And the ford was associated with catastrophe--to sheep, to horses and to men.
Lucy rode across the bar to the shore where the Indians were loading the sheep into an immense rude flatboat.

As the sheep were frightened, the loading was no easy task.

Their bleating could be heard above the roar of the river.

Bostil's boatmen, Shugrue and Somers, stood knee-deep in the quicksand of the bar, and their efforts to keep free-footed were as strenuous as their handling of the sheep.

Presently the flock was all crowded on board, the Indians followed, and then the boatmen slid the unwieldy craft off the sand-bar.