Sunset Ranch: A Story of a Boy's Adventures in the West — page 170: what you’re looking at

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

CHAPTER XII. UNDER THE WANING MOON. The task that the young Virginian had set him- self was no light one. A journey lay before him of several days’ duration, and unknown perils might beset him on every hand. There were his late friends, the Sioux, whom he expected to make a hasty and hot pursuit. Standing Elk’s affection he had little faith in; but the white lad represented a winter’s supply of to- bacco, ammunition and fire water, which, in the eyes of an Indian, counted for much, so that the old chief might be expected to strain every nerve in the en- deavor to recapture such a prize. Then there were wild beasts with which he might come in contact, or, worse still, some of those des- peradoes always to be found prowling about the out- skirts of civilization, to whom the newly-discovered gold fields among the Black Hills would serve as a lodestone, drawing them from other less-favored communities. Still, Cuthbert’s heart seemed stout enough to meet and overcome all these difficulties. The suc- cess attending his start gave him courage. Besides, a cowboy always feels fortified against evil and disaster so long as he can press his knees against the sides of a stanch and faithful broncho; so often has he to depend upon this four-footed friend for his safety that there seems to be magic in the very contact. Once a mile and more from the Sioux village and free from timber, the runaway put his horse into the broken country that lay to the south. The moon had now arisen at midnight, a battered CoOnnicloOokks.€©