Sunset Ranch: A Story of a Boy's Adventures in the West — page 157: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Taking French Leave. 145 Accordingly, Cuthbert became very cautious in all his work looking toward flight. He knew his best hope lay in a good horse and a fair start. The river was friendly enough, and the bull boats of the Sioux, made of buffalo hide, seemed inviting a ready escape, but this method was too slow, and the chances greatly in favor of his being intercepted by fleet horsemen, who could go four miles to his one, and thus patrol the lower reaches of the river. It must be as he came—on horseback. And Buckskin was the animal he selected to carry out that part of the scheme. Had he not seen the broncho tested under the most adverse circumstances, and seldom with the shadow of defeat upon his proud record? Yes, Buckskin was the first choice. The animal had never gotten over his singular animosity toward redskins in general, and was de- tested as well as feared by the Sioux, toward whom he showed a vicious temper. A number had tried to tame him, but with meagre success, and always with bruises and contusions ga- lore among themselves. Probably the gallant little buckskin nag would have been killed ere now only that Standing Elk took him under his wing. Perhaps he really admired the tawny beast, or else his stubborn grit appealed to the innate chivalry of the chief. Cuthbert was secretly inclined to believe that Standing Elk still clung to the hope of some day securing Karl, the lad who he fancied resembled his dead son, and that he had an idea the fact of this horse being in the hands of the Sioux might sooner or later draw the cowboy thither—in his mind, it was a connecting link, cComiclooks C©