That was too much. A few days later, at Tucson, Arizona, the bull cars were run fifteen miles out of town, and the agitators were put to death.
All of which has its antithesis in another stampede which actually made money. The gods sometimes favor even a keeper of the bulls, and such was the case in the stampede of Old Mom’s herd at Idaho Falls.
The day had been hot. The elephants came out of the performing ring of the matinée tired and “juggy,” as a bull-man terms lassitude, to be led quite indifferently to a near-by irrigation ditch to drink. There, by their straining against the elephant hooks, they indicated that a mere drink would not satisfy.
“What’re we goin’ t’ do?” inquired an assistant as he scrambled at the end of a bull-hook. “They want in an’ they’re goin’ t’ have in!”
“Hold them bulls!” came the curt reply of the keeper. “Sink that hook deeper an’ hold them bulls.”
“What’s the matter?” It was a new voice. “They just want a swim, don’t they?”
“Yeh.” The keeper touched his cap to the owner of the show. “Yeh—that’s what they’re after.”
“Then why don’t you let ’em have it?”
“Afraid. Snake River’s just over this hump here, and they might make for it. It’s deep an’ swifter’n ’ell. Been a half a dozen horses drowned right here; nothing’s ever come out of it alive.”
“But,” argued the little owner, “that isn’t this ditch, is it? Why should they want to go over to a river they can’t see when there’s all this water right here?”