sy old mothers.

After the men have rushed into camp to swallow the noonday meal and have
hurried back to the herd, the hardest and most interesting part of the
day's work begins,--that is, the "cutting out," or sorting, the cattle
of those brands which it is desired to separate from the promiscuous
multitude. In the "general round-up" of the early summer the branding of
the young stock is the chief business; but in this gathering the object
is to separate certain cattle to be driven away to new grazing-grounds
in the northern Territories. As we are riding out with the herders
returning to their work, suddenly the body from head to foot is suffused
with a sense of relief and refreshment, as when water touches a parched
throat; for, after eight hours of scorching heat, a cloud has drifted
across the sun as he begins his descent. It is only in such an arid,
shadeless region that the scriptural metaphor of a "shadow in a weary
land" can have the full force which it had to its Asiatic author.

But now, as we came to the herd and turned to circle about it, the
westward view was wonderfully changed. The background of mountains which
in the morning had been so shadeless was now almost wholly in shadow.
The cloud-puffs of an hour ago had spread and united into black canopies
of storm-cloud. The range had assumed its darkest and most sublime
aspect. As the eye runs up and down the long sweep of vision, here and
there a white peak, flooded with sunshine from an unseen space between
the storms, shines with an unearthly brightness amid the general
blackness. Here and there the snowy head of a mountain looks out cold
and wan through a transparent veil of showers. Every moment at some
point along the rank of mountains a thunderbolt leaps across from cloud
to peak with a quick shiver. A portentous darkness settles over the
Great Divide. The pine-clad slopes are as black as night; the snowy
summits leaden.

In contrast with the dark majesty of the background is the intense
animation of the scene close at hand. Back and forth and round and
round patrol the horsemen appointed to hold the cattle within certain
boundaries. Men representing the owners of brands ride into the crowd of
cattle, and, moving slowly about, observe the brand on every animal they
pass. Usually a rider represents several owners. Catching sight of the
brands for which they are looking, each man follows close at the heels
of the cow he has selected, and, when she is