Bodo Follows the Wild Horses
Two or three years passed by.
Bodo was now about ten years old.
He still lived on the wooded hills.
One afternoon he went to the river.
The wild horses were drinking there.
Bodo watched them wade through the shallow water.
He watched them toss their shaggy manes.
He listened to their whinnying calls.
He tried to whinny, too.
The horses drank until they were satisfied, then they started toward their evening pasture.
“Bodo watched them wade through the shallow water”
The largest horse led the herd up the trail.
Others followed one by one.
What a long line they made!
The leader was far away over the hill before all the horses had left the stream.
“Farther out was a herd of mammoths”
The smallest and the weakest ones lagged behind.
Spotted hyenas were lying in wait for them.
Bodo wondered if he could catch a wild horse.
He wondered where the horses went at night.
He followed the herd a long, long way.
He went swinging along from branch to branch.
At last he came to a grassy plain.
He did not dare to go out on the plain.
A bison
So he sat on a branch and peeped through the leaves.
Wild horses were feeding on the edge of the plain.
Farther out there was a herd of mammoths.
Beyond these still other herds were feeding.
They may have been bisons or wild cattle.
All these animals were eating the fresh green grass.
Bodo watched them till nearly sunset.
But while the sky was still red in the west, Bodo tied himself to a branch and fell asleep.