After eliminating all foreign bodies as carefully as possible, the pudding was duly mixed, tied up in the cloth after the established manner, and placed in the pot. Many a time was it taken out and its state examined by point of fork before it was at last--after boiling nearly all day--pronounced thoroughly cooked. We had a brace of prairie chickens also, but all interest was centred in the pudding. No one who has not been restricted entirely to one species of food for a long time can form any idea of the greedy eyes with which we viewed that plum pudding. It proved delicious beyond all anticipation, in spite of certain drawbacks in the shape of caps, buck-shot, and fragments of tobacco, which we discovered in it. We had fondly hoped to finish it at a sitting, but it was a very Brobdingnagian pudding, and we were reluctantly compelled to leave a portion unconsumed. We passed the night somewhat restlessly, partly caused perhaps by the indigestible character of our evening meal, but principally from impatience for the morning to arrive, that we might repeat the delights of the previous evening. When day began to break, each watched the movements of the other with anxious distrust, and before it was fairly light both jumped out of bed at the same moment, each fearful he might lose his share of the delicious breakfast. Never did schoolboy view with such sincere regret the disappearance of his last morsel of cake, as we did when sighing over the last mouthful of that unequalled pudding. The time wore on monotonously. The beginning of March had arrived, and still La Ronde and Bruneau had not returned. Our solitude was occasionally enlivened by visits of Indians--invariably starving-- who seriously impoverished our scanty larder. Rover also assisted us to while away some of the dreary long winter evenings, which we partly devoted to teaching him various additional accomplishments. His performances were an unfailing source of wonder and delight to our Indian visitors, who never tired of watching him stand on his head, walk about on his hind legs, or sit up in begging attitude. But one of his feats elicited loud “wah! wahs!” and “aiwarkakens!” their expressions of astonishment. This was watching a piece of meat placed on the floor, or sitting with it balanced on his nose. They could not understand how a dog could be taught to refrain from seizing it at once, instead of waiting for the word of command. Their own dogs, being never fed except when at work, are always so lean and ravenously hungry, that they steal everything they can get at. When meat is being cut up, the squaw keeps a huge stick ready to her hand, with which she thwacks unmercifully the starving curs, which seize every opportunity of abstracting a morsel unperceived.