Before we knew it the rain had begun. In ten seconds it had
increased to a deluge, and in twenty we were all to leeward of
the herd striving desperately to stop the drift of the cattle
down wind.
We did everything in our power to stop them, but in vain.
Slickers waved, quirts slapped against leather, six-shooters
flashed, but still the cattle, heads lowered, advanced with slow
and sullen persistence that would not be stemmed. If we held our
ground, they divided around us. Step by step we were forced to
give way--the thin line of nervously plunging horses sprayed
before the dense mass of the cattle.
"No, they won't stampede," shouted Charley to my question.
"There's cows and calves in them. If they was just steers or
grown critters, they might."
The sensations of those few moments were very vivid--the blinding
beat of the storm in my face, the unbroken front of horned heads
bearing down on me, resistless as fate, the long slant of rain
with the sun shining in the distance beyond it.
Abruptly the downpour ceased. We shook our hats free of water,
and drove the herd back to the cutting grounds again.
But now the surface of the ground was slippery, and the rapid
manoeuvring of horses had become a matter precarious in the
extreme.
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