted "Hollo!" A voice answered mine, and one of
the horsemen came galloping up; it was Saint Vrain.
"Why, bless me, Haller!" cried he, reining up, and bending from his
saddle to get a better view of me, "is it you or your ghost? As I sit here,
it's the man himself, and alive!"
"Never in better condition," I replied.
"But where did you come from? the clouds? the sky? where?" And his
questions were echoed by the others, who at this moment were shaking
me by the hand, as if they had not seen me for a twelvemonth.
Gode seemed to be the most perplexed man of the party.
"Mon Dieu! run over; tramp by von million buffles, et ne pas mort!
'Cr–r–ré matin!"
"We were hunting for your body, or rather, the fragments of it," said
Saint Vrain. "We had searched every foot of the prairie for a mile round,
and had almost come to the conclusion that the fierce brutes had eaten
you up."
"Eat monsieur up! No! tre million buffles no him eat. Mon Dieu! Ha,
Sleep-head!"
This exclamation of the Canadian was addressed to Hibbets, who had
failed to warn my comrades of where I lay, and thus