Sunset Ranch: A Story of a Boy's Adventures in the West — page 96: what you’re looking at

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

CHAPTER VII. THE GRAND ROUND-UP. All that was noble and manly in the young Vir- ginian awakened into life when he heard his com- panion thus declare that a human life was in peril out yonder in the whirling, sifting snow that was borne on the pitiless wind of the Arctic blizzard. His own painful experience had been so very re- cent that he could fully sympathize with the feelings of any one confronted by such a dismal outlook. At Karl’s suggestion, then, he dropped the rifle where he could easily find it again, and plunged into the storm, intent only upon saving a human life. The chances were decidedly in favor of the lost and imperiled one being an Indian, but, to the credit of the boys, be it said that neither of them gave a sec- ond of time to considering whether or not it were worth risking their own precious lives for a misera- ble red man. Both of them were in prime fettle now to do bat- tle with the shrinking blizzard. The long rest beside a warm fire, together with a _ generous meal, had put new life and vigor into the erstwhile half-frozen and almost despairing lads, so that they buffeted the shrieking blast without diff- culty. | _ Karl had located the cry for help, and kept his bearings as only a prairie-born lad might under such confusing conditions. Straight as a die he pushed his way out upon the prairie until he believed they must be very close to the spot whence had sprung that involuntary, hope- less cry, such as despair wrings from a lost soul. Cuthbert floundered to his side. Connicloooks CO