Jack the Young Cowboy: An Eastern Boy's Experiance on a Western Round-up

by George Bird Grinnell

  CHAPTER IX

  VICENTE, COW HAND

  It was plain daylight, but the sun had not risen, when Vicente, TulareJoe and Jack set out from the camp to ride circle through the roughhills to the northeast. They would gather whatever cattle they couldfind and bring them to the camp, which would be moved a short distancefarther during the day.

  Vicente was a Mexican, of at least middle age. His hair and mustachewere jet black, but his side-whiskers were gray. With his stiff conicalblack hat and a little military cape which he often wore, sittingerect in his saddle, with an air of great dignity, he looked more likea Spanish hidalgo than an everyday cowboy of the plains. No one knewVicente's history, nor where he came from. This was not especiallybecause he was a silent man, for in fact he often talked quite freely,but however much he talked, he himself was never the subject of hisconversation.

  Notwithstanding his dignity, his unusual clothing and his more or lessprecise and elaborate manner, Vicente was a wonderful cow hand. Ifanything especially difficult had to be done, he was usually calledupon to do it. If some steers had to be handled in a small corral,Vicente was likely to ride into the corral on his favorite gray ropinghorse, and to pick out one animal after another, throw and tie it, andthen when all hands on foot had gotten through with it, and had boltedfor the fence, Vicente would untie the steer and dodge it until itwearied of the effort to fight him and went back to crowd in among theother animals.

  The younger cowboys stood somewhat in awe of Vicente, and never triedto play jokes on him, nor made fun of him as they did of each other;though of course they cheered and shouted if by chance he mounted ahorse which bucked with unusual ferocity. No horse, however vicious,energetic or long-winded had as yet been found, so far as any one onthis round-up knew, that was able to stir Vicente from his saddle.

  Hugh once said that only once in his life had he seen a man who rodeas well and as certainly as Vicente. This was an old Mexican knownas "One-Eyed Juan" who used to live down at Bent's Old Fort on theArkansas. It was said that if a particularly bad horse had to be riddendown there at Bent's Fort--one that none of the Mexicans or Indianscould do anything with--Juan would mount it, and putting a silverdollar between the sole of each foot and the stirrup, would ride thebeast to a standstill, and when he dismounted the silver dollars werealways found in the stirrups. One who saw Vicente ride a bad horsecould believe this story. He rode in quite a different way from theAmerican cow punchers, even those who were never thrown. Some of themlopped about on the horse, riding on one thigh or the other, and someseemed wholly unconcerned as to what the horse did; but, while theyrode well, and were never shaken from their seats, they did not ridegracefully, firmly and steadily as did Vicente.

  The three men rode fast to the edge of the hills, and had little tosay to each other, but when they reached the point where they mustseparate to look for the cattle, Joe and Jack, by common consent,turned to the older man and asked him for instructions. Vicente'sEnglish was extraordinary and, until one was familiar with it, noteasy to understand; but, brokenly as he spoke, every one in this cowcamp understood him, as indeed did every one in all the region roundabout, for he had lived here for a long time, and on all the range wasa well-known personage.

  "How shall we work, Vicente?" asked Joe. "You tell us and we'll try todo as you say."

  "It looks to me best," Vicente answered, "that Joe rides along the edgeof the hills looking up the valleys; and you, Jack, ride a mile or twoback from the edge; and I'll go still farther back toward the divide,maybe up on the divide--anyhow, so as to see the heads of all thecoul?es. What cattle Joe finds and what cattle I find we'll drive alongand turn down to Jack, and Jack will push along the bunch, while we tryto get all the cows that are feeding in these ravines."

  "We'll do that," said Joe; "and that means that I turn off now beforewe've gone very far, and take in these lower hills."

  After they had ridden a mile farther, Joe turned to the north ornorthwest, while Jack and Vicente kept on until the Mexican pointed outa place where he said Jack had better start north by himself, while hewent farther on.

  Jack sat for a moment watching the little horse swinging easily alongup the hill under the erect military figure; and then, turning to hisleft, he started to gallop over the ridges and ravines that cut theslopes. It was killing work for a horse, up and down, up and down, upand down. As much as he could, Jack tried to save his animal by takingthe hills at an angle, but even at best it was such hard work that Jackfelt obliged often to stop, to let the horse rest and breathe.

  For some time he rode on without seeing any cattle, but presently in anarrow valley, where evidently water had stood late into the spring, hesaw ten or a dozen cows and young stock feeding on a little flat fromwhich they had nipped off all the tall grass, so that at a distance thegreen carpet looked as if it had been gone over by a lawn-mower.

  The cattle saw him almost as soon as he saw them, and seemed wilderthan any he had previously come across. In a moment their heads weredown, and their tails up and they were bolting across the ridges at alively gait. Their direction was just that which Jack was taking, orperhaps they bore off a little to the left, which would bring them downmore toward Joe's line. At all events, there was no reason to hurryafter them, for they would certainly be gathered by one of the threemen.

  As Jack looked up toward the hill he could occasionally see Vicentecrossing an open space, going at a good rate and apparently thinkingnothing of his horse. Yet, oddly enough--and Jack as well as othersof the round-up boys had often wondered at it--Vicente's horses, eventhough he had a string of only six and seemed to work them twice ashard as any other horses on the round-up, were always in good spirits,fat and springy. Now and then on the hillside above, and always inadvance of Vicente, he could see little bunches of cattle hurryingalong. He kept a sharp lookout to his right, thinking that possiblysome of those being driven by the Mexican might turn off and drift downthe hill in his direction, and if they did so he did not wish to go sofar, or so carelessly, as to leave them behind.

  Keeping his eye out warily, both up and down the hill, he presentlysaw above him, rushing diagonally to the front, five black-tail deer,none of them with horns--apparently an old doe, two yearlings and twospotted fawns. They had been startled either by Vicente or by thecattle he was driving, and now were making great time down the hilland toward safety. Even for them the work of crossing these ridges wastiring, and before long Jack could see that the old doe's tongue washanging out of her mouth and that she was beginning to lose her wind.Jack had no cattle immediately in front of him, and he was riding downinto a rather wide valley with a flat bottom. As the deer were drawingnear, and would apparently cross in front of him, he put his horse intoa fast gallop in order to reach the top of the next ridge about thetime the deer got there. This he succeeded in doing, and as he rode upon top of the ridge and drew rein just below some scrubby pine trees,he could see the deer coming at a gallop along the top of this ridge,apparently intending to follow it down to the lower country, insteadof continuing their way across the ravines. Jack was partly hiddenby the trees, and was making no movement. The deer kept on along theridge, slackening their pace as they got near to him, until just beforethey reached the pine trees the two leading does were trotting, the twofawns had almost stopped and the old doe was coming along heavily inthe rear. By the pines they all stopped and looked back up the hill, asif to try to learn what had become of the cause of their alarm. Theywere so close to Jack that he could readily have thrown a rope over thehead of any one of them. Their red flanks were heaving and the old doewas quite tired. The little fawns, which could not have been more thansix weeks or two months old, were the embodiment of grace and lightness.

  After looking back for a moment or two, the deer seemed to feel thatthere was nothing more to fear from the enemy that had frightened themup the hill. Two or three times they looked at Jack, but neither he norhis horse moved, and after a stare or two t
he deer looked unconcernedlyaway. Presently, with a slow, almost slouching, gait, they started towalk on down the ridge toward some underbrush on the hillside; and indoing this they crossed the wind which was blowing from the southeast,and so, in their changed position, blew from Jack to them. As each deerwalked into this tainted current it bounded into the air as if shotup by a gigantic spring, and coming down again, the headlong flightwas resumed with every appearance of terror. It was not the first timethat Jack had seen something of this sort, and Hugh had more than oncespoken to him of the effect of the scent of man on wild animals; butto-day Jack wondered at it as much as he had ever done before. Thedeer had looked squarely at him without recognizing him as anythingdangerous or hostile, but the instant that their noses told them thathe was there, they raced off in headlong flight.

  A few more ridges surmounted, and Jack came again upon the littlebunch of cattle that he had started in the morning. Though still wild,they did not rush off in the same alarm that they had shown earlierin the day. Above them on the hillside and near the head of the sameravine were other cattle lying on the steep side hill, and Jack, ridingup, started them on their way. These animals had evidently just laindown after feeding, and were not at all wild. It seemed probable toJack that he might have to do some literal cow punching with theselogy beasts, and he took them down the hill with him and started themforward about in the line that he was riding.

  All through the morning this went on, and Jack had gathered forty orfifty head of cattle, while from what he could see on the hillsideabove him Vicente had a still larger bunch. It was impossible to getany idea of what Joe was doing, because the slope here was too gradual.

  In the early afternoon it was evident that Vicente had turned hiscattle down the hill toward Jack. Many of them showed themselvesworking down ahead of him, and now and then he could hear the whistlesand calls by which Vicente was urging them on.

  It was not long after this that Vicente was seen hurrying along thehillside up and down, gathering the cattle into a more or less closebunch, and then starting them down a ridge ahead of Jack. A littlelater, too, Jack began to see cattle coming from his left--from downthe hill. He therefore stopped where he was, and getting up on as higha point as possible, looked over the ground to get an idea of thesituation. Evidently this had been a pretty fruitful gather, for theremust have been more than three hundred cattle brought along by Vicenteand by Joe, and as yet it was only a little after noon.

  After a time, as the animals got together in a fairly close bunch aheadof Jack, Vicente rode up to him; and presently Joe appeared from aravine. The three stopped and got off and sat down on the ground, andJoe and Vicente rolled cigarettes. The tired horses panted and thesweat dropped from their saddle cinches.

  "Lots of cattle here," said Vicente. "We bring in big bunch to-night;hard on the horses, though. Lots of places in this rough country wherecattle can hide."

  "Yes," agreed Joe, "that's sure so. I ought to have a fresh horse now;mine's near give out."

  "Well," said Jack, "I've been having an easy time, I reckon. I haven'tdone much of anything except to keep right straight ahead. My horse istired too, but not so tired as those you two have been riding."

  "Suppose we get lot more cattle," said Vicente; "we'll have a bunch toobig for you to handle; then we'll have to take 'em out of the hills anddrive 'em to camp; but we've not much farther to go now."

  "No," answered Jack; "I suppose it's not much farther, and I guess wecan keep these going all right; but I'll have my work cut out for me ifany of these cattle should be mean and try to break back, as they areliable to. I'll have to do some riding myself."

  "Some of these cattle are pretty wild," said Vicente. "I started threeor four bunches that tried hard to break back, but now that they'retogether in a big bunch they'll be easier to handle. Only, Jack, lookout and don't lose any in these ravines."

  "All right; I'll try," Jack promised.

  A little later, the three mounted again and Jack rode down towardthe cattle and put the bunch in motion. It was slow work to get themstarted, but as Jack went along he could see from the tops of theridges he crossed that the range of hills along which they had beenworking bent away to the east just ahead of him, and that before longhe would have the cattle on smoother ground where it would be easier towatch them and to keep them traveling straight. Now the ravines beganto grow wider and shallower. Joe joined him with a few more head, andat length they got the bunch out into fairly flat country. A littlelater, Vicente was seen off to the right coming with a few more cows;and presently the herd with the three riders guiding it was travelingslowly along under its cloud of dust toward the camp, which they couldnow see ahead of them.

  The sun was still pretty high above the western horizon when they drovethe cattle down to the stream to drink, and after that began to workthem over to where the main herd was feeding.

  "I suppose," Jack said to Vicente, "that now we have got so many cattlewe'll have to spend a day or two cutting and branding calves."

  "Yes," replied Vicente; "I think so. Seems to me I saw a big lot ofstrays in this bunch that we've got ahead of us. Not many brands ofpeople around here. I don't know where they come from. Some of thebrands I don't know."

  "That's right," put in Joe. "I've seen plenty of brands that are new tome. Say, Vicente," he went on, "there's a big fat maverick heifer amongthose that I gathered. I wonder if McIntyre wouldn't like to kill herfor beef?"

  "You sure she's got no brand on?" asked Vicente.

  "Yes, I'm sure."

  "Suppose you ride to camp and ask McIntyre, and maybe we can cut herout before we get to the herd."

  "All right," said Joe; and galloped off in the direction of the camp.

  Before long he returned, riding a fresh horse.

  "McIntyre says to bring that maverick over to the camp, and we'll killher there," he reported.

  No sooner said than done. Vicente and Joe pushed their horses into thebunch of cattle and before long had cut out the unbranded heifer, whichwas very fat, and were driving her back to the camp. A little later theherd Jack was driving mingled with the main herd, and he also turnedtoward camp; but before he got there he heard a shot, and as he rodeinto the camp he could see two of the boys dressing the young cow.