Meantime both guns were discharged, and the contents undoubtedly penetrated the animal’s body, for he leapt upright in the air, and on descending, staggered off slowly in a course at right angles from the one which he was first pursuing.  Glenn then let the hounds go forth, and soon overtaking the animal, they were speedily forced to act on the defensive; for the enormous foe wheeled round and pursued in turn.  Finding the hounds were too cautious and active to fall victims to his sharp horns, he pawed the earth, and uttered the most horrific bellowings.  As Glenn and Joe rode by the place where he had stood when they fired, they perceived large quantities of frothy blood, which convinced them that he had received a mortal wound.  They rode on and paused within eighty paces of where he now stood, and calling back the baying hounds, again discharged their guns.  The buffalo roared most hideously, and making a few plunges towards his assailants, fell on his knees, and the next moment turned over on his side.

“Come back, Joe!” cried Glenn to his man, who had mounted and wheeled when the animal rushed towards them, and was still flying away as fast as his pony could carry him.

“No—­never!” replied Joe; “I won’t go nigh that awful thing!  Don’t you see it’s getting dark?  How’ll we over find the way home again?”

The latter remark startled Glenn, for he had lost all consciousness of the lateness of the hour in the excitement, and to his dismay had also lost all recollection of the direction of his dwelling, and darkness had now overtaken them!  While pausing to reflect from which quarter they first approached the mound, the buffalo, to his surprise and no little chagrin, rose up and staggered away, the darkness seen obscuring him from view altogether.  Glenn, by a blast of his horn, recalled the dogs, and joining Joe, set off much dispirited, in a course which he feared was not the correct one.  Night came upon them suddenly, and before they had gone a mile the darkness was intense.  And the breathless calm that had prevailed during the day was now succeeded by fitful winds that howled mournfully over the interminable prairie.  Interminable the plain seemed to our benighted riders, for there was still no object to vary the monotony of the cheerless scene, although they had paced briskly, and, as they supposed, far enough to have reached the cliffs of the river.  Nor was there even a sound heard as they rode along, save the muffled strokes of their horses’ hoofs in the dry grass that covered the earth, the low winds, and an occasional cry of the dogs as they were trodden upon by the horses.