Thus thinking, the lad continued to ride in the direction he thought the deer had taken, though he could no longer distinguish their tracks. Nor did he discover any sign of the wounded one, which for more than an hour he expected to do with each moment. By this time he was beginning to feel a little uneasy at not coming to the river toward which he was confident he was circling. The speed of his pony was now reduced to a walk, and Todd was greatly bewildered by the labyrinth of walls, columns, and fantastic rock forms into which he had wandered.
With the waning day the sky became overcast, and a strong wind, blowing in gusts, so shifted the desert sands, piling them into ridges and whirling their eddies, that when the boy finally determined to retrace his own trail he found, to his dismay, that even a few paces behind him it had wholly disappeared. At this discovery the terrible knowledge that he was lost came into his mind like a flash, and for a full minute he sat stunned and motionless.
Then he pulled himself together, laughed huskily, and said aloud: "Don't lose your head, old man. Keep cool. Camp right where you are until daylight, and then climb the highest point you can find. From it you will surely be able to get your bearings, for the river can't be more than a mile away."
[to be continued.]
[BEAR-HUNTING.]
BY CASPAR WHITNEY.
ear-hunting varies according to the kind of bear you are hunting. If black bear, it is rather tame sport, but if it is grizzly, cinnamon, or silver-tip, as the several species of the grizzly are called, then it becomes big-game hunting indeed, and is sport for only the most experienced.
Grizzly-bear hunting is not boys' play. It is men's work, and only for the most experienced at that; no boy should be permitted to go grizzly-bear hunting, either alone or in the company of other boys, or even in the company of most men who claim to be sportsmen.