An uncomfortable night indeed it turned out to be.  Our covers were scanty and did not number among them any blankets.  The bed was hard as a rock, and lumpy.  No sleep!  As the night wore on the air grew colder, and I could not keep warm.  At four a.m.  I heard the howling of coyotes—­a thrilling and well remembered wild chorus.  After that perfect stillness reigned.  Presently I saw the morning star—­big, blue-white, beautiful.  Uncomfortable hours seemed well spent if the reward was sight of the morning star.  How few people ever see it!  How very few ever get a glimpse of it on a desert dawn!

Just then, about five-thirty, Romer woke up and yelled lustily:  “Dad!  My nose’s froze.”  This was a signal for me to laugh, and also to rise heroically.  Not difficult because I wanted to stay in bed, but because I could hardly crawl out!  Soon we had a fire roaring.  At six the dawn was still gray.  Cold and nipping air, frost on everything, pale stars, a gold-red light in the east were proofs that I was again in the open.  Soon a rose-colored flush beautified the Peaks.

After breakfast we had trouble with the horses.  This always happened.  But it was made worse this morning because a young cowboy who happened along took upon himself the task of helping Lee.  I suspected he wanted to show off a little.  In throwing his lasso to rope one, the noose went over the heads of two.  Then he tried to hold both animals.  They dragged him, pulled the lasso out of his hands, and stampeded the other horses.  These two roped together thundered off with the noose widening.  I was afraid they would split round a tree or stump, but fortunately the noose fell off one.  As all the horses pounded off I heard Romer remark to Isbel:  “Say, Joe, I don’t see any medals on that cowboy.”  Isbel roared, and said:  “Wal, Romer, you shore hit the nail, on the haid!”

Owing to that stampede we did not get saddled and started till eleven o’clock.  At first I was so sore and stiff from the hard bed that I rode a while on the wagon with Doyle.  Many a mile I had ridden with him, and many a story he had related.  This time he told about sitting on a jury at Prescott where they brought in as evidence bloody shirts, overalls, guns, knives, until there was such a pile that the table would not hold them.  Doyle was a mine of memories of the early days.

Romer’s mount was a little black, white-spotted horse named Rye.  Lee Doyle had scoured the ranches to get this pony for the youngster.  Rye was small for a horse, about the size of an Indian mustang, and he was gentle, as well as strong and fast.  Romer had been given riding lessons all that summer in the east, and upon his arrival at Flagstaff he informed me that he could ride.  I predicted he would be in the wagon before noon of the second day out.  He offered to bet on it.  I told him I disapproved of betting.  He seemed to me to be daring, adaptable, self-willed; and I was divided between pride and anxiety as to the outcome of this trip for him.