Cattle camp

“ Every water-hole out-bush is as the axis of a great circle, cattle pads narrowing into it like the spokes of a wheel, from every point of the compass, and along these pads around the Stirling mob after mob of cattle came in in single file, treading carelessly, until each old bull leader, scenting the camp, gave its low, deep, drawn-out warning call that told of danger at hand. ”

“ On these camps the cattle assemble in the heat of the day, lying lazily in the shade, and moving off to feed at night and in the afternoon and morning. They are easily trained to assemble on the camp whenever hunted up, and the crack of a stock-whip anywhere on a cattle-run, with a well-broken herd, will set all the animals within hearing moving off to the camp. Mustering is attended to at frequent intervals on a well-worked cattle station. The stockmen ride round, hunting up all stray groups, and direct them to the central camp, where they assemble in a great compact herd. ”

“ Our comfort was nothing; men were cheap, but cattle cost money.
We reached the camp about two o’clock, and found the outfit cutting out range cattle which had been absorbed into the herd during the run. Throwing in our contingent, we joined in the work, and though Forrest and Quarternight were as good as afoot, there were no orders for a change of mounts, to say nothing of food and drink. Several hundred mixed cattle were in the herd, and after they had been cut out, we lined our cattle out for a count. ”

“ CATTLE LIFTING—KAFFIR AND FINGO CUSTOMS, ETC.
Nov. 18th.—Between ten and eleven in the forenoon, parade and drill having been got over as usual in the early morning, the camp, in shirt sleeves, was hushed in its first siesta; we were all lying, like so many cucumbers under frames, in our sultry tents, which, in spite of wet blankets and "raised walls," were but a degree more bearable than the scorching summer sun outside, when distant shots were suddenly heard, and an alarm was given of an attack on the cattle out grazing at the foot of the hills, about a mile from the sentries. ”

“ In camp-work there is little or no chance of oppression or hurt. After an hour’s ‘beating up,’ and ringing of whips, streams of cattle are seen pouring in from every point of the compass towards, let us say, the main camp. Generally situated at no great distance from the stockyard, this is supposed to be the central and principal trysting-place. From one side comes a long string of comparatively sober and peaceful cattle, comprising a goodly number of cows and calves. ”

“ They commence to run towards it, and of their own accord, and then the camp is formed.
Such is their origin and nature of formation. The advantage is patent. The driving of cattle, especially of a large herd, into a yard is always a troublesome, costly, and injurious process. The larger and fiercer cattle horn, crush, and sometimes fatally injure the weaker. Calves are hurt. Occasionally valuable cows are injured; even the strongest and fattest animals are not improved by the cruel goring and ceaseless crushing to which they are exposed during days or nights in the yard. ”

“ We do not propose to 'chance' the cattle to-night, so a camp is made. First of all the drove is permitted to graze peaceably to the particular spot selected. This is either a dry knoll or the angle of a creek, fence, or whatever boundary may help to confine the cattle at night and lessen the labour of watching. This being accomplished, they are gradually driven up into such a compass as gives room for comfort without undue extension of line. Fires are as quickly as possible lighted around them. ”

“ But there is, nevertheless, a certain fascination about this very vastness of the Camp which grows upon one; in these leagues upon leagues of rich soil, which here spread themselves in readiness to receive the seed from the hand of the farmer, and to yield forth an abounding harvest in return for the labour bestowed. Upon these plains one may watch the herds of cattle and the flocks of the sheep which are scattered clear to the limit of one’s vision, a distance so great that the largest animals stand out as mere specks against the sky. ”

“ Everybody laughed at the two white boys, but they took the fun in good part and learnt their first important lesson in handling cattle: it's never so easy that it doesn't need care.
[1] A camp-horse is a horse which has been especially trained for cutting out cattle on a cattle-camp.
[2] Working on the face of the camp means taking cattle which have been cut out from the man who is doing this particular job, and driving them away to the second mob.
CHAPTER XVII The Branded Warragul
By noon the cattle were in two mobs, clean-skins and branded. ”

“ Every cow-camp within striking distance of the Walnut Grove, on the Salt Fork of the Cimarron, was a scene of activity, taxing to the utmost its hospitality to man and horse. There had been a hearty response to the invitation to attend the circle drive-hunt of this well-known shelter of several bands of gray wolves. The cowmen had suffered so severely in time past from this enemy of cattle that the Cherokee Strip Cattle Association had that year offered a bounty of twenty dollars for wolf scalps. ”

“ For if there's a permanent shut-off we might as well move out of Flume Valley," he went on. "The cattle would just naturally die of thirst!"
"Isn't there any water at all?" asked Nort, as he pulled his pony up sharply when the animal stumbled.
"Not enough to water all the stock I aim to raise," answered Bud. "At the far end of the valley—away from our camp—the grass grows pretty well, for some rain does fall there once in a while. But there isn't a water-hole worth the name, and you know what happens to cattle when they can't get a drink!" ”

“ The care of cattle, and particularly of horses on such journeys, requires great attention; to stand idle on a fine morning, unable to proceed, until by some fortunate chance, stray cattle or horses are discovered in a boundless forest, is like a calm on the line, irksome enough; but there is also the risk of losing the men sent in pursuit who, even after coming on the objects of their search, may be unable afterwards to find the camp, especially when there may be no watercourse to lead them to it. ”

“ For large numbers of captured cattle in the camp can be nothing less than a nuisance of the first magnitude; leading to confusion and worry, the telling off of a considerable body of men as guards or as escort who might be better employed in the field; and conducive to much friction and irritability among the various native levies, each only too anxious to suspect and accuse the other of quiet purloining from the herds under their charge. ”

“ The young saplings were bending like reeds; while some cattle, which had been driven into the camp to be slaughtered, had broken loose, and now ran wildly about, tearing up the loose soil and bellowing in affright: and overhead, the birds, scared from their noontide shelter, flew hither and thither blindly. ”

“ But generally the cattle were driven from the camp at the dawn of morning, and brought back thousands together in the evening, to be picketed in the great corral or enclosure, where beeves, bulls, cows, and oxen, with the horses, mules, hogs, calves, sheep and human beings, could all look together upon the red watch fires, with the feeling of security, when aroused by the Indian stampede, or the howlings of the prairie wolves at moonrise. ”

“ There was a mile of open country surrounding our camp, and if two men could not turn the beef on that space, it was useless for others to offer assistance. In the stillness of the morning hour, we could hear the running and see the flashes from six-shooters, marking the course of the outlaw. After making a half circle, we heard them coming direct for the herd. For fear of a stampede, we raised a great commotion around the sleeping cattle; but in spite of our precaution, as the ladino beef reëntered the herd, over half the beeves jumped to their feet and began milling. ”

“ The steers and yearlings, with which Bud's father had entrusted him and the boy ranchers, thrived and fattened on the succulent grass. Old Billee, Yellin' Kid, with Buck Tooth's help, aided the boys in such minor duties as were necessary to perform about the camp. The main duty was looking after the safety of the cattle, to see that none of them strayed beyond the wire fence at the far end of the valley. Should any stray from the other egress, nearest Diamond X ranch, no great harm would result, as they would still be on their owner's land. ”

“ At four o'clock in the morning the sentinels who were on guard waked the camp by shots from their rifles, the emigrants crept from their canvas-covered wagons or tents built against the side of the wagons, and soon the smoke of camp-fires began to rise in the air. Sixty men, whose duty it was to look after the cattle, would start out from the corral, or enclosed space, spreading through the horses and cattle, who had found pasturage over night in a great semicircle about the camp. ”

“ CHAPTER XV 1 A small herd of lean long-horned wild cattle edged cautiously out of the trail on the bluff above the river and paused, peering and sniffing as they looked up and down the valley, and across into the camp. They were light tough cattle, used to feeding on parched grass and hunting their own water. They stared uneasily, then swung about, turning on the trail, meaning to go back. There was a headlong rush of two horsemen at their flanks, the shrill ya-i! of the vaqueros, and the cattle bolted down the steep trail, stumbling, sliding, falling. ”

“ The system of camp, with the aid of which the greater part of the work of every cattle station is carried on, would appear to have originated in the earliest days of colonial cattle-herding, the instinctive tendency of all cattle permitted to rove at will within certain limits being to assemble daily, generally as the heat commences to become oppressive, at a given spot, affording for the most part shade and water. ”

“ Ride hard!" shouted Old Billee as he galloped up beside the boy ranchers.
And they were riding hard—all of them, including the cow punchers who had come in from their night's duties, expecting to be relieved. It was at this favorable—for them—moment that the rascals had made their attack.
It was so dark that only, indistinctly, could the forms of raiders be made out. But there were several of them, leaning low over the necks of their galloping steeds, and endeavoring to create a panic among the cattle so that a stampede would result. ”

“ Other cowmen lying around Dodge, who had herds on the trail, could hear nothing from their men, but in their experience and confidence in their outfits guessed the cause—it was water. Our surprise when we came opposite Camp Supply to have Carter and a stranger ride out to meet us was not to be measured. They had got impatient waiting, and had taken the mail buckboard to Supply, making inquiries along the route for the Hat herd, which had not passed up the trail, so they were assured. ”

“ One night the camp heard the sudden start, and over one wagon over which the lead ox had leaped, went the whole herd. The wagon, which belonged to John Kay, was badly broken up. Out into the prairie ran the cattle; but as speedily as possible a man jumped on a horse, and riding furiously until he got ahead of the herd, he circled round and brought them back to camp. The cattle, when stampeding, always follow a leader, so the horseman took advantage of this, making a circle of some ten miles around to get back to camp. ”

“ Certain moderate performers were told off to encircle and keep within the camp limits the main body of the cattle, while ‘the equestrian talent’ was selected to carry out the more dashing and delicate duty of ‘cutting out.’ And few tasks had a more difficult appearance than to divide the fierce and wild-eyed bullocks from the mixed medley of a thousand head of cattle of all ages and sizes which crowded the camp. ”

“ When the cattle had eaten enough and lain down, the guards would sometimes come into camp and go to sleep, always finding the stock all right in the morning and no enemy or suspicious persons in sight. But one bright morning no cattle were in sight, which was rather strange as the country was all prairie. They went out to look, making a big circuit and found no traces till they came to the river, when they found tracks upon the bank and saw some camps across the river, a mile or so away. ”

“ At sunset the troops camped wherever they could find a particle of shelter, some under bluffs, and some in the willow copses. At daybreak the camp was surrounded by the carcasses of frozen cattle, of which several hundred had perished during the night. Still, as the trains arrived from the rear, each one halted for a day or more, giving time for the cattle to graze and rest on such scant herbage as they could find. To press forward more rapidly was impossible, for it would have cost the lives of most of the draft animals; to find shelter was equally impossible, there was none. ”

“ On reaching the agency, the cattle were in fine condition and ready to issue to the Indian wards of our Christian nation. In the very first allotment from this herd the line-back beef was cut off with thirty others. It was fitting that he should die in his prime. As the thirty head were let out of the agency corral, a great shouting arose among the braves who were to make the kill. A murderous fire from a hundred repeaters was poured into the running cattle. ”

“ I speak of the cattle as their own, and they were, in a sense. For though, of course, Mr. Merkel really owned Flume Valley, and put up the cash to start the boys in business, he had determined that they should run the place as though it was their own. They must stand or fall by what happened. It was the only real way to start them in the way of becoming cattlemen, he decided.
So, though the boys were young, possibly the youngest ranchers in that part of the west, they were in earnest and accepted all the responsibilities that went with the venture. ”