WITH bow or gun 't is the very deuce and all to shoot a running buffalo from the back of a horse that shies.

"Sheers-my good sir, write sheers." "I'll do no such thing. Shear, which is the word you mean, is a sea-phrase. I am talking 'horse,' and the noble animal has a lingo of his own-why should n't he as well as a ship?" [Vide 'shy,' neut. verb. Lex. Equ.]

I repeat, 't is the deucedest hard thing in the world to make a good flying shot with any thing but a pistol from the back of a horse that shies.

The best prairie men that were ever in garrison at Fort Gibson know this well. For some of these dashing officers, forgetful wholly that their necks belonged to Uncle Sam, have periled them too often in the experiment. But that painful affair of young "Humming Bird," the famous Comanche rider, it is hoped, put an end forever to such fool-hardiness.

"The Humming Bird," if I mistake not, was one of the hostages taken by Col. Dodge when he swept the base of the mountains with the first dragoons, in the sickly summer of '34. I have often wondered that CATLIN, who went out with that party, did not take a portrait of this gallant and pretty fellow. He it was, unless I am again in error, who succeeded at last in capturing that celebrated white horse which so long led the wild troops of the southwestern prairies, and for which, if taken uninjured, such large rewards were offered along that frontier. The Humming Bird has always been thought to have captured him finally by some device of Indian cunning, and not by the ordinary use of the lasso. Poor fellow, he himself, though naturally an amiable youth, showed his temper ungovernable enough at the one or two attempts which were made to restrain his own wild nature. Why had he not the thought to leave this un

| tamable kindred spirit of the prairies as free as he himself would be?

Yet, had it been so, I should have had no story to tell here, nor would Darley's admirable picture of a disunited horseman have ever graced the classic pages of "Graham."

"Hummie," said Captain B-to the Indian when he first brought in the noble steed to the garrison, "tis a foolish talk, Hummie, to think of sending that mustang into the settlements for a purchaser. I will give you half that you ask for him and throw one of my double barrels into the bargain, if you will first kill a buffalo from his back without his throwing you."

The Indian smiled in derision at the idea of any horse unseating him; but at the same time his barbarian vanity was not proof against the implied doubt of his horsemanship. Captain B- only wished to ascertain the quality of the animal of which he wished to become the purchaser. But "The Humming Bird," with that selfism which is always pardonable in the untutored, construed the proposition only as referring to himself.

"Let the Long Knife," said he, "gallop this mustang but once past that buffalo hide that is drying yonder in the sun, and if he does not kiss his mother, I will try what I can do upon another skin with a running buffalo inside of it."

"Good, good," exclaimed a dozen voices, while Captain B-, laughing good-naturedly, prepared at once to take up the Indian's challenge.

"Hummie," said he, when his servant had brought out his saddle and bridle, "you handle horses so much better than a white man it will be no trouble for you to put these things upon that restive devil.”

The Indian smiled grimly at the compliment, and, notwithstanding the furious plunging of the wild-horse,

succeeded, by the aid of a soldier who held his head the while, in fairly saddling him.

"Good thing to save horse-bad thing to save rider," he muttered, striking his hand on the saddle when all was ready.

B- then, who was a capital horseman, after first examining the adjustments with a quick and practiced eye, leaped lightly into the saddle. The Indian, who stood at the bits the while, instantly gave him his head; and nothing could be more beautiful than the cool pliancy with which B- forthwith initiated the virgin mouth of the unbroken horse into the gentle mysteries of curb and snaffle. His object, however, was not to break him, but merely to get the horse well in hand before attempting to put him to any work that might require the use of the spur. The Humming Bird looked on with the most earnest expression of gratified admiration at this kindly but firm handling of his noble steed. And now, after making a considerable sweep in the prairie, B-, in galloping back toward the group of lookers on, turned the foaming horse suddenly toward the scantling where hung the raw bison hide of which the Indian had already spoken. A slight hillock intervened between the on-coming horse and the low frame-work against which the skin was stretched. The animal seemed to smell it, however, and, snorting, tossed his head, but whether in fear or anger it mattered not with such a horseman as B-, for a stroke of the spur sent him forward with a furious leap on the instant, and the third bound brought him immediately upon the object of his aversion. A cloud of dust shut both horse and rider from view at that very moment, but when it had subsided on the next moment, there sat Captain B- as much a part of the horse as ever.

"I have no idea of breaking the fellow's horse for him," said he, riding up to the group, "but it's odd that so intelligent an Indian can't see the difference between the skill of a mere stable-boy in keeping his seat at a trial like this, and that of shooting game in one direction from the saddle when your horse is running another."

"How the deuce is that, B-?" said a young officer. "Why, man, if your horse on the full jump shies to the off-side while you are busy with your fire-arms on the near-side, do n't you see you must be disunited on the instant?"

on the instant, and if what you say really were true, we should be able to trace the principle constantly in the battle-pieces of the old painters."

"I've never been much East," said B-, modestly, "and, except the engraving of the Battle of Bunker Hill which hangs up in my quarters, I have never seen much of pictures of any kind, except those that sporting Yorker gives us in the Spirit of the Times; but I'd stop my subscription quick enough if, instead of his new portraits of horses, one wants to know about, he re-vamps things that lie against truth and nature from those old painters. Why, I saw one of those old paintings once in a traveling museum on the Mississippi, in which Indians were represented as having woolly heads, like negroes. How can you trust fellows to paint horses who'd lie about men in that way?"

"An old painting in a floating museum on the Mississippi?" cried the young and accomplished West-Pointer, in perfect dismay at the simplicity of his superior.

"Yes-an old painting-old enough too, I can tell you, for all the frame-gilding was as black as my hat, and the picture itself looked as if time had been staining it with tobacco juice ever since the first plant was raised in the James River Colony."

"A painting by an old master?" repeated the youth, not yet recovering himself.

"Faith, man, I didn't trouble myself to find out who it was by. It was old itself and it belonged to an old master, but it might have been painted by one of his grandfather's niggers for aught I know."

A sudden exclamation from The Humming Bird cut short this important episodical discussion. The officers looked afar, and, after gazing intently a few moments, a faint streak of amber-colored cloud was seen edging the farthest bourn of the prairie."

"A band of buffalo!" was the general joyful cry. "Impossible! It cannot be. Saddle my horse instantly," said Captain B-. "It cannot be, boys, for unusually near to the post as they have ranged this season, this is too good luck for us. Yet that dust is too heavy for a trading caravan. What says The Humming Bird?"

The young chief had already torn off the civilized equipments from his white charger, upon whose back he now flung himself before replying, and cast his peering gaze far off into the prairie.

"Speak up, Indian," cried B-, with some impatience. "What sees The Humming Bird?"

"He sees Captain B-'s double-barrel gun in his own wigwam, and plenty of buffalo meat for the soldiers before sunset."

"Mount and follow, boy," shouted B-. "I want to keep as near this white stallion as he'll let me, to see how he does his work upon a first trial."

The Indian had already given his wild-horse the rein, and with rival fleetness the well-mounted cap

Bird. The latter turned but once on his crupper to

it seemed, had first selected a remarkably fine heifer from the bison herd; and B- thought afterward, when he now struck off after a tough old bull who