Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas!

We're in a series about the Wild West and the incredible story of an 11 year old German boy, Hermann, who was captured by an Apache war party from his family's farm in 1870 in Central Texas.

He's now 16 years old at this point in the story and has become a full blown warrior who hates and fears the White man. And in fact, has taken many a scalp. 

## Yesterday's post
In the <a href="https://steemit.com/story/@janton/hermann-s-life-in-the-wilderness-c2ee231cef6e5est">last post</a> Hermann was suffering in the desert wilderness trying to make it somewhere that had water and game to hunt. In fact, he was so bad off that he finally killed and ate a skunk and thought it was the best meal he ever had! lol. The kid had been through hell.

Many times Hermann and his horse were so weak that he'd walk and lead him.

<center>![silhouette-young-female-rider-her-horse-model-riding-mohave-desert-82853190.jpg](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmQK7t65QPYoRwKaXGNbkgjmeVwjS1ZVtjgcKCLfEqV88B)</center><center>[source](pinterest.com)</center>


After he ate the skunk and his horse ate grass they rode on in search of more food and water. He got lucky and came across a few buffalo. 

>By the year 1875 most of the huge buffalo herds had been slaughtered by hunters. This was a program designed by the U.S. government to destroy the food, shelter, and clothing source of the Plains Indians.

>The government could then force them onto reservations or starve them to death, they didn't really care which. They just wanted them out of the way.

In his weakened condition he knew he needed to find a small one so that's what he did.

## Today's post

He found a calf and roped it, drug it a little distance and figured he'd jump down and cut it's throat and have a feast. The problem was, when he jumped down the calf got up, charged him, butted him and knocked him flat on his can! 

Well, Hermann was indeed weak but he had his bow and 50 arrows so he got to his feet and shot the calf. But the calf just charged him again, butted him and knocked him down again. 

In his weakened condition he couldn't pull the bow string all the way back so his arrows weren't penetrating very far.

## The calf was kicking his butt

Thus, the calf was a tough little guy and this pattern kept repeating until Hermann wasn't getting back up to be knocked down again, he was shooting from a down position. 

The calf looked like a pin cushion because Hermann used all his arrows on him but he was still not down.

Finally Hermann managed to get back on his horse. The calf still had the rope around it's neck so Hermann dragged him a good distance until the calf was pretty much strangled then he got down and was able to cut it's neck and kill it.

## Survival of the fittest

I know it's brutal but this was a life or death situation, Hermann was about starved and had to have food and this was his best source of some good protein, fat and carbs.  

He cut the calf open and then sliced the stomach and drank the sour milk and ate the warm liver.

## A superstition everyone took to heart

The next thing was the meat. His tribe believed that if a hole was cut or punctured in the meat before or while it was cooking then the Great Spirit was offended. So he followed this rule very carefully because he believed it. 

If an Indian did this then it meant that something really bad was going to happen to them. They took this rule so seriously that if anyone broke it they were thrown out of camp if not killed! 

## His horse was his watch dog

Hermann's routine was to lay down at night with whatever meat he had, wrapped up and under his head while he slept. His horse would never leave him so he let the horse roam free at night. 

If the horse ran up to him at night and snorted then he'd grab his meat and supplies, jump on the horse and off they'd ride.

## Surrounded by wolves

This happened many times. They were constantly on the move. One night his horse woke him up but a big wolf was standing next to him smelling the meat under his head. 

He sprang up and shot it with an arrow, then turned and shot another and then another, five of them in all. There were three left but they ran away.

I'm sure this was the Gray Wolf which is no longer in the area, in fact they're almost extinct:
<center>![lobo_logo_3_2-600x391.jpg](https://ipfs.busy.org/ipfs/QmRYbVXKVpk8vppLfPrQXEcczE1mnQDdXPkoz5wMgvPoAp)</center><center>[source](https://nywolf.org/learn/mexican-gray-wolf/)</center>

![a0esw215rr.png](https://img.esteem.ws/a0esw215rr.png) 

Hermann's time in the desert continues on the next post.

Thanks for reading folks, God bless you all!
-jonboy
Texas

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