He said that on one occasion he had fallen in with a company of young army officers who were very desirous to shoot one buffalo or more; they must have a taste of the sport, however dangerous.
“And it is mighty dangerous,” he went on, “mighty dangerous, as I told ’em. They’re shy critters, them buffaloes, but if you wound one and don’t kill him, he’s very apt to turn and charge head down, gore you with his big horns, toss you up, and when you come down again, stamp you to death with his heavy hoofs.
“But those young chaps wasn’t to be skeared out o’ the notion; bein’ soldiers, they was bound to show themselves afeard o’ nothing, I ’spose. So I led ’em along the buffalo tracks to one o’ the critters’ drinkin’ places, and, sure enough, we found a big herd gathered round it. They was to windward of us, but we’d hardly come up with ’em when by sight or scent some of ’em become aware of our vicinity, and off started the whole herd, we after ’em.
“One young officer (I furgit his name now) had a swifter horse than the others, and presently he got near enough the hindermost ones to send a bullet into a big bull. The critter was hurt purty bad, but not killed by a good bit; so round he wheels and charges toward the feller that had hit him. He put spurs to his horse and it was a race fer life, now I tell you.
“And to make matters worse, somehow the man lost his balance, or the saddle turned, and there he was a-hangin’ with one foot in the stirrup and clingin’ to the horse’s neck with his left arm, the pistol in his right hand, the buffalo comin’ up on t’ other side o’ the horse, and it a runnin’ like mad.
“Fer a bit it seemed the poor young chap would never come out o’ that alive, but one o’ his mates put another bullet into the buffalo so he staggered and fell dead just as it seemed there wasn’t no escape for horse or man; and somehow the feller had got back into his saddle in another minute, though the horse was still tearin’ over the praries at a thunderin’ pace.
“So it all ended well, after all; he’d killed a buffalo—leastways he and the feller that fired the last shot into the critter—and ’scaped without no hurt worse’n a purty bad scare.
“But here comes the fun o’ the thing. He told us he’d about give himself up fer lost when he found hisself hangin’ by the stirrup and the horse’s neck, and that mad buffalo bull after him, bellowing and pawin’ up the ground and comin’ on as if he’d a mind to gore and toss man and beast both, so he thinkin’ there wasn’t no earthly help for him, concluded he’d better fall to prayin’, but when he tried he couldn’t fer the life o’ him think of nothin’ to say but the words his mother’d taught him when he was a leetle shaver, ‘Now I lay me down to sleep,’ and they didn’t seem no ways appropriate to that perticlar occasion.
“No; I’m wrong thar; he did say that, finally, somethin’ else come into his head, but it warn’t much improvement on t’ other; it was the fust words o’ the blessin’ his father was used to ask afore eatin’. ‘Fer what we are about to receive make us truly thankful.’”
When the laugh that followed the old hunter’s story had subsided Mr. Austin remarked: “That goes to show the folly and danger of neglecting prayer on ordinary occasions,—one is not prepared to employ it in emergencies.”