noon
For the Coyoteros , like the animal from which they derive their tribal name , do more of their prowling by night than by day . Moreover , it is the sultry season , and they design reaching Nauchampa-tepetl before the sun gets so high and hot as to make travelling uncomfortable . Even savages are not averse to comfort ; though these are now thinking more about that of their horses than their own . They are on an expedition that will need keeping the animals up to their best strength ; and journeying in the noon hours would distress and pull them down . So nearly an hour before dawn declines itself they are up and active , moving about in the dim light , silent as spectres . Silent , not from any fear of betraying their presence to an enemy -- they know of none likely to be near -- but because it is their habit . What they first do is to shift the picket-pins of their horses , or give greater length to the trail-ropes , in order that the animals may get a bite of clean fresh grass , that on which they were tethered throughout the night being now trampled down .