The crescent moon, just rising over the divide, was scarred by many cloud lines, and as yet gave no light. The sensation which had stolen over me was becoming disagreeable, when far off, at some ford down the creek, I heard animals splashing through water, and concluded that Billy's nervousness was caused by crossing buffaloes. The horse had an established reputation as a watch, his former owner having assured us that neither Indian nor wild beast could approach camp without Billy giving the alarm.
Presently, Dobeen resumed his droning, which had been suspended for a few moments, this time singing some snatches from an old Irish ballad. The last words were just dying away, when I started to my feet in horror. What an infernal chorus filled the air! Each point of the compass was represented, and we were wrapped around with a discordant, fiendish cordon of sound. Bursting upon us with a deep mocking cry, it ended abruptly in a wild "Ha-ha!" It was such a chorus as pours through Hades, when some poet opens, for an instant, the gate of the damned. Our poor Irishman, at the first sound, had fallen from the log as if shot, but had suddenly sprung to his feet, and was now performing a terror-dance behind the fire with a club. For a moment, I, too, had taken the outburst for the war-whoop of savages, but was saved from a panic by seeing through the gloom the figure of the sentinel still at his post, and the next instant the voice of the guide was lifted, with the re-assuring intelligence—"Only cayotes, gentlemen, only cayotes!"
Mr. Sachem and Mr. Muggs had been lying close behind me in their blankets. The former had given a terrified snort, and then both lay motionless. After the alarm, Sachem admitted that he was frightened. Had always heard that people shot over instead of under the mark in battle. Was resolved to lay low. Had no high views about such things. Muggs had not thought it worth while to get up. Knew they were wolves. Had heard more hextraordinary 'owls before he came to the blarsted country.
But where was the doctor? Echo answered, "Where?" "Hallo, Doctor!" cried the guide, and a voice from the woods, which was not echo, answered, "Coming!" Again Buffalo Bill lifted his voice in the solitude, and again came an answer, this time in a form of query, "Is it developed, my boy? If so, classify it." And we answered that the birth in the air had developed into wolves, and been classified as the canis latrans, noisy and harmless.
Finding that this new lesson in natural history had taken away all desire for sleep, I finished the study by the fire, with our guide for a tutor.
The cayote (pronounced Kī-o-te), in its habits, is a villainous cross between a jackal and a wolf, feasting on any kind of animal food obtainable, even unearthing corpses negligently buried. With the large gray wolf, the cayotes follow the herds of bison, generally skulking along their outskirts, and feeding upon the wounded and outcasts. These latter are the old bulls which, gaunt and stiff from age and spotted all over with scars, are driven out of the herd by the stout and jealous youngsters. Feeding alone, and weak with the burden of years upon his immense shoulders, the old bull is surrounded by the hungry pack. But they dare not attack. One blow of that ponderous head, with the weight of that shaggy hump behind it, is still capable of knocking down a horse. The veteran could fling his adversaries as nearly over the moon as the cow ever jumped, if they only gave him a chance. Like a grim old castle, he stands there more than a match for any direct assault of the army around.
MIDNIGHT SERENADE ON THE PLAINS.
With the tact of our modern generals, a line of investment is at once formed, and a system of worrying adopted. No rest now for the old bull. He can not lie down, or the beasts of prey will swarm upon him. Again and again he charges the foe, each time clearing a passage readily, but only to have it close again almost instantly. In these resultless sorties the garrison is fast using up its material of war. The ammunition is getting short which fires the old warrior, and sends the black horns, like a battering-ram, right and left among his foes. As long as he keeps his feet he lives, though hemmed in closely by the snapping and snarling multitude. The tenacity of one of these patriarchs is wonderful. For a whole life-time chief of the brutes on his native plains, he has grown up surrounded by wolves. Not fearing them himself, he has easily defended the cows and calves. An attempted siege would once have been but sport to him, and it seems difficult for the brain in the thick skull to understand that Time, like a vampire, has been sucking the juices from his joints and the blood from his veins.