"Do you call that good going?" Hugh asked in astonishment.
"Sartin. Why, it is level ground, and not a water-course to go over! You don't expect a railway track, graded and levelled, do yer?"
Hugh hastened to say that he entertained no such extravagant ideas.
"This road ain't nowhere, so to speak, real bad," the driver went on; "that is, not for a hill road. I don't say as there ain't some baddish places, but nothing to what I have driven teams over."
The animals had now dropped down into a walk, although, so far as Hugh could see, the track was no worse than that which they had been hitherto following.
"The critters are just getting their breath," the driver said as he proceeded to light his pipe. "They have had their fling, and now they are settling down to the day's work. They know as well as I do what they have got before them. Don't you, Pete?"
The mule addressed lifted one of its long ears and partly turned his head round.
"They are fine mules," Hugh remarked.
"You will see bigger than them. Them's Mexicans, and they have wonderful big mules in Northern Mexico. I have seen them standing a hand higher than these. But Pete and Bob are good mules. They would be better if they were a bit heavier when it comes to a dead pull, but except for that I would as lief have them as the biggest."
"Are they better than horses?"