I felt terribly frightened at this sight, for this region was rarely free from wild horses, and I was well aware that if Czar once got among them he would be eternally lost to me. I was looking after him in desperation, when I noticed in front of him a long black line apparently coming towards me; I looked through my telescope, and recognised a herd of buffalo which, aroused by some cause, were galloping towards my horse in a long line; Czar stopped, raising his head high in the air, then turned and came straight towards me with flying mane; I collected all my strength to reach one of the highest spots around that lay in the course of my terrified horse. He dashed through the last bottom over the trailing grass, dragging the tiger skin after him which hung down on one side of the saddle. On hearing my cry he stopped and recognised me, ran to me, and stood trembling all over by my side, while timidly looking round at the pursuing column. With one bound I was on his back, and felt myself once more lord of the desert. The buffaloes halted on the nearest elevation, looked at me for some minutes, and then dashed into the bottom on the right. I then rode back to my buffalo, broke it up, hung its tongue and fillet on the saddle, and started home, fetching my rifle as I passed. I reached the fort at noon, saddled the cream-colour after we had drunk coffee, and then went out with the cart, to fetch the very fat meat of my vanquished foe. It was then cut into long thin strips, and packed into a cask with alternate layers of salt; after it had lain thus for a few days it was put up on long sticks, and hung over a very smoky fire in the burning sun, when in a few hours it became dry enough to be carried into the smoke-house, where it kept good for a very long time. One morning my men were busily engaged in hanging up the dried meat in the smoke-house, when one of them came running up to me and informed me that a herd of buffaloes was coming up close to the garden on the river. I seized my rifle and darted out, shouting to my men to keep back the dogs, but to let them all loose when I waved my handkerchief. I ran out of the fort, and in a stooping posture along a prairie hollow, in order to get before the buffaloes, which were marching two and two in a long row up from the river to the prairie, and lay down in the long grass under an elevation for which they were steering. I had been lying there but a few minutes when the first bulls appeared on the heights, and I shot one of them, though without showing myself. The buffalo stopped, sank on its knees, and fell over, while the others gathered round it, looked at it for a long time, and then tried to make it get up by pushing it with their horns. If you do not show yourself, you can in this way kill a great number of these animals, as they are not frightened by the sound of a rifle.