"But how came the rope to break? A man must be a fool and worse to come down to round-up with a rotten old rope."
"Well, the rope was a new un. You may guess there was a lot of talk over it, and it put our backs up a bit that New York John should get killed that way. The rope wur a new one, there warn't no doubt about that, but it had been cut half through. Who had done it, in course, no one knew. The men were mad over it, and ef they could have found out who had done it he would have swung from the limb of a tree in a squirrel's jump. There were two or three men who had had musses with the chap as the rope belonged to, but no one could say as any of them had cut his rope. Of course it might have been an accident, but no one thought that very likely. However, there it wur. Somebody cut the fellow's rope to spite him, and it cost New York John his life, which was pretty rough on him."
"What is the work for to-morrow?"
"Well, your lot and the men of the other two outfits are to be in the yard. We have got a spell off, except, of course, that we have got to look after our own bunch of cattle."
"How many are there of them?"
"About 6000 I should say. I expect some of us will start driving them up north day after to-morrow."
The next morning Hugh went down to the cattle-yard as soon as they had finished breakfast. Day had just broken, and while they were waiting for the herd to be brought up he looked round at the yard. The paling was composed of very strong posts six feet high, placed at intervals of two or three inches apart. It had been built three or four years before, as this place was the most convenient and central upon the plains. A few waggon loads of timber had been taken out there a fortnight before the arrival of the teams, with a gang of men, who took up any posts that showed signs of rottenness and replaced them by others, the various ranches in the round-up performing this duty by turns. The fence inclosed a space of upwards of an acre.
Beside the contingent from the
ranche some forty or fifty cow-boys from the other ranches were gathered within it. Several fires were lighted for heating the brands, and the overseer who was in charge of the work for the day divided the men into parties, each group consisting of representatives of four or five different ranches. In a short time a great herd was seen approaching, driven in by a number of mounted cow-boys. The cross-bars were removed from the opening that served as a gate at the upper end of the yard, and the reluctant animals, unable to withstand the pressure of those behind, poured in. Several hundreds entered; the bars were dropped again, and the animals inclosed stood in a dense group, stamping the ground, and threatening an attack as the cow-boys approached them.