The Wolf Hunters: A Story of the Buffalo Plains

"How was it, Tom, that when we were buying our outfit at Leavenworth we forgot to get a compass? That is a pretty useful thing in travelling across the prairie, where there is n...

The captain's party returned from To hausen's village about sunset. He said that he had had an amicable and satisfactory talk with the old chief and his followers, all of whom r...

"Well, boys, what do you think? When I offered them fellows the money you paid me for the outfit they would not take a dollar of it, but told me to keep it for an advance paymen...

After supper, as we lay on our beds in the tent talking over old times, Jack recalled to my mind the Cheyenne campaign of 1857 and how we used to gather wild plums in the sand-h...

Calling us inside the tent and changing our bayonet candlestick to a position where it would be protected from the wind, while the light would still shine on the prisoner throug...

In preparing for a probable blizzard we had hauled up several loads of good, dry wood and chopped much of it into stove wood, carrying it into our quarters and stowing it away i...

Next day, mounted on Black Prince, Tom started for Fort Larned. He had stowed the skull of the supposed deceased wolf hunter in a gunny sack tied to his saddle, but the buffalo...

As the shades of evening crept over the plain it became impossible for me to see anything distinctly. The occasional reports of their carbines assured me that my companions were...

While Jack and I stowed away the sack of corn and waited for Tom's reply to my question, he stood watching the disappearing riders till an intervening rise of ground hid them an...

"Now, men," said old Tom as we gathered around the mess box for breakfast next morning, "we want to get an early start for we've got a big drive before us. It's only about thirt...

Early March found us closing up our affairs at the camp, preparatory to starting back to the settlements. We had succeeded in taking a few more than our three thousand wolfskins...

Glancing around as Bill galloped away, I plainly saw, in the bushes at the edge of the timber back of our burnt haystack, two Indian ponies tied to some bushes, with saddles and...

Tom returned from Fort Larned that evening. He hoped that his intercession for Flaherty would procure a mitigation of the usual penalty; but desertion, even under extenuating ci...

This evening, just before dark, when we were bringing in the tools and making things secure for the night, I noticed that Tom had got out an old padlock that had long lain unuse...

When the dusty bull train came rolling along the road past the garrison it found us waiting. Our property was stowed in an empty wagon, and, again shouting good-bys to the comra...

During the time I had been at work on Lieutenant Lang's papers there had been another heavy snow, but it had soon passed off. Tom had come over to the fort once or twice, report...

Jack had been gone a couple of hours and it had become quite dark, when our dog Found, by growling, pricking up his ears, and looking toward the road, gave notice that some one...

We reached the dugout just before noon, and after unsaddling, watering, and feeding our horses and partaking of a good dinner that Jack had prepared we saddled up again. I now r...

That afternoon we reached Council Grove, on the west bank of Neosho River. It was then a place of less than a hundred and fifty inhabitants but an important business point--the...

One day, on stopping at a store to buy some feed, just before reaching the crossing of a timbered creek, we noticed two saddled horses hitched to the fence and on entering the s...

For the next week or two, although the weather had turned stormy, Jack and I put in all the time we could at poisoning and skinning wolves. It was now getting well along in Febr...

We were a cheerful trio next morning as we started out of camp on the home-stretch for "God's country," with Jack singing: "Ain't we glad to get out of the wilderness!"

For the next few days we were all very busy. Tom was putting the finishing touches on our quarters, while Jack and I were doing the trapping, baiting, and skinning. I assisted J...

On the plains a prairie fire is always something to be dreaded, for with the usual breeze, which often amounts to a gale, a fire in heavy, dry grass is almost invariably uncontr...

"Well, men, what will we do?" said Jack Flanagan. "We can re-enlist or go back to the States and each hunt his job, or we can try to get something to do where we can all three s...

The next day Tom came to me looking rather serious, and I saw that he had something on his mind, and when he had gotten me alone he explained what this was.