The scheme had worked fine--the cowboy grinned to himself as he helped the breed put the saddle on Smoky. Once he'd got a little too close to that pony's head while helping that way, and that horse come within an inch of getting his arm, the cowboy overlooked it, and to himself remarked: "the poor devil had sure got a reason to be mean, and I guess he's at the point where he figgers no human is his friend any more." The cowboy was right, anything on two legs, whether it was the breed or any other human, had sure enough got to be Smoky's enemy,--a crethure to scatter into dust and put out of the way whenever a chance showed up. The saddle was cinched on, and while the breed was getting as much of the seat under him as he could, the cowboy took off the foot ropes, and soon as the last coil was pulled away, he made long steps for the highest part of the corral and where he could watch everything to _his heart's content_. [Illustration: And while the breed was getting as much of the saddle under him as he could, the cowboy took off the foot ropes.] The cowboy had no more than reached the top pole of the corral when a sudden commotion, which sounded like a landslide, made him turn. Smoky had come up, and at last given a chance had more than started to make use of it. It was his turn to do some pounding, and he done it with the saddle that was on his back and which went with every crooked and hard hitting jump he made. The breed had rode many hard horses and he was a good rider, but he soon found that Smoky was a harder horse to set than any he'd ever rode before, and as good a rider as he was there was many a twist brought in that he couldn't keep track of,--they kept a coming too fast, and it wasn't long when he begin to feel that setting in that saddle on such a horse was no place for him. The saddle horn and cantle was taking turns and hitting him from all sides, till he didn't know which way he was setting. Pretty soon he lost both stirrups, and once as he was a hanging over to one side, one of them stirrups came up and hit him between the eyes. That finished him--, he hit the ground like a ton of lead. The cowboy up on top of the corral had laughed and enjoyed the performance all the way thru, and when the breed dug his nose in the dust of the corral he laughed all the more, he'd never been more agreeable to seeing a man get "busted" in his life.