ars began to buy land. He
finally acquired a thousand acres; he told me that at one time he had
about five thousand head of cattle. Of course, these cattle could not
live on your father's thousand acres, but the ranges are free and the
thousand acres answered very well as a headquarters.

"Eight years ago some men in Santa Fe organized what is known as the
Union County Cattlemen's Association. This company secured a section of
land adjoining your father's property, on the other side of Rabbit-Ear
Creek. The company called its ranch the Circle Cross. Perhaps it strikes
you as peculiar that the Association should have chosen a brand so
closely resembling your father's. I will digress long enough to explain
the action."

The judge drew out a pencil and picked up a piece of paper that lay near
him on the desk, making some crude hieroglyphics and poising his pencil
above them.

"Here," he explained, indicating a sketch which he had drawn, "is the
Circle Bar brand--a bar within a circle. And this--" indicating another
sketch, "--is the Circle Cross--a cross within a circle. It is of course,
perfectly obvious that all the Circle Cross company had to do when it
desired to appropriate one of the Circle Bar cattle was to add a
vertical bar to the Circle Bar brand and the brand became the Circle
Cross. From a mechanical standpoint it was a very trifling operation,
the manipulator of the brands having merely to apply the hot iron
through a piece of wet blanket--that gives a new brand the appearance of
age.

"To get back to the main subject. The new company called its ranch the
Circle Cross and it erected new buildings within a few miles of the
Circle Bar buildings. Not long after the advent of the new company it
tried to buy the Circle Bar, but your father refused to sell. Bill
Dunlavey, the Circle Cross manager, attempted to negotiate the purchase
of the Circle Bar and when he was met with refusal hard words passed
between him and your father. Not long after that your father began to
miss cattle--rustlers began a systematic attack upon his herds. Your
father recognized this thievery as the work of the Cattlemen's
Association and he fought back.

"A number of times he changed his brands but each time the company
checkmated him. To illustrate: Your father changed his brand to appear
thus:" The judge drew again on the paper. "That is the 'Wine-Glass'
brand. You can see that it resembles a wine glass when held up
vertically, th