An inch of soft snow fell the following night, and it adhered where falling, thus protecting the sleet.  On the boys reaching the corrals at an unusually early hour, a new menace threatened.  The cattle were aroused, milling excitedly in a compact mass, while outside the inclosure the ground was fairly littered with wolf tracks.  The herd, already weakened by the severity of the winter, had been held under a nervous strain for unknown hours, or until its assailants had departed with the dawn.  The pendulum had swung to an evil extreme; the sleet afforded splendid footing to the wolves and denied the cattle their daily food.

“Shall we put out poison to-night?” inquired Dell, on summing up the situation.

“There’s no open water,” replied the older boy, “and to make a dose of poison effective, it requires a drink.  The bait is to be placed near running water—­those were the orders.  We’ve got five hundred cattle here to succor first.  Open the gates.”

The second day’s work in the sleet proved more effective.  The sun scattered both snow and ice; southern slopes bared, trails were beaten out to every foot of open ground, and by the middle of the afternoon fully a thousand acres lay bare, inviting the herd to feast to its heart’s content.  But a night on their feet had tired out the cattle, and it was with difficulty that they were prevented from lying down in preference to grazing.  On such occasions, the boys threw aside their flails, and, mounting their horses, aroused the exhausted animals, shifting them to better grazing and holding them on their feet.

“This is the first time I ever saw cattle too tired to eat,” said Joel, as the corral gates were being roped shut.  “Something must be done.  Rest seems as needful as food.  This is worse than any storm yet.  Half of them are lying down already.  We must build a bonfire to-night.  Wolves are afraid of a fire.”

Fully half the cattle refused to drink, preferring rest or having eaten snow to satisfy their thirst.  The condition of the herd was alarming, not from want of food, but from the hungry prowlers of the night.  Before leaving, the brothers built a little fire outside the gate, as best they could from the fuel at hand, expecting to return later and replenish the wood supply from headquarters.

The boys were apt in adopting Texas methods.  Once the horses were fed and their own supper eaten, the lads fastened onto two dry logs, and from pommels dragged them up to the tiny blaze at the corral opening.  It was early in the evening, the herd was at rest, and the light of the bonfire soon lit up the corral and threw fancy shadows on the combing snow which formed the upper rim.  The night was crimping cold, and at a late hour the boys replenished the fire and returned home.  But as they dismounted at the stable, the hunting cry of a wolf pack was wafted down the valley on the frosty air, and answered by a band far to the south in the sand hills.