Our horses having quite recovered from their past fatigue, we started at a brisk canter, under the beams of a genial sun, and soon felt the warm blood stirring in our veins.  We had proceeded about six or seven miles, skirting the edge of the mass of buffaloes reclining on the prairie, when we witnessed a scene which filled us with pity.  Fourteen hungry wolves, reeling and staggering with weakness, were attacking a splendid black stallion, which was so exhausted, that he could not get up upon his legs.  His neck and sides were already covered with wounds, and his agony was terrible.  Now, the horse is too noble an animal not to find a protector in man against such bloodthirsty foes; so we dismounted and despatched the whole of his assailants; but as the poor stallion was wounded beyond all cure, and would indubitably have fallen a prey to another pack of his prairie foes, we also despatched him with a shot of a rifle.  It was an act of humanity, but still the destruction of this noble animal in the wilderness threw a gloom over our spirits.  The doctor perceiving this, thought it advisable to enliven us with the following story:—­

“All the New York amateurs of oysters know well the most jovial tavern-keeper in the world, old Slick Bradley, the owner of the ‘Franklin,’ in Pearl-street.  When you go to New York, mind to call upon him, and if you have any relish for a cool sangaree, a mint-julep, or a savoury oyster-soup, none can make it better than Slick Bradley.  Besides, his bar is snug, his little busy wife neat and polite, and if you are inclined to a spree, his private rooms up-stairs are comfortable as can be.

“Old Slick is good-humoured and always laughing; proud of his cellar, of his house, of his wife, and, above all, proud of the sign-post hanging before his door; that is to say, a yellow head of Franklin, painted by some bilious chap, who looked in the glass for a model.

“Now Slick has kept house for more than forty years, and though he has made up a pretty round sum, he don’t wish to leave off the business.  No! till the day of his death he will remain in his bar, smoking his Havanas, and mechanically playing with the two pocket-books in his deep waistcoat pockets—­one for the ten-dollar notes and above, the other for the fives, and under.  Slick Bradley is the most independent man in the world; he jokes familiarly with his customers, and besides their bill of fare, he knows how to get more of their money by betting, for betting is the great passion of Slick; he will bet anything, upon everything:  contradict him in what he says, and down come the two pocket-books under your nose.  ‘I know better,’ he will say, ’don’t I?  What will you bet—­five, ten, fifty, hundred?  Tush! you dare not bet, you know you are wrong;’ and with an air of superiority and self-satisfaction, he will take long strides over his well-washed floor, repeating, ’I know better.’

“Slick used once to boast that he had never lost a bet; but since a little incident which made all New York laugh at him, he confesses that he did once meet with his match, for though he certainly won the bet, he had paid the stakes fifty times over.  Now, as I heard the circumstance from the jolly landlord himself, here it goes, just as I had it, neither more nor less.