That had happened when he was ten years old.

His life thereafter had been hard, and but for his sturdy Texas training he might not have survived.

The last five years he had been a horse-hunter in the wild uplands of Nevada and Utah.
Slone turned his attention to the pack of supplies.

The Stewarts had divided the flour and the parched corn equally, and unless he was greatly mistaken they had left him most of the coffee and all of the salt.
"Now I hold that decent of Bill an' Abe," said Slone, regretfully.

"But I could have got along without it better 'n they could." Then he swiftly set about kindling a fire and getting a meal.