“Waal, waal,” he continued, after a pause, “let the beasts jog on for a while. You can’t expect horses that never saw a perarer before to keep the speed. But if I had only a know’d a month ago that we should’er had such a race to run, I’d’er had horses from a corral I know of, that would not have broke a gallop till they run their noses into them trees. It’s only fun for my horse, but it’s death to your’n.”
Slowly, for an hour, they proceeded, with the hardy pioneer chafing every moment at the delay, and his equally hardy steed pressing against the bit, as if wondering at this unusual restraint.
“Waal, waal,” he said, addressing his horse from time to time, as if he had been his sole companion, “Waal, waal, Blazin’ Star, (he named him so, from the single white mark he had about him—the snowy spot in his forehead,) I didn’t think we’d be joggin’ across the perarer to-day as if we was goin’ to a funeral. Any horse that is not good for an all day’s run isn’t of any account here, and the sooner the buzzards foreclose the mortgage they have on them, the better.”
Insensibly, unknown to himself, he had slackened the rein, and his impatient horse had stretched his lithe limbs again into a gallop. With the careless fling that tireless power ever gives, and the certainty of foot that only comes with constant practice, he sped along, making light of the task, and leaving the rest far behind. Keen-eyed, and with heart of fire and limbs that mocked at exertion, he would have sped on, on, until the shafts of death struck him in his reckless career, had not the iron curb again forced his will to bend to the strong hand.
And a sad scene for one so tender of heart awaited his eyes. The truly brave are ever merciful, and as the gallant soldier is both just and kind to his conquered enemy, so is the master to the dumb beast that becomes at once friend and companion on the lengthy trail. The pain of his steed becomes his own, and, tenderly and kindly as a mother, he watches, and strains every nerve to alleviate his sufferings.
The horses came struggling through the rank herbage up the long swell, reeling, staggering, and to hold their own in the desperate toil. On they came, flecked with foam, their great eyes dim with exhaustion, their flanks heaving, their inflamed nostrils widely distended as the hot, dry breath panted through them.
Poor wretches, it was a pain to look upon them, so patient and so ready to drop down dead in that horrible journey. Their poor lips were drawn back, for the relaxed muscles no longer held them firmly in place, and the dry tongue fell helplessly through the yellow teeth, now visible to the roots. As the poor, dumb creatures turned their glaring eyes on their masters, but one wild pitying cry went up from the human lips:
“Water! water!”
That speechless agony of insupportable thirst—the horrible tragedy of mindless creatures perishing in dumb submission, made those stern men forget their own anguish. That picture of men and beasts grouped together in one horrible suffering was awful to behold.
“Waltermyer,” whispered the despairing father, in a voice that came hoarse and faint from the parched lips and seared throat, “can we not find water?”