ranche started.
"Well, I am glad that is over, Bill," Hugh said, as they halted at the end of the first day's march.
"I am not sorry," Bill Royce replied; "it is desperate hard work. All day at the stock-yard, and half one's time at night on guard with the herds, is a little too much for anyone."
"Yes, it has been hard work," Hugh said; "but I don't think I meant that so much as that it was not so pleasant in other ways as usual. The men are too tired to talk or sing of an evening. One breakfasted, or rather swallowed one's food half asleep before daylight, took one's dinner standing while at work, and was too tired to enjoy one's supper."
"I reckon it has been a good round-up," Broncho Harry said. "There have been only four men killed by the cattle, and there haven't been more than five or six shooting scrapes. Let me think! yes, only five men have been shot."
"That is five too many, Broncho," Hugh said.
"Well, that is so in one way, Hugh; but you see we should never get on out here without shooting."
"Why shouldn't we?"
"Because we are an all-fired rough lot out here. There ain't no law, and no sheriffs, and no police, and no troops. How in thunder would you keep order if it weren't for the six-shooter? Thar would be no peace, and the men would be always quarrelling and wrangling. How would you work it anyhow? It is just because a quarrel means a shooting scrape that men don't quarrel, and that every one keeps a civil tongue in his head. There ain't nowhere in the world where there is so little quarrelling as out here on the plains. You see, if we didn't all carry six-shooters, and were ready to use them, the bad-tempered men, and the hard men, would have it their own way. Big fellows like you would be able to bully little fellows like me. We should get all the bad men from the towns whenever they found the settlements too hot for them. We should have murderers, and gamblers, and horse-thieves coming and mixing themselves up with us. I tell you, Hugh, that without the revolver there would be no living out here. No, sirree, the six-shooter puts us all on a level, and each man has got to respect another. I don't say as there ain't a lot wiped out every year, because there is; but I say that it is better so than it would be without it. When these plains get settled up, and the grangers have their farms on them, and the great cattle ranches go, and you get sheriffs, and judges, and all that, the six-shooter will go too, but you can't do without it till then. The revolver is our sheriff, and judge, and executioner all rolled in one. No one who is quiet and peaceable has got much occasion to use it."
"I nearly had to use it the other day, Broncho, and I reckon I am quiet and peaceable."