Gradually daylight returned, and the sky became blue over my head. Thousands of large and small predaceous birds followed the flames, and fell now and then in them. On all sides lay the black carcases of the countless victims which this prairie fire had destroyed, and many animals struggling with death were rolling in their agony on the plain. Czar and I were completely covered with ashes. I now mounted my horse to get away as quickly as possible from this scene of destruction and death, and reach the green forests of the Leone by the straightest line. I rode down to the three buffaloes, two of which were not dead and strove to rise, but fell back powerless on the earth. It was a fearful sight offered by these burned monsters, and their frightened snapping for air and blind rolling of their heads induced me to put an end to the pain of the poor tortured creatures. I put a bullet through each of their flat foreheads, and after reloading, I rode in a southern direction towards the Leone. I saw many animals still wrestling with death on both sides of the road, and might have expended the whole of my ammunition in trying to help them out of their agony. Most of the burnt animals were buffaloes and deer, but I also saw a bear and a horse and a number of wolves lying lifeless on the ground. My road over the black, bare, burnt fields of desolation was tiring, and my horse was so worn out that I frequently dismounted and led him: although the wind was no longer so violent, it brought with it a quantity of fine ashes, and rendered both seeing and breathing difficult. I frequently came across birds of prey, whose wings only displayed the bare quills, the feathers being burnt off: they sate helpless and wretched on the ground, and tried in vain to rise into the air when I approached them. These birds regularly follow the prairie fires in large numbers, in order to eat its countless small four-footed denizens, after the fire has passed over them, and either rendered them helpless or killed them. They looked at me in terror with their large rolling eyes, spread out the quills of their wings, and uttered a complaining cry. I went past them as I could not help them.