How often are pride and conceit confounded. The cañon narrowed--narrowed to sheer walls fifty feet apart--and there ahead of me, blocking my path, was a cliff of red-streaked rock. Water trickled down its face. That much I perceived, and then it rushed upon me that the race was run. I turned short about and tried to go by him as I had passed Sloan, but he threw his rope and caught me cleanly. Sloan had taught me the lesson of the rope--taught it in bitter vindictiveness--and I followed my captor without struggle. “Done got a maverick,” he announced, when he rejoined his comrades. “He’s been rode before, Chappo,” another said. “Look at the way he follows. And there’s been a cinch sore on his left side. Look.” “I cain’t see it,” Chappo said obstinately. “He’s a maverick, I’m a-telling you. And he’s my horse, because I done found him.” When he had me in the corral at headquarters, Chappo walked fearlessly to my head. Of course I began to quiver, for well I knew what this portended. “You pore son-of-a-gun,” he muttered, and stopped. “So he done beat you over the haid?” He scratched my ears and rubbed my head lightly between the eyes. All the while, he talked to me in a low tone, with a sort of laugh behind it. Chappo was a small man, no higher than a fence post, but there was something in his touch that made me fear and yet want him to keep on rubbing. When he attempted to put the bridle on, I stood rigid, expectant. Surely the beating would come now. It did not. Instead, he said, “You ol’ rascal, you,” and jabbed me in the ribs with his thumb. Now, here is a curious thing. A man can jab you with his thumb so that it hurts, and he can jab you in the same place with the same force and it will only tickle pleasantly. Everything depends on the spirit in which it is done. Chappo’s thumb was very agreeable and I laid back my ears and pretended to nip at him. “I’ll top you,” he said, “and then I’ll put the Box C on you.” It amused me vastly to hear this mite of a man tell so confidently how he would ride me, when even the terrible Sloan could not keep the saddle at times. Just to scare him, I bowed my back when he slapped the blanket on. Then I rolled my eyes backward to note the effect. He was grinning, actually grinning--and his hat did not show above my withers. Next, he threw on the saddle, and the curve in my spine was unmistakable; but he merely hummed a tune and began to cinch me tightly, with careless freedom, just as if we had been friends all our years. It surprised me so much that I suffered his impertinence in quiet. There were some cowboys on the fence, watching. “Want me to ear him, Chappo?” one asked. “No-oo. Me and him’s friends already. Ain’t we?” He made me walk a few steps, still grinning as he inspected the significant upward tilt of the saddle. “Look at his tail, boys. We’ll shore have to call him Beaver.” “Call him Neutria,” one cried.