wagon, rounding up saddle horses, hiring men and making final
arrangements for the start.
When the day arrived everything was in a state of activity and as
evening approached the corral was filled with horses. Each “waddie” was
tolled off his string of mounts. Ten to each man, and after the summer
on rich buffalo grass every horse was in a state that boded no good for
the unaccustomed rider.
That night we ate our suppers at the chuck wagon at the round-up camp,
after which the boys sat around a chip fire, telling stories and
smoking.
The cowboy story differs from any I have ever heard, both in
extravagance of statement and manner of telling. They relate to anything
and everything that has ever come under his acute observation.
“I always had an especial desire to make governors my associates,” said
“Beaut” Bowers, “so with a view to a pleasant acquaintance I once called
upon Governor Waite, presenting the compliments of Governor Rentfrow of
Oklahoma and several other governors, none of whom had sent any
compliments, but then they are so cheap I thought I could give him a few
without their missing them.
“I had heard that he wanted to ride to his bridle bits in blood and I
wanted to get into the swim, although I would rather it was beer.
“It was the governor’s day to be out of sorts, and he did not seem
inclined to talk. I wanted to talk and resolved to break the ice of his
reserve in some manner. So when he asked how the people of Oklahoma
stood the panic, I told him we had not felt it in the least. He seemed
surprised at this and asked, “Why not!” I replied we were all too poor
to own anything and had got beyond expecting it. “Well, poor people have
to live; how do they manage for some money?” I told him when silver was
demonetized we took to catching Keeley graduates and scraping the
chloride of gold off them with a case-knife and had done fairly well.
“The old man stared at me and asked me if I had wheels in my head too.
Everybody had been saying the old governor had wheels in his head until
I believe he was afraid to pick his ears lest a cog clip the end of his
finger off.
“I had recently been on Zack Mulhall’s ranch in Oklahoma, where the
Reverend Buchanan used to come and talk Populism to the boys until I got
tired of it one night and stole his false teeth where he put them to
soak in a tin cup. There was a lot of socialism too, in his talk that
didn’t go down, for on that ranch the first fellow up of a morning got
the best socks, and that made me fall out with the idea of community of
interests. But to humor the governor I spoke of the widespreading
revolutionary sentiment in Texas and Oklahoma and hinted that they had
their eyes turned eagerly on his movements, as it was their hope he
might devise some way to lead the country out of the silver difficulty.
He then showed me a letter from President Diaz, of Mexico. It suggested
another pan-American congress in the interests of silver. “It’s no use,
though,” he said, “the last assembly of the kind amounted to nothing.
Eastern influences would soon retard any movement of the sort.’
“‘If we are to continually be the back dooryard of the east,’ I replied,
‘the sooner we secede from it the better.’
“Here was a long pause, the old man looking at me intently to see if the
wheels in my head were working, and I tried at the same time to discover
if the machinery in his was all right.
“Seeing the point of vantage I continued: ‘Divide the country from the
Mississippi River, establish a new republic with our own capital, make
Galveston our New York, with a national railroad to that point; coin our
gold and silver, make banks a public trust, with any betrayal of it
punishable as high treason. If we are going into revolution we must
have something like this for our object, otherwise we will only
terminate in anarchy. As governor of Colorado call for a delegation of
representative citizens from other states to meet here in convention and
start the ball rolling.’
“I delivered this sentiment in round, strong terms, while the governor
listened, apparently pleased.
“You will see all you want to of revolution before two years,’ he
quietly said, ‘it is coming sure as fate and were I your age I would win
fame and fortune by--’
“At this moment an unfortunate affair happened. An Indian had given me a
white bulldog. That dog had more sense than half the people and I loved
him like a brother. One day the dog got too close to the heels of a
heifer and she kicked one eye out. He felt so bad over it that I wrote
to an eye doctor to send me a glass eye for my dog. He wrote back that
he did not deal in dogs’ eyes, but sent me a bright blue human eye. One
of the boys and I managed to fix it in and the dog was very proud of it,
only it fit so tight he could not wink. He would lay for hours asleep
with the glass eye staring with an expression of strangled innocence
confronting the murderer. Where I went that dog went also, and all
through the conversation with Governor Waite my dog lay on the floor
asleep, but that glass eye kept staring at the governor’s dog until he
took it for an insult and came over to our part of the room for a scrap.
“In the melee of separating the dogs the governor jabbed his thumb in
that glass eye and nearly cut it off. That made him so mad he would not
talk any more and I may have to wander on through eternity guessing what
he would have said. My dog felt so humiliated that he went home by the
back alleys.”
Other stories followed, relating to horses and daring deeds of their
riders. It seemed like we had only slept a few moments when we were
awakened by the call of the boss, “roll out,” “roll out.” In a short
time every man of the twenty-five was on his feet, rolling up his bed
and throwing it in a pile ready to be loaded on the wagon. All gladly
answered to the call, “Chuck’s ready!”
Each man took a plate and tin cup, knife, fork and spoon, and went to
the Dutch ovens, where everything was cooked and helped himself. The
breakfast consisted of bacon, potatoes, warm bread and black coffee.
Seated on the ground Turk fashion, with plate on knees and cup by side,
we ate our hearty meal.
After breakfast the bed wagon was loaded with its freight. The chuck
wagon which was driven by the cook and drawn by six horses, pulled out
for the next camp, followed by the wrangler with the bunch of unused
saddle horses. Orders were given to the riders, the place of the next
camp appointed. The range was divided into circles, beginning at the old
camp and ending at the new. Riding the outside is the hardest of all.
The boys took turns at this as each must use his best horse, start first
and get in last. It is his business to round up all the cattle on the
limits of the range and throw them toward the center, where they will be
taken up by the next man and so on until the whole is bunched together
and driven to camp. Here they were held in a bunch until the foreman
with his chosen riding men and trained cut horses went into the bunch
and cut out the beef cattle and calves that had escaped branding and ear
marking.
The beef cattle were then cut into a bunch by themselves and held by
some of the men. After the beeves were out the calves were branded. The
calves were roped from horseback, generally by both hind feet, then
another rope was thrown over the head and the calf stretched out. Thus
held by two horses the hot branding iron was applied. This required only
a moment and “doggy” was on his feet making for the main bunch. So the
work proceeded until the whole bunch had been worked.
The beef cattle were driven along with the wagons and night herded until
five train loads had been gathered.
The unused saddle horses were herded and kept with the camp. They were
brought to the wagons each morning by the wrangler. For a corral to
catch the horses in, two long ropes were stretched out in the form of a
triangle, using the wagon as one side, into which the bunch was driven.
Each man then roped his horse for the day. A different horse is used
each day, so that one horse is used only once in about eight or ten
days, according to the number of horses a man has on his string.
I rode the outside one day with “Beaut” Bowers. We chose our stoutest
horses, cinched on our hulls and rode in a steady lope from 5 o’clock
in the morning until 2 o’clock in the afternoon.
[Illustration: Pueblo de Taos (page 181).]
When a bunch of cattle was found we started them in toward the center on
a full run. We took our slickers from behind our saddles and waved the
cattle into a run, which carried them within the next rider’s circle.
The cowboys are master hands at yelling, and cattle run at sight of a
man on horseback much faster when he begins to yell.
Two or more men went on watch at sundown to keep the cattle from
straying. Later in the evening the cattle become quiet and bed down. If
the night is still and nothing happens to disturb them, they will remain
quiet all night. The stampede is one of the worst things that can
happen, even now in these days of wire fences.
If the cattle are only a little scared they may be easily quieted,
though sometimes they break away and the men on guard have to ride at
break-neck speed through the night, over ground that is dangerous even
in the day time. More than one fellow has met with a broken limb or ribs
from such a mad ride.
When the cattle break away in this manner the men ride alongside of the
bunch and gradually work up the leaders and sometimes even throw their
horses over against them in an attempt to get them to “milling”--that
is, get them to running in a circle. Once this is accomplished, the
rest is more easy. The bunch is kept milling until exhausted, when they
gradually slow down, and at last, after perhaps hours of hard riding,
quiet down. Through the rest of the night they need close watching; they
are nervous and may break away again. When the cattle become restless at
night the boys sing and whistle and walk slowly around and around the
bunch. The sound of the human voice seems to have a soothing effect on
them.
When we had gathered five train loads of beef they were driven to the
railroad station, where car after car was loaded.
XXIII.
THE EGYPT OF AMERICA.
Once I made a horseback ride from Trinidad, Colorado, to El Paso,
following the old trail over the Glorietta mountains to Pueblo de Taos
and thence by easy stages to El Paso, Texas, my object being to prospect
for placer mines.
It is a wild, weird scene, when after crossing the Glorietta range, one
finds himself in this storied valley of the Rio Grande, New Mexico, that
mysterious land of sunshine, of eternal silence and (may I say) eternal
sadness. Sunlight paints the landscapes in rarest tints of blues and
greys, heightened by vermillion and bright ochre colorings on cliff and
crag, whose silence of ages is broken only by the rumble of the train,
to relapse again into its wonted quietude. The land has been asleep for
over three hundred years, while the world’s progress has been going on
about her. Once she was aroused when the cattle men came from over the
range and stocked her valleys, but the cattle did not do well. Then she
laid down for another nap. These valleys are those of sadness like unto
fabled regions of the hereafter, wherein ungodly spirits are destined to
roam forever in isolation from kindred beings. Sad-eyed Mexicans lean
against the sunny side of their adobe huts--they are always leaning
against something, as though their weak anatomies would not stand alone.
They are poor, very poor, but proud. Let a stranger go to their casas
and their hospitality is never wanting. A frugal meal of corn, beans and
chile is divided with as free a hand as a minister’s benediction.
Sad-eyed sheep graze upon the scant vegetation of hill and valley, while
the mournful, philosophic donkey does the work of the land,--and perhaps
the thinking, too. When the shadows of night fall and the mountain range
stands in dark relief against the sky the eye can trace the outlines of
grotesque faces formed by irregular peaks and curves. Many of them have
traditions old as the Sphinx, for the semi-civilization of the Aztecs
that once inhabited this land dates hundreds of years before Cabeza de
Vaca explored these valleys of the Pecos and Rio Grande. The sacred
fires of the Aztecs have died out in the ashes of the past, yet there
are those living who still look for the coming of Montezuma. It seems
that every race of people in their decline look for the coming of a
redeemer. This belief is kept alive by the Pueblo Indians of these
valleys, who bow to the sun from their housetops as he shines from over
the mountain range at early morn. Like the men of Mars Hill, they
believe in “the unknown God,” whose name is too holy to be spoken. They
hold sacred all animals living in or near water, which in this dry
climate is the greatest blessing.
At Taos they have a tradition that at the flood a few faithful Pueblos
gathered upon a mountain top and waited long and in vain for the waters
to subside. At last a youth of royal blood and a beautiful virgin
decorated with brilliant feathers, were let down from the cliff as an
offering to the angry Deity. The waters soon fell, and the youth and
maiden were transformed into statues of stone. With all the silence and
sadness of this region, contentment seems to reign supreme, and if some
genius with the pen of Washington Irving will study the simple ways of
these Mexican people and write of their traditions he will do mankind a
service and make himself famous.
Swiftly flows the Rio Grande along its shallow banks, from whence here
and there runs an irrigating ditch which waters a patch of corn or
vineyard, near the adobe houses which are scattered thickly along the
banks of the river, from the Sangre de Christo mountains to the Mexican
sea. Here for over three hundred years a semi-Spanish civilization has
existed in a sweet contentment to which the Anglo-Saxon race was born a
stranger. Here is the Egypt of America, teeming with the traditions of a
simple people, content almost with breath alone.
The old mission of Las Cruces was among the first built by the Jesuits
in this valley. Behind its altar were two crude paintings of Santo
Domingo and Santa Rita, and between them the statuettes of the Virgin
and St. Joseph. Beneath the whole was a painting, the scene of which the
artist had located somewhere on the borderland between heaven and hell.
Gilded saints were flying off in one direction while great horned toads
and scorpions were pulling dark browed Mexicans and Indians into a sea
of flames. At this mission was held the first Auto de Fa in New Mexico.
An Apache chief had been made a prisoner and was set to work herding
sheep. One day he lost one and the holy father said: “Son of the
infidel, what did you do with that sheep?”
“I lost it,” replied the Apache, “but you may take it out of my pay.”
“Pay! what pay, you sacrilegious toad?”
“Why, out of my daily lashes.”
“Holy saints protect us!” exclaimed the padre. “Theft, disbelief and the
church itself defied! We will have Judaism here next. Away with him to
the faggot fires.”
Then, as the flames crept around the Apache chained to a stone post, he
repented and the father baptised him and agreed to meet him up yonder,
but did not offer to put out the fire. As about two hundred and fifty
years have passed since then, they have perhaps met and adjusted their
differences by this time.
Cruel as these old religious zealots may have been at times, they did a
world of good, for they semi-civilized the natives.
Beside the yellow waters of the Rio Grande and near the Sierra Blanco
range, lies El Paso. Its streets were busy with traffic, and tall
buildings rose majestically on either side. But the wind sweeps through
the mountain pass and the dust storms darken the sky for days at a time.
Like all other desert regions the chief boast of its inhabitants is
climate and “this exceptionally bad weather only known heretofore to the
oldest settler” grows irksome when one has heard it five hundred times
in like regions. Around and about El Paso for three hundred miles north,
south, east, and west, is desert, and to those who have never seen a
desert country it is surprising how all conditions of life are changed.
These conditions are harder than in humid countries. In our northern
land between Canada and the Gulf, that which sustains life grows in
abundance and few people there are who know what it is to be hungry. But
here in El Paso there are many of the poorer classes who actually suffer
for something to eat.
Within thirty minutes the entire scene had changed. I had crossed the
river and was in El Paso del Norte, on the Mexican side of the Rio
Grande. Narrow lane-like streets, white adobe buildings with heavily
grated windows make the stranger feel that he has intruded on a
convention of county jails. In half an hour I had gone backward three
centuries. Silent, dark-browed figures walked the streets with Spanish
cloak or serape wound majestically around them, donkeys laden with wood,
peddlers with hogskins filled with pulque, strangely attired Mexicans,
all formed a weird street scene not soon to be forgotten.
[Illustration: We Saw Smoke Signals (page 187).]
It was on the plaza here that General Bonito Juarez camped his little
force of 150 men while he went to Washington to appeal to this
government to enforce the Monroe doctrine in the midst of our own
rebellion. When the American ultimatum went forth to France, Napoleon
III withdrew his French troops. Then Juarez marched on to the City of
Mexico gathering strength as he went. The unfortunate Maximilian fell
into his hands and was executed on the “Cerra de las Campus” (The Hill
of the Bells), near Queretaro on the 19th of June, 1867. General Bonito
Juarez was a full blooded Aztec whom Fate seems to have ordained to
bring about the political regeneration of his country.
It was a gala day in El Paso del Norte. A company of Rurales from the
interior was to contest in a shooting match with the Carbine Rifles and
bets were running high. Both sides did some good shooting at 500 yards
and the Carbine Rifles won. Bets were paid freely and everybody was in a
good humor.
I had formed the acquaintance of Captain Esperanza Provincio and at his
invitation I fired a few shots, hitting the bull’s eye each time with
one of the Mexican carbines.
This excited everybody’s attention and soon some Americans offered to
bet that I could beat any man they had in their company shooting at 500
yards. The bets were taken and I was pitted against six crack shots
belonging to the Carbine Rifles. I won in every instance and received a
neat sum for my skill from my American friends who had won the Mexicans’
money. Captain Provincio, not to be outdone in generosity, caused a
handsome silver medal to be made which he afterwards presented to me
with the compliments of his company.
The Military Band from Chihuahua discoursed sweet music in the plaza
that night to a large crowd of citizens from both towns.
The Mexican plaza is the national chimney corner, where at evening a
band plays wild, weird strains of martial music, and the young gather
about the old to hear tales of daring and valor. It is the plaza where
the traditions are kept alive and where the young are taught that the
very acme of glory in life is the battlefield.
The soft effects of moonlight, the plaza with its green trees,
fountains, and sauntering of senors and senoritas in the presence of the
silvertoned bells of an old cathedral and the weird strains of martial
music, form the pleasant remembrances of El Paso del Norte, since named
Juarez.
In company with a Mexican miner named Martenez I rode westward along the
Mexican border for two days, and thence toward the northwest to Gila
River, when one morning we saw to the southward a column of smoke
ascending. We knew it to be Indian signals and so rode our bronchos into
a clump of bushes on the river banks in order to be out of sight.
On scanning the plain with my field glass I saw a column of dust rising
far to the north like a pillar of smoke and rightly guessed it to be
caused by a body of horsemen. From the speed they were making, I judged
they were either pursuers or being pursued. In either event, we felt
fairly safe, as our bronchos were in good condition, were splendid
animals, and as we had used them well of late, we believed we could
outdistance them if they proved to be hostile Indians. Nearer the cloud
of dust approached and the closer I looked with my field glass until I
discovered they were Apaches making all haste to reach the mountains.
They crossed the Gila River, which was at flood tide, five hundred yards
from where we were concealed and disappeared in the direction from
whence we saw the smoke signals. We had made up our minds to remain in
our hiding places until night, when I saw another dust cloud in the same
direction as the first, and in a little while I made out that the dust
was raised by a party of scouts and rode out to meet them. They were led
by Captain Jack Crawford and were in pursuit of the murderous band of
Apaches who had been killing ranchmen in the upper country.
The scouts continued on the pursuit, while we rode away in the direction
of Silver City.
It was that band of marauding Apaches which we saw crossing the Gila
River that furnished the cause for the Geronimo war, which broke out
soon afterwards. It was not until March, in 1886, that General Crook
captured Geronimo and his band of Chiricahua Apaches, who escaped from
him while they were being taken to Ft. Bowie. The chief and band were
recaptured by General Nelson A. Miles in Mexico some months afterwards
and sent to Fort Pickens, Florida. Geronimo and fourteen of his band
were afterwards taken to Ft. Sill, Indian Territory. Here the cunning
old Chief spent most of his time playing monte with the soldiers.
XXIV.
IN THE DOME OF THE SKY.
There are three ways of reaching the summit of Pike’s Peak--walking,
riding a burro, or seated comfortably in one of the coaches of the Cog
Road.
It was three o’clock in the afternoon when the car was pulled out of the
yards at the foot of the Peak. The strongly-built little engine puffed
like a living thing, obedient to the task of drawing its heavy load. The
wheels moved rapidly, and we ascended the steepest mountain railroad in
the world. It wound about the mountain sides in little curves, climbing,
always climbing higher and higher, until we shuddered at the dizzy
heights as we looked down into the great yawning chasms thousands of
feet below.
The air grew cooler in the deep mountain defiles densely wooded with
fir, pine, cedar and quaking asp. A great fire once swept up these
gorges and burned away the fir and pine in patches; in their place came
the quaking asp, growing here and there in thickets.
Along the slopes and in the dells, wild flowers grew with the luxuriant
profusion of a semi-tropical clime. There were columbines and tiger
lilies growing at an altitude of ten thousand feet.
Nature has done some queer things in the mighty rocks which stand
sentinel guard along the route.
One great boulder is named the Hooded Monk, because of its resemblance
to the human head in a monk’s cowl. There is a Gog and Magog. The
Sphynx, the Lone Fisherman, and many other images of man, bird and
beast, wrought by nature’s hand in stone.
We glided by one of the loveliest glens in all the mountains; it was
called Shady Springs. Here the oriole, the raven and the big blue jay of
the mountains have builded their nests and take their morning baths in
waters clear as crystal from a spring that gushed from fern and moss
covered banks.
Farther on to the right a stream plunges in wild, mad swirl of clear
waters and dashing from rock to rock in foamy white, forms Echo Falls.
An elephant’s head in bass relief was here to be seen wrought in stone.
We rounded Cameron’s Cone and Sheep Mountain and soon began the ascent
of the “Big Hill,” which has a rise of 1,300 feet to the mile.
Nearing timber line, the road ahead appears to be almost at an angle of
45 degrees.