Jeeka, seeing the accident, touched me on the shoulder.
“Poor horse!” he said, “good horse! He go there now. So, so?”
He pointed solemnly upwards with his whole arm as he spoke.
What could I answer? This was my convert to Christianity, the religion of love. I had read to him of horses in both the Bible and New Testament. Could I now say to him, “No, Jeeka, a horse has no hereafter?” Had I done so, I would not have been speaking my mind, as I do most sincerely believe that no creature God ever made is born to perish. So I nodded and smiled and said—
“So, so, Jeeka; so, so.”
Chapter Twenty Seven.
The Snow-Wind—Winter Life and Amusement—Death of “De Little Coqueet.”
“Listen,” said Castizo, one evening about a month after this, as we all sat round the fire in the log hut. “Listen, boys, listen all. That is the snow-wind. Winter is coming now in earnest. Pedro,” he added, “put more logs on the fire, and brew us a cup of yerba maté. Thank Heaven no one of us is out on the Pampa to-night, or belated in that dismal forest.”