"It will be here before you know it, old fellow; and we'll be at the ranch before you know it too." CHAPTER II PRAIRIE WOLVES AND ANTELOPE One morning, a few days later, a train was speeding westward among the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, bearing the travellers towards their summer home. The grey monotone of the prairie was unbroken by any bit of colour. The soil, the sage-brush, the dead grass that had grown the summer before, were all grey, unvaried except where a great rock or a bush taller than its fellows cast a long black shadow. Now and then the train passed close to some high butte, whose sides were gashed and gullied by deep ravines, and whose summit was crowned by a scattered fringe of black pines. Far off on either side, rose great mountains, covered with a mantle of snow, the most distant looking like far-off white clouds. From this snowy covering long fingers of white ran down the narrow valleys and ravines, seeming like white clasps holding the covering close in its place. The nearer foothills were white towards their tops, and against the shining snow the black pine trees stood out in strong contrast. Scattered over the grey plain were horses and cattle, most of them in little herds, but now and then a single cow was seen and near her a staggering calf, which had just been born, to face the scorching heats and bitter colds of the high plains. Suddenly as the train rushed around a low knoll, a dozen animals were seen, running swiftly along, parallel with the track, and less than three hundred feet distant. In colour they were bright yellow, almost red, with white patches and white legs, and two or three of them had black and nearly straight horns. They were graceful, and ran very swiftly, easily keeping pace with the train. "Oh, Uncle Will," said Jack, grasping his uncle's arm, "what are those? They're not deer, I am sure. They must be antelope. How pretty they are, and see how fast they run! Why, they are going faster than the train, I do believe. They just seem to skim over the ground." "Yes, those are antelope, the swiftest animal on the plains. And yet the coyotes catch a good many of them, just by running them down. Now, how do you suppose they do that, Jack?" and his uncle smiled at the boy's puzzled expression. "I don't know. You said they were the swiftest animals on the plains, and yet you say that the coyotes catch them. That seems to mean that the coyotes are swifter. Doesn't it?" asked Jack. "Not exactly," replied his uncle; "it only means that they are smarter--more cunning. A single coyote who undertook to run down a single antelope, would get very tired and very hungry before he accomplished it, but when two or three coyotes are together, it is quite a different thing. The coyotes do not all run after the antelope together. They take turns, and while one runs, the others rest, so at last they tire the antelope out."