"Whar did ye find any camels hereabouts, 'ceptin in a circus?" asked "Tex," an old-time puncher who had followed the chuck wagon for thirty years.
"Right here in Arizony, me lads," said the cook, with an affirmative nod of his red head.
"Gee!" and the wagon boss looked incredulous. "Camels in Arizony! Who ever heard tell of any of them critters down this-a-way?"
Pat by this time had finished his after-dinner work, and while the team horses were eating their grain, he sat down to peel a panful of potatoes in readiness for the evening meal.
"Tell us about them there camels, Pat," begged one of the boys.
"Sure," with a grin, "I don't mind givin' yez a little bit of enlightenment on the subject of camels, seein' as none of yez ever heern tell of thim before now. When I first came to Arizony, ye know I was a sojer in the regular army, in the Sixth Cavalry, the gallopin' Sixth, they called it in them days."
"Aw, give us a rest, Pat, about your army days, an' tell us about them camels," for the Galloping Sixth and its adventures was an old story to the boys.
"Well," he resumed, "we was scoutin' down the Santy Cruz valley, west of Too-sawn, a lookin' for old Geronimo and his murderin' gang. One night we was camped in a little openin' in the mesquites, wid guards out on all sides ag'in a surprise, when somethin' stampeded every hoss in the herd an' left us plumb afoot, exceptin' them the guards was a-ridin'. Next morning when the captain asked the sargint of the guard what made 'em stampede, he sort of grinned an' looked sheepish like.
"'Captain,' ses he, 'ye'll not be after thinkin' me a dirty liar, but, sor, by the blissid Saint Patrick I'd be willin' to swear that the animiles that set them there crazy hosses off like a bunch of skeered sheep were nothin' less nor camels—camels, sor, with two humps an' long necks on 'em; the same as I be seein' in the maynageries whin I were a lad.'
"'Camels, sargint?' sez the captain, lookin' sort o' puzzled like. 'Do ye surely mean what ye be a-sayin'?'