“I think that when the Almighty made this country on the north side of the Brazos,” said McCann the next morning at breakfast, “the Creator must have grown careless or else made it out of odds and ends.  There’s just a hundred and one of these dry arroyos that you can’t see until you are right onto them.  They wouldn’t bother a man on horseback, but with a loaded wagon it’s different.  And I’ll promise you all right now that if Forrest hadn’t come out and piloted me in, you might have tightened up your belts for breakfast and drank out of cow tracks and smoked cigarettes for nourishment.  Well, it’ll do you good; this high living was liable to spoil some of you, but I notice that you are all on your feed this morning.  The black strap?  Honeyman, get that molasses jug out of the wagon—­it sits right in front of the chuck box.  It does me good to see this outfit’s tastes once more going back to the good old staples of life.”

We made our usual early start, keeping well out from the river on a course almost due northward.  The next river on our way was the Wichita, still several days’ drive from the mouth of Monday Creek.  Flood’s intention was to parallel the old trail until near the river, when, if its stage of water was not fordable, we would again seek a lower crossing in the hope of avoiding any waterbound herds on that watercourse.  The second day out from the Brazos it rained heavily during the day and drizzled during the entire night.  Not a hoof would bed down, requiring the guards to be doubled into two watches for the night.  The next morning, as was usual when off the trail, Flood scouted in advance, and near the middle of the afternoon’s drive we came into the old trail.  The weather in the mean time had faired off, which revived life and spirit in the outfit, for in trail work there is nothing that depresses the spirits of men like falling weather.  On coming into the trail, we noticed that no herds had passed since the rain began.  Shortly afterward our rear guard was overtaken by a horseman who belonged to a mixed herd which was encamped some four or five miles below the point where we came into the old trail.  He reported the Wichita as having been unfordable for the past week, but at that time falling; and said that if the rain of the past few days had not extended as far west as the Staked Plains, the river would be fordable in a day or two.

Before the stranger left us, Flood returned and confirmed this information, and reported further that there were two herds lying over at the Wichita ford expecting to cross the following day.  With this outlook, we grazed our herd up to within five miles of the river and camped for the night, and our visitor returned to his outfit with Flood’s report of our expectation of crossing on the morrow.  But with the fair weather and the prospects of an easy night, we encamped entirely too close to the trail, as we experienced to our sorrow.  The grazing was good everywhere,