your six-shooters are no match for Winchesters and buckshot; and
Dodge's officers are as game a set of men as ever faced danger."

Nearly a generation has passed since McNulta, the Texan cattle drover,
gave our outfit this advice one June morning on the Mulberry, and in
setting down this record, I have only to scan the roster of the peace
officials of Dodge City to admit its correctness. Among the names that
graced the official roster, during the brief span of the trail days,
were the brothers Ed, Jim, and "Bat" Masterson, Wyatt Earp, Jack
Bridges, "Doc" Holliday, Charles Bassett, William Tillman, "Shotgun"
Collins, Joshua Webb, Mayor A.B. Webster, and "Mysterious" Dave
Mather. The puppets of no romance ever written can compare with these
officers in fearlessness. And let it be understood, there were plenty
to protest against their rule; almost daily during the range season
some equally fearless individual defied them.

"Throw up your hands and surrender," said an officer to a Texas
cowboy, who had spurred an excitable horse until it was rearing and
plunging in the street, leveling meanwhile a double-barreled shotgun
at the horseman.

"Not to you, you white-livered s---- of a b----," was the instant
reply, accompanied by a shot.

The officer staggered back mortally wounded, but recovered himself,
and the next instant the cowboy reeled from his saddle, a load of
buckshot through his breast.

After the boys left us for town, the remainder of us, belonging to the
third and fourth guard, grazed the cattle forward leisurely during the
afternoon. Through cattle herds were in sight both up and down the
river on either side, and on crossing the Mulberry the day before, we
learned that several herds were holding out as far south as that
stream, while McNulta had reported over forty herds as having already
passed northward on the trail. Dodge was the meeting point for buyers
from every quarter. Often herds would sell at Dodge whose destination
for delivery was beyond the Yellowstone in Montana. Herds frequently
changed owners when the buyer never saw the cattle. A yearling was a
yearling and a two year old was a two year old, and the seller's word,
that they were "as good or better than the string I sold you last
year," was sufficient. Cattle were classified as northern, central,
and southern animals, and, except in case of severe drouth in the
preceding years, were pretty nearly uniform in size throughout each
section. The