Songs of the Cattle Trail and Cow Camp | Page 6

Ned
Saddled up their hosses an' rode ahead

To station themselves ten miles away
An' act as judges an' see fair play;
While Mexican Bart and big Jim Hart
Stayed back fer to give us an even start.
I got aboard of my broncho bird
An' we came to the scratch an' got the word;
An' I laughed till my mouth spread from ear to ear
To see that tenderfoot drop to the rear.

The first three miles slipped away first-rate;
Then bronc began fer to lose his gait.
But I warn't oneasy an' didn't mind
With tenderfoot more'n a mile behind.
So I jogged along with a cowboy song
Till all of a sudden I heard that gong
A-ringin' a warnin' in my ear--
Ting, ting, ting, ting,--too infernal near;
An' lookin' backwards I seen that chump
Of a tenderfoot gainin' every jump.

I hit old bronc a cut with the quirt

An' once more got him to scratchin' dirt;
But his wind got weak, an' I tell you, boss,
I seen he wasn't no ten-mile hoss.
Still, the plucky brute took another shoot
An' pulled away from the wheel galoot.
But the animal couldn't hold his gait;
An' the idea somehow entered my pate
That if tenderfoot's legs didn't lose their grip
He'd own that hoss at the end of the trip.

Closer an' closer come tenderfoot,
An' harder the whip to the hoss I put;
But the Eastern cuss, with a smile on his face
Ran up to my side with his easy pace--
Rode up to my side, an' dern his hide,
Remarked 'twere a pleasant day fer a ride;
Then axed, onconcerned, if I had a match,
An' on his britches give it a scratch,
Lit a cigarette, said he wished me good-day,
An' as fresh as a daisy scooted away.

Ahead he went, that infernal gong
A-ringin' "good-day" as he flew along,
An' the smoke from his cigarette came back
Like a vaporous snicker along his track.
On an' on he sped, gettin' further ahead,
His feet keepin' up that onceaseable tread,
Till he faded away in the distance, an' when
I seed the condemned Eastern rooster again
He war thar with the boys at the end of the race,
That same keerless, onconsarned smile on his face.

Now, pard, when a cowboy gits licked he don't swar
Nor kick, if the beatin' are done on the squar;
So I tuck that Easterner right by the hand
An' told him that broncho awaited his brand.
Then I axed him his name, an' where from he came,
An' how long he'd practiced that wheel-rollin' game.
Tom Stevens he said war his name, an' he come
From a town they call Bosting, in old Yankeedom.
Then he jist paralyzed us by sayin' he'd whirled

That very identical wheel round the world.

Wal, pard, that's the story of how that smart chap
Done me up w'en I thought I had sich a soft snap,
Done me up on a race with remarkable ease,
An' lowered my pride a good many degrees.
Did I give him the hoss? W'y o' course I did, boss,
An' I tell you it warn't no diminutive loss.
He writ me a letter from back in the East,
An' said he presented the neat little beast
To a feller named Pope, who stands at the head
O' the ranch where the cussed wheel hosses are bred.
Anonymous.

RIDERS OF THE STARS

TWENTY abreast down the Golden Street ten thousand riders
marched;
Bow-legged boys in their swinging chaps, all clumsily keeping time;
And the Angel Host to the lone, last ghost their delicate eyebrows
arched

As the swaggering sons of the open range drew up to the throne
sublime.

Gaunt and grizzled, a Texas man from out of the concourse strode,
And doffed his hat with a rude, rough grace, then lifted his eagle
head;
The sunlit air on his silvered hair and the bronze of his visage
glowed;
"Marster, the boys have a talk to make on the things up here," he
said.

A hush ran over the waiting throng as the Cherubim replied:
"He that readeth the hearts of men He deemeth your challenge strange,
Though He long hath known that ye crave your own, that ye would not
walk but ride,
Oh, restless sons of the ancient earth, ye men of the open range!"

Then warily spake the Texas man: "A petition and no complaint
We here present, if the Law allows and the Marster He thinks it fit;
We-all agree to the things that be, but we're longing for things that
ain't,

So we took a vote and we made a plan and here is the plan we writ:--

"'Give us a range and our