That was what kept me so long."
Just at this moment Baba tripped over some small object on the
ground. A few steps farther, and he tripped again. "There is
something caught round his foot, Alessandro," said Ramona. "It
keeps moving."
Alessandro jumped off his horse, and kneeling down, exclaimed,
"It's a stake,-- and the lariat fastened to it. Holy Virgin! what --"
The rest of his ejaculation was inaudible. The next Ramona knew,
he had run swiftly on, a rod or two. Baba had followed, and
Capitan and the pony; and there stood a splendid black horse, as
big as Baba, and Alessandro talking under his breath to him, and
clapping both his hands over the horse's nose, to stop him, as often
as he began whinnying; and it seemed hardly a second more before
he had his saddle off the poor little Indian pony, and striking it
sharply on its sides had turned it free, had saddled the black horse,
and leaping on his back, said, with almost a sob in his voice: "My
Majella, it is Benito, my own Benito. Now the saints indeed have
helped us! Oh, the ass, the idiot, to stake out Benito with such a
stake as that! A jack rabbit had pulled it up.
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