bank, to his surprise Patches snorted and began backing water, and Larry headed him downstream. Here he again evinced fear, so Larry tried still another spot. Here Patches found good footing and soon they were on terra firma. Then Larry and the faithful horse climbed back through the bushes where he was soon joined by his uncle. Torrents of rain now began to fall and the lightning ceased, and as the cow-punchers said "they had weathered the storm" although it seemed to Larry that they were in the midst of the very worst of it.
Soon the cowboys kindled small camp fires around the frightened herd, then began co-ordinating and quieting down the cattle. Half an hour later daylight came and then they went to look for the stragglers.
Larry found the place where he and Patches had cleared a six-foot pole fence. Here they found half a dozen cattle; three of them with broken legs, one punctured by a stake, and two dead. At the gulch where he and Patches had passed over in safety a dozen more cattle had succumbed, while in the river they had lost nearly twenty, part of these had been drowned in the swift current and the rest caught in the quicksand which Patches had avoided through his wild horse sagacity.
Altogether they had lost thirty-five head of cattle but some of these were partly salvaged by shooting
