As I continued to look up, an object attracted my attention.  Against the sky, I distinguished the outlines of a large bird.  I knew it to be the obscene bird of the plains, the buzzard vulture.  Whence had it come?  Who knows?  Far beyond the reach of human eye, it had seen or scented the slaughtered antelopes; and, on broad, silent wing was now descending to the feast of death.  Presently another, and another, and many others, mottled the blue field of the heavens, curving and wheeling silently earthward.  Then the foremost swooped down upon the bank, and, after gazing around for a moment, flapped off toward its prey.  In a few seconds, the prairie was black with filthy birds, who clambered over the dead antelopes, and beat their wings against each other, while they tore out the eyes of the quarry with their fetid beaks.  And now came gaunt wolves, sneaking and hungry, stealing out of the cactus thicket; and loping, coward-like, over the green swells of the prairie.  These, after a battle, drove away the vultures, and tore up the prey, all the while growling and snapping vengefully at each other.  “Thank heaven!  I shall at least be saved from this.”

I was soon relieved from the sight.  My eyes had sunk below the level of the bank.  I had looked my last on the fair, green earth.  I could now see only the clayey wall that contained the river, and the water that ran unheeding past me.  Once more I fixed my gaze upon the sky, and, with prayerful heart, endeavored to resign myself to my fate.  In spite of my endeavors to be calm, the memories of earthly pleasures, and friends, and home, came over me, causing me, at intervals, to break into wild paroxysms, and make fresh, though fruitless struggles.  And I was attracted by the neighing of my horse.  A thought entered my mind, filling me with fresh hope.  “Perhaps my horse—­” I lost not a moment.  I raised my voice to its highest pitch, and called the animal by name.  I knew that he would come at my call.  I had tied him but slightly.  The cactus limb would snap off.  I called again, repeating words that were well known to him.  I listened with a bounding heart.  For a moment there was silence.  Then I heard the quick sounds of his hoof, as though the animal was rearing and struggling to free himself; then I could distinguish the stroke of his heels, in a measured and regular gallop.

Nearer came the sounds; nearer and clearer, until the gallant brute bounded out on the bank above me.  There he halted, and, flinging back his tossed mane, uttered a shrill neigh.  He was bewildered, and looked upon every side, snorting loudly.