It Was Just Possible To Make Out That He Was
Accusing Him Of Having Stolen And Eaten Four Large Cakes Which Had
Been Laid By For Dinner.
Tete Rouge, utterly confounded at this
sudden attack, stared at Delorier for a moment in dumb amazement,
with mouth and eyes wide open.
At last he found speech, and
protested that the accusation was false; and that he could not
conceive how he had offended Mr. Delorier, or provoked him to use
such ungentlemanly expressions. The tempest of words raged with such
fury that nothing else could be heard. But Tete Rouge, from his
greater command of English, had a manifest advantage over Delorier,
who after sputtering and grimacing for a while, found his words quite
inadequate to the expression of his wrath. He jumped up and
vanished, jerking out between his teeth one furious sacre enfant de
grace, a Canadian title of honor, made doubly emphatic by being
usually applied together with a cut of the whip to refractory mules
and horses.
The next morning we saw an old buffalo escorting his cow with two
small calves over the prairie. Close behind came four or five large
white wolves, sneaking stealthily through the long meadow-grass, and
watching for the moment when one of the children should chance to lag
behind his parents. The old bull kept well on his guard, and faced
about now and then to keep the prowling ruffians at a distance.
As we approached our nooning place, we saw five or six buffalo
standing at the very summit of a tall bluff.
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