Even to a horse there is nothing more terrible or repulsive than the first sight or smell of a buffalo. A buffalo has caused many a man to be left on the open prairie as the result of the fright given to the horse he was riding or driving. Many horses have stampeded from buffalo coming too near where they were picketed out to graze.

My partner and I were once compelled to walk sixteen miles, from just such an experience. Our horses became frightened at the approach of a small herd and broke away. I was a much delighted individual when I discovered the horses had been caught by a friendly hunting party, and that we did not have a hundred or more miles to walk.

Often in such cases the horses were lost, or when found by the hunter or emigrant, they were dead from thirst. Many such vexations and disasters came to the hunters and emigrants on their lonely "trails" across the continent.

Buffalo were numerous in those days, but today they are almost extinct. Only a small number in our National and other parks. While scarcely a quarter of a century ago millions roamed over the plains of North America.

When railroads were built in the vast territory, the slaughter of the poor animals began.

Until this time the emigrant and occasional hunter had killed only a comparative few for meat or robes, but when transportation became less inconvenient and dan

gerous, buffalo robes were in demand and hundreds were sent to Europe to be converted into leather. Thousands of green hides were distributed to the markets of the world.

Some men rushed into the hitherto unknown country to kill merely for the sport of it.

To those who traveled across the continent at that time and saw the carcasses of the huge beasts, and the bleached bones, thickly strewn for miles along the railroads and old "trails" are not surprised at the almost complete annihilation of the buffalo within a few years.

That old familiar tree,

Whose glory and renown
Are spread o'er land and sea,
And wouldst thou hew it down?
Woodman, forbear thy stroke!
Cut not its earth-bound ties;
Oh, spare that aged oak
Now towering to the skies!

When but an idle boy,

I sought its grateful shade;
In all their gushing joy

Here, too, my sisters played.
My mother kissed me here;
My father pressed my hand;
Forgive this foolish tear,

But let that old oak stand.

My heartstrings round thee cling,
Close as thy bark, old friend!
Here shall the wild bird sing,

And still thy branches bend.
Old tree! the storm still brave!

And woodman, leave the spot; While I've a hand to save,

Thy ax shall harm it not.

-GEORGE P. MORRIS.

păn sies growled

LESSON LXXII.

ǎl'lowed
äeh'ing

THE LITTLE LAZY CLOUD.

A pretty little cloud away up in the sky,
Said it did not care if the earth was dry:

eŭd'dled cherries

'Twas having such a nice time sailing all around, It wouldn't, no, it wouldn't, tumble on the ground.

So the prettly little lilies hung their aching heads,
And the golden pansies cuddled in their beds;

The cherries couldn't grow a bit, you would have pitied them,

They'd hardly strength to hold to the little slender stem.

By and by, the little cloud felt a dreadful shock,
Just as does a boat when it hits upon a rock;

Something ran all through it, burning like a flame,
And the little cloud began to cry, as down to earth it

came.

Then old Grandpa Thunder, as he growled away,

Said, "I thought I'd make you mind 'fore another day; Little clouds were meant to fall when the earth is dry, And not go sailing round away up in the sky."