"Now I know," continued the captain, "you are really my friend; and now let me see you dressed up as a true traveller, while I put the other things back into their parcels."
"But before I don my new prairie costume, I have something else to buy," cried Oliver.
"What!" cried the captain, "I thought surely I had forgotten nothing."
"Do you think, my dear friend, that I am going to carry all this on my back. I don't want to look like a comic Robinson Crusoe, and, besides, it is more than I could do. I must have a horse."
The captain burst out laughing.
"Look out of window, my dear friend," he said, "and then you shall decide whether or not I forgot anything."
Oliver approached the window, and saw two magnificent horses admirably caparisoned.
"What do you think of those animals?" asked the captain.
"They are both splendid; above all, the black one—a true horse of the prairies—a mustang."
"You seem to know all about it."