re turned out with the ranch horses they
would start for their old feeding grounds, leading the other horses with
them. We found it impossible to thoroughly domesticate them, so for that
reason we gave them up as a bad proposition, and did not attempt to
capture any more, though at that time thousands of wild mustangs were on
the plains of Texas, Arizona, Wyoming and in fact all over the West.
They were large, fine and as pretty a lot of horses as one could wish to
see. They were seldom molested, though once in a while the Indians would
make a campaign against them and capture a few, but not often, as they
were so hard to capture. It was not worth the trouble, as it was almost
impossible to approach them nearer than two miles, and there was always
some stallions on the lookout while the others grazed over the plains,
so it was out of the question to surprise them. At the first sign of
danger the stallion sentinel would give his shrill neigh of warning and
the herd were off like the wind.

We received unstinted praise from our employers for bringing to a
successful conclusion the errand on which we were sent under such trying
circumstances. But now that we were where grub was plentiful we looked
on our experience as nothing to make a fuss over.

But we deeply regretted the loss of our cook and mess wagon, and we
resolved that if we ever found the guilty parties to make it rather warm
for them. This we never did, neither did we ever hear more of the fate
of the cook. Our work, so far as trips on the trail were concerned, was
over for this season, and we could count on a long rest until spring, as
aside from range riding and feeding there was nothing doing around the
home ranch. But sometimes the range riding kept us on the go pretty
lively, especially during and after a big storm, which sometimes
scattered the cattle all over the surrounding country, and it would take
some lively riding to get them all together again. Then the Indians and
the white cattle thieves would make raids on our herds, running them off
in great numbers and stampeding the balance of the herd.

This generally resulted in us chasing them sometimes for miles over the
prairies, and we generally were successful in recovering our cattle and
punishing the cattle thieves in a manner that they did not soon forget.
But then again sometimes they would stampede the herd in the night, and
under the cover of darkness and the excitement would manage to make off