While
nooning that day some six or seven miles distant, the half-breed
jauntily rode into camp, leading a fine horse, saddled and bridled,
with a man's coat tied to the cantle-strings. He explained to us that
he had noticed the trail of a horse crossing our course at right
angles. The freshness of the sign attracted his attention, and
trailing it a short distance in the dewy morning he had noticed that
something attached to the animal was trailing. A closer examination
was made, and he decided that it was a bridle rein and not a rope that
was attached to the wandering horse. From the freshness of the trail,
he felt positive that he would overtake the animal shortly, but after
finding him some difficulty was encountered before the horse would
allow himself to be caught. He apologized for his neglect of duty,
considering the incident as nothing unusual, and I had not the heart
even to scold him. There were letters in the pocket of the coat,
from which the owner was identified, and on arriving at Abilene
the pleasure was mine of returning the horse and accoutrements and
receiving a twenty-dollar gold piece for my wrangler. A stampede of
trail cattle had occurred some forty miles to the northwest but a few
nights before our finding the horse, during which the herd ran into
some timber, and a low-hanging limb unhorsed the foreman, the animal
escaping until captured by my man.
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