During the night a wind began to blow from the northwest, and in a few hours it had become a hurricane.  Small stones were carried by it like grains of sand.  They would pelt us on the head as we lay in our blankets.  We could hear the stones clicking against the spokes of the wagon wheels.  Great clouds, of dust would obscure the sky.  By morning the velocity of the wind was terrific.  Our horses, driven frantic, had broken loose and disappeared.  We could not make a fire, nor if we had had one could we have cooked anything, for the dirt that filled the air.  For breakfast we ate such things as we had prepared.  The roustabout started off trailing the horses.  Chauvin and I sat around under a bank, blue and disconsolate.

About 11 o’clock we saw a great band of antelope going to water.  They were coming up against the wind, straight to us.  When fully half a mile away they scented us and started off in a circle to strike the creek above us.  We put off after them, following up the creek bed.  They beat us to it, watered and started back to their feeding ground, passing us in easy range.  We shot at them, but without effect.  The wind blew so hard that accurate shooting was an impossibility.  We went back to camp.  Not far from it we found quite a hole under the bank, which the winter waters had burrowed out.  It afforded shelter enough from the wind, which was still blowing, to allow us to build a fire of dry sage brush.  We then prepared a good, warm meal, which we at with great relish.  By 1 o’clock in the afternoon the wind began to abate, and it died away almost as suddenly as it came up.  It left the atmosphere dry and full of dust.

Great Sight.

We heard nothing from the man who had gone after the horses.  About 3 o’clock Chauvin said he was going to get an antelope or know why.  He argued that they would be coming to water soon.  He told me to remain near the camp.  He went up the stream, intending to get above the point at which the animals usually watered.  He had been gone about an hour, when I saw the dust rise toward the east—­such a dust as a drove of sheep in motion makes.  Pretty soon the advance guard of the largest band of antelope I ever saw, or ever hope to see again, appeared in sight.  As they scented our camp, what a sight they made!  There they stood, out of range, looking to the point where their keen noses notified them that danger lurked.  Then they would wheel and run, stop and look again.  The white spots on their rumps shone in the sunlight like burnished silver.

They would stop, look awhile and again wheel and run.  Suspicious and anxious they stood, heads up and nostrils dilated, sides heaving.  They made a beautiful picture of excited and alarmed curiosity.  Several times they advanced, and then fell back.  Finally they whirled away and headed up stream.  In a few minutes I heard the report of Chauvin’s rifle, followed a little later by another shot.  Then the whole band appeared in wild disorder, running