"He's Whitey's," Buck Higgins maintained. "He saw him first."
This law was older than any ranch house, or any cowpuncher, so it held good, and Whitey became the proud owner of the dog. The matter of his name came next in importance. Of course he had one, and he was awakened, and asked to respond to as many dog names as the party could think of. These were many, running from Towser to Nero, but they brought no response from the sleepy animal.
"Must be somep'n unusual," Buck Higgins decided, and he ventured on "Alphonse" and "Julius Cæsar," but they didn't fit.
"Well, we jest nachally got t' give him a name," said Shorty Palmer.
Again the list was gone over, but nothing seemed quite right. "Oughta be somep'n' 'propriate," said Bill Jordan. "How 'bout Moses? He was lost in th' wilderness."
"Wilderness nothin'!" objected Buck. "In the bullrushes. Them ain't prairie grass."
"Besides," said Whitey, "he ought to have a fighting name. Napoleon!"
"'Tain't English."
"Wellington."