Wandering Will and his companions laid the reins on the necks of their half-tamed horses and galloped wildly away over the western prairie. Perhaps it was the feeling of absolute freedom from human restraints that excited them to the galloping and shouting condition of maniacs; perhaps it was the idea of sweeping over unbounded space in these interminable plains, or the influence of the fresh air around, the sunny blue sky overhead, and the flower-speckled sward underfoot—perhaps it was all these put together, but, whatever the cause, our three travellers commenced their journey at a pace that would have rendered them incapable of further progress in a few hours had they kept it up. Their state of mind was aptly expressed, at the end of one of these wild flights, by Larry, who exclaimed, as he reined in—

 

“Ah, then, it’s flyin’ I’ll be in a minit. Sure av I only had a pair o’ wings no bigger than a sparrow’s, I cud do it aisy.”

 

“Yoo’s a goose, Larry,” observed Bunco.

 

“Faix if I was it’s mesilf as would fly away an’ lave you to waller on the dirty earth ye belongs to,” retorted the other.

 

“Dirty earth!” echoed Will Osten, gazing round on the plains of bright green grass that waved in the soft air with something like the gentle heavings of the sea. “Come, let’s have another!”

 

They stretched out again at full gallop and swept away like the wind itself.

 

“Hooroo!” shouted Larry O’Hale, wildly throwing out both arms and rising in his stirrups; “look here, Bunco, I’m goin’ to fly, boy!”

 

Larry didn’t mean to do so, but he did fly! His horse put its foot in a badger-hole at that moment and fell. The rider, flying over its head, alighted on his back, and remained in that position quite motionless, while his alarmed comrades reined up hastily and dismounted.

 

“Not hurt, I hope,” said Will, anxiously.

 

“Och! ha! gintly, doctor, take me up tinderly,” gasped the poor man as they raised him to the perpendicular position, in which he stood for nearly a minute making very wry faces and slowly moving his shoulders and limbs to ascertain whether any bones were fractured.

 

“I do belave I’m all right,” he said at length with a sigh of relief; “have a care, Bunco, kape yer paws off, but take a squint at the nape o’ me neck an’ see if me back-bone is stickin’ up through me shirt-collar.”

首页  上一页 [1] [2]  [3]  下一页  尾页