The Project Gutenberg EBook of George in Camp, by Harry Castlemon This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. Title: George in Camp or Life on the Plains Author: Harry Castlemon Release Date: December 4, 2016 [EBook #53666] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GEORGE IN CAMP *** Produced by Richard Tonsing, David Edwards and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) Shooting the Cattle. ROUGHING IT SERIES. GEORGE IN CAMP: OR, LIFE ON THE PLAINS. BY HARRY CASTLEMON, AUTHOR OF “THE GUNBOAT SERIES,” “THE FRANK NELSON SERIES,” “THE BOY TRAPPER SERIES,” &C. PHILADELPHIA: PORTER & COATES. FAMOUS CASTLEMON BOOKS. GUNBOAT SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 6 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. Frank the Young Naturalist. Frank on a Gunboat. Frank in the Woods. Frank before Vicksburg. Frank on the Lower Mississippi. Frank on the Prairie. ROCKY MOUNTAIN SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. Frank among the Rancheros. Frank at Don Carlos’ Rancho. Frank in the Mountains. SPORTSMAN’S CLUB SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. The Sportsman’s Club in the Saddle. The Sportsman’s Club Afloat. The Sportsman’s Club among the Trappers. GO-AHEAD SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. Tom Newcombe. Go-Ahead. No Moss. FRANK NELSON SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. Snowed Up. Frank in the Forecastle. Boy Traders. BOY TRAPPER SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 3 vols. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. The Buried Treasure; or, Old Jordan’s Haunt. The Boy Trapper; or, How Dave Filled the Order. The Mail-Carrier. ROUGHING IT SERIES. By Harry Castlemon. Illustrated. 16mo. Cloth, extra, black and gold. George in Camp. Other Volumes in Preparation. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1879, by PORTER & COATES, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. Among the Texans Page 5 CHAPTER II. A Neighborhood Row 19 CHAPTER III. Ned’s Experience in Camp 30 CHAPTER IV. A Discontented Boy 49 CHAPTER V. The Clerk’s Ruse 70 CHAPTER VI. A Frontier Hotel 87 CHAPTER VII. Zeke’s Letter 109 CHAPTER VIII. Ned’s New Horse 128 CHAPTER IX. A Visit from the Raiders 150 CHAPTER X. The Two Friends 172 CHAPTER XI. Gus Hears from Home 192 CHAPTER XII. A Narrow Escape 215 CHAPTER XIII. George has Company 236 iii iv CHAPTER XIV. Good and Bad News 257 CHAPTER XV. What Happened at the Rancho 282 CHAPTER XVI. Caught at Last! 304 CHAPTER XVII. Conclusion 325 GEORGE IN CAMP; OR, LIFE ON THE PLAINS. “I CHAPTER I. AMONG THE TEXANS. don’t like the way things are going at all, and I just wish those two people were back where they came from. They have turned the ranche upside down since they have been here, and now I begin to feel as though they were the masters, and that I have no more rights than a tramp who had dropped in to beg a night’s lodging!” The speaker, a sturdy, broad-shouldered youth, about fifteen years of age, was sitting on the porch in front of the house in which he lived, busily engaged in mending a broken bridle with an awl and a piece of waxed-end. His name was George Ackerman, and he was one of the boys whom we introduced to the notice of the reader in the concluding volume of the “Boy Trapper Series,” and of whose adventures and exploits we promised to say something more than we said then. We find him now at his home in Texas, where he had been born, and where he had always lived, with the exception of the two years he had passed in a distant city attending school. He was dressed, as all the boys and men in that country were dressed, for hard work; and he had done a good deal of it during his comparatively short life—not because it was necessary, but because he had been brought up to it. His father was very wealthy—no one knew how many horses and cattle he owned—and he had left a property worth between thirty and forty thousand dollars a year. If money is what makes people happy, one would suppose that George Ackerman ought to be one of the happiest boys in the world; and so he was, up to the time his only parent died, which was about a year and a half previous to the beginning of our story. He had everything a boy could possibly wish for—good health, a kind and indulgent father, a comfortable and happy home, and all the other aids to complete happiness so dear to the heart of most boys, and for which Bob Owens and Dan Evans so impatiently longed—such as horses, dogs, jointed fish-poles and breech-loading guns. He had made a start in business for himself, and was thought by the boys of his acquaintance to be pretty well off in the world. He began when he was only nine years old, by herding cattle for his father at forty dollars a month, taking his pay in young stock which he selected himself. These increased in numbers and value during the two years he was away at school, and now he was the owner of three hundred head of cattle which he had paid for by his own labor, and which he could have sold any day for twenty dollars apiece. He had a herdsman of his own and colts enough to mount all the cronies he had left at school, and who had faithfully promised to visit him at no distant day in his far-away home. It was two years and more since he parted from those same cronies, and not one of them had ever been to see him. He never heard from them now. His correspondents had dropped off, one after the other, until he had not a single one remaining. His father was gone, too, and poor George felt much as he would have felt if he had been dropped suddenly on Robinson Crusoe’s lonely island, without even a man Friday to keep him company. It is true, that there were plenty of people around him. His Uncle John and Cousin Ned lived in the same house with him, and there were a score or more of men, Americans and Mexicans, employed on the ranche as house-servants and herdsmen. He had four playmates close at hand—that is, two of them lived five miles east of him and the others eight miles west—and they were jolly fellows and he liked to be in their company. The time never hung heavily on his hands, for he was very industrious, and could always find something useful to do; but still he was lonely and homesick every hour in the day. The old house was not the same now that it was during his father’s lifetime. Uncle John had built additions to it, rearranged the inside of it to suit himself, and filled it with the most expensive furniture, such as had never been seen in the wilds of Texas before. Uncle John and his son, who dressed as fashionably now as they did when they came from the States, and who took as much pains with their toilet as a couple of city dandies would have done, were very much pleased with the new order of things. They seemed to have been made for no other purpose than to idle away their time on the luxurious sofas and easy- chairs with which the old rancho was now so plentifully supplied; but George, with his heavy cowhide boots, coarse clothing and sun-browned face and hands, was sadly out of place among them. Uncle John Ackerman lived somewhere in the state of Ohio. He was a poor man, and, up to the time of the death of his only brother, George’s father, was obliged to work hard for his living. That sad event, which brought so much sorrow and trouble to George, was the making of Uncle John, for the time being. It took him and his scapegrace of a son from a life of toil and placed them just where they had always wanted to be—in a position to live without work. Uncle John was made his nephew’s guardian and the executor of his brother’s will, and to him the property was left in trust, to be cared for and managed for George until the latter became of age, when it was to be turned over to him, less a certain sum, which Uncle John was at liberty to keep in payment for his services. If George died before reaching his majority, Ned Ackerman, Uncle John’s son, was to be the heir. As soon as the terms of the will were made known, Uncle John and Ned hastened to Texas, and took up their abode at the rancho. At first, everything passed off smoothly. George could see nothing to admire in either one of his relatives, whom he had met but once before; but still he did not absolutely dislike them, until Ned began to show, both by words and actions, that he considered himself the lawful master of the ranche and everything belonging to it, and that George had no rights that he or his father were bound to respect. One change after another was introduced, in spite of all the rightful owner could say or do to prevent it, until at last the old house was so changed in appearance, both inside and out, that George could hardly recognise it as his home. Then he grew angry and almost made up his mind that he would strike out for himself, and live on the prairie, with his cattle and his herdsman, as a good many of the early settlers had done before him. But the fact that his cousin Ned was gradually crowding him to the wall, and usurping the place that George himself ought 5 6 7 8 9 10 to have held in the house, was not the only thing that troubled the young rancheman. That was bad enough, but it was accompanied by something worse. If he was snubbed and kept in the background by his relatives while at home, he was treated but little, if any, better by the people, both young and old, who lived in the settlement, and that was what hurt him. He was acquainted with almost every farmer and rancheman in the county, and, until lately, he had always been very popular among them; but when Uncle John and his son arrived his troubles began. The neighbors would have nothing whatever to do with the newcomers. They would not even notice them when they met them on the highway, and it was not long before they began to extend the same treatment to George himself. The young cattle-herder could not imagine what it was that caused this change, until one day, while he was riding to Palos, to purchase some supplies for himself and his hired man, he met one of his young friends, who, instead of stopping to talk with him, as he usually did, simply bowed and put spurs to his horse, as if he were in a hurry to pass by him; but George reined his own nag across the trail and stopped him. “Now, Hank Short,” said he, “I want to know what you mean by such work as this? What’s the reason that you and the other fellows never come to see me any more, and that you take pains to pass me in this fashion? Do you take me for a horse-thief?” This, according to a Texas boy’s way of thinking, was the worst term of reproach that could be applied to anybody. In Nantucket, if they want to convey the impression that a man is utterly detestable, they say he is mean enough to “mix oil.” In Massachusetts, he will “rob a hen-roost,” and in Texas, he will “steal horses.” “Everybody in the settlement seems to have gone back on me since my father died,” said George, bitterly, “and I don’t know what to think of it. Now, Hank, you can’t go by here until you tell me what I have done to make all the folks angry at me. As soon as I know what it is, I will try to make amends for it.” “You haven’t done anything,” was Hank’s reply. “We don’t take you for a horse-thief!” “Then why do you——Eh? You don’t take me for a horse-thief! What do you mean by that?” “Well, I—you know——” faltered Hank, “those northern relations of yours sling on a good many frills, and folks who wear store clothes and boiled shirts are not wanted in this country. We’re afraid of them.” “Whew!” whistled George. He looked steadily at his friend for a moment, then down at the ground, and finally he reined his horse out of Hank’s path and went slowly on his way toward Palos. It was all plain enough to him now. Uncle John and Ned wore store clothes and boiled shirts, and the settlers took them for horse-thieves and treated them accordingly. That was the English of it, and George wondered why he, knowing the customs of the country and the habits and opinions of the people as well as he did, had not been smart enough to see it without asking any questions. This was what he thought at first, and then he suddenly grew so angry that he could scarcely control himself. He drew up his horse with a jerk, faced about in his saddle and called after his friend. “Look here, Hank,” he shouted, shaking his fist in the air, “you may tell those people who shun my relatives because they would rather wear good clothes than shabby ones, and who go back on me because I live with them—you can tell those people that we are just as good as they dare be any day and just as honest!” “All right,” was Hank’s response. “And bear another thing in mind,” cried George, growing angrier every minute, “and that is, I am boy enough to make you, or any fellow like you, who says anything against them take back his words. I am going to stand by them, no matter what happens.” “I haven’t said anything against them,” answered Hank. “I think too much of you to do that. I’ll talk to you the next time I see you. Perhaps you will be better natured then.” This reply completely disarmed George, who promptly turned about, intending to ride up to his friend and take back every harsh word he had uttered; but Hank touched his horse with his spurs as soon as he ceased speaking, and was now almost out of earshot. So George was compelled to face about again and go on his way toward Palos, without making things straight with his friend. “Hank is a good fellow, that’s a fact,” said he to himself, “and I might have known that he wouldn’t say a word that he thought would offend me. But here’s one thing I can’t understand,” continued George, growing angry again. “If the settlers don’t want anything to do with Uncle John and Ned, is that any reason why they should give me the cold shoulder? If they don’t want to come to our rancho, they might at least treat me civilly when they meet me away from home. This is the strangest world I ever saw or heard of. If I should walk into Foxboro’, where Uncle John came from, with these clothes on, folks would look at me suspiciously, lock their back doors and keep an eye on their smoke-houses. He and Ned came into the country, dressed as I suppose all city folks dress, and every body is down on them, and ready to take them for anything in the world but an honest man and boy.” Yes, it is a fact that Uncle John and Ned had been received by the settlers in about as cordial and friendly a manner as a couple of ragged, ill-looking tramps would be received if they suddenly made their appearance in the streets of some retired village in New England. It was just the sort of reception that these rough frontiersmen always extend to people of that stamp. This may seem like a strange statement, but it is nevertheless true. If you want to be certain of it read the following paragraphs, which have been condensed from a recently published book[1] written by two men who have spent long years in the wilds of which we write. 11 12 13 14 15 1. Two Thousand Miles in Texas on Horseback; by McDanield and Taylor. “The men who follow this business of stock raising are peculiar. They are a stalwart, sinewy race, bronzed and bearded, and always go armed to the teeth; but they wear their weapons just as other people wear coats and vests, mainly because it is fashionable. A more peaceably-disposed people I never saw; and they seem to vie with one another in hospitality to the stranger. They are nearly all young or middle-aged men. To subdue the wilderness and stand guard over the watch- towers of civilization, do not belong to the old; and yet I see a few strong old men here whose heads are as white as if a hundred winters had sprinkled their snows upon them—old men youthful in everything except years. They are a sharp, quick and intelligent people, and there are some who are evidently of superior education. These are doubtless stray young gentlemen whom a restless spirit of adventure decoyed from their homes in the old states, finally stranding them on the shores of this far-away country. They are appreciated here, for these rough frontiersmen dearly love to have educated and sensible young men settle among them. But let no pin-feather youth think that he can come here and be made a lion of at once. A pretentious, foppish young fellow would be heavily discounted by them, in spite of all his book learning and elegance of manner. He must have a good store of common sense and understand how to adapt himself to the situation. He must throw on no airs, for these frontiersmen are nearly all men of as much sharpness of wit as boldness of heart. They have seen a good deal of the world and quickly detect the spurious. The newcomer must show a heart for honest, manly work, be companionable, bear himself toward all respectfully and courteously, and he will soon find that he has a noble army of friends around him who will always be glad to advance him, and who will feel proud of him as one of themselves. “I have often thought of my first appearance among those frontier people with considerable amusement. When a boy, almost beardless and just from the schools, I came on horseback to San Saba, wearing a nice silk hat, carrying a silver- headed cane, and dressed as young gentlemen generally dress in the best communities of the older states. The old frontiersmen looked upon me with almost intolerable scorn, and there was some serious talk of hanging me as a suspected horse-thief, for no other reason in the world than because I was well-dressed, well-educated and decidedly well-behaved, though rather a reserved young fellow. “One old chap, rough and bearded, and to my eye quite a monster in appearance, actually talked of this within my hearing. The look of scorn he cast upon me was sublime. I was quick to perceive the drift of things; and as the Indians were then stealing and scalping at a great rate, I threw aside my nice clothes, and silver-headed cane, put on a rough suit and went Indian hunting with the frontiersmen, sleeping with them in their houses, in the woods and on the prairie. They soon grew fond of me, and I have never been in a country where I had so many warm friends; but they never ceased to joke me about my three-story hat and silver-headed cane. Had I not thrown aside these articles it is not at all impossible that I might have been hanged.” This was the kind of people among whom Uncle John and Ned lived now. 16 17 18 W CHAPTER II. A NEIGHBORHOOD ROW. hat was true of the people who lived in San Saba, during the days when the incident we have just recorded happened, was equally true of the people who lived in Palos and the surrounding country, at the time of which we write. They were nearly all rich—there was hardly a man among them who could tell how many horses and cattle bore his brand, —but every man and boy of them kept busy at something, and strangers who came to that country, and sported their fine clothes and did nothing, were always objects of suspicion. All the settlers knew that Uncle John and Ned were the brother and nephew of one of the most popular men who had ever lived in the county, but that did not alter the facts of the case. If the newcomers expected to be kindly received and hospitably treated, they must come down from the high position they had assumed and act like other folks. George mourned in secret over this disagreeable state of affairs, but he knew that it could not be remedied in any way, unless his relatives could be prevailed upon to conform to the customs of the people among whom they lived. When he returned from Palos, after his interview with Hank Short, he waited and watched for an opportunity to give them a little advice, and one morning, at the breakfast-table, the chance was presented. “I have always heard that Texans were a friendly and hospitable set of people,” said Uncle John, as he pushed his chair away from the table; “but I have learned that they are just the reverse. I have been among them a good many months, and there hasn’t been a person here to see me—not one.” “They’re a set of boors,” observed Ned. “You and I want nothing to do with them, father. We must live entirely within ourselves, while we stay here, and we’re able to do it.” “But they won’t let you,” said George. “They! Who?” demanded Ned. “The settlers about here.” “How are they going to help themselves, I’d like to know? Isn’t this a free country?” “Yes, it’s a free country,” answered George, with a smile, “almost too free, you would think, if you had seen what I have. If you are going to live among these people, you must be one of them.” Ned ran his eye over his cousin’s sturdy figure taking in at a glance his copper-colored face, large, rough hands and coarse clothing, and then he looked down at himself. “How must I do it?” he asked. “You must pull off that finery, the first thing you do,” was George’s blunt reply. “Throw it away. It is of no use to you in this country.” “I found that out long ago,” sneered Ned. “These people look upon a red shirt as a badge of respectability.” “And so it is, in one sense of the word,” returned George. “When you are dressed for work, you are ready for it; and when people see you at work, they know that you have an honest way of making a living. People who do nothing are of no more use here in Texas, than they are in Ohio.” “That’s just what I have been trying to drum into his head ever since we have been here,” said Uncle John, who had not been known to do a stroke of work of any kind during the long months he had lived in the rancho. “Go on and tell him what to do, George.” “It must be something that will bring me money,” chimed in Ned. “I shan’t work for nothing.” “There are plenty of things that will bring you money,” replied George. “You can rent a piece of ground, fence it in and go to farming; or you can be a cattle or pig-raiser.” “Pig-raiser!” exclaimed Ned, in great disgust. “There’s money in it, I tell you. These post-oak belts that run across the state, afford the finest pasturage in the world— hundreds of bushels of acorns to the acre,—and all you would have to do would be to build you a little hut in some place that suited you, and call up your pigs twice a day and feed them a little corn, to keep them from straying away and going wild. If you want to make money without work,” added George, who knew very well that that was just what his cousin did want, “you can’t select a better business.” “I’m not going to live among pigs!” declared Ned, emphatically. “That’s settled. If I had a herd of cattle like yours, I might take some interest in it.” “You can get it, if you are willing to work for it, as I did.” “That would take too long. If I go into any business, it must be something that will yield me immediate returns. I think the easiest thing I could do would be to put in fifty or a hundred acres of wheat. That is a crop that will require the least work.” “Well, there is land enough at your disposal,” said George. “There are ten thousand acres in this ranche. But where are you going to get the money to fence your field?” 19 20 21 22 23 “I don’t see why I should fence it at all. Our own cattle (Ned and his father always spoke of the ranche, and everything belonging to it, as though it were their own property) will not trouble it, for I shall tell the herders to keep them at a distance.” “But they couldn’t always do it. Besides, suppose some of the neighbors’ cattle should stray away from the herdsmen and trespass on your field: what would you do?” “I should tell those neighbors, whoever they were, to keep their cattle at home; and if they didn’t do it, I should watch my field and shoot the first steer that came into it. That thing has been done in this country.” “Yes, it has,” returned George, “and what was the consequence?” “O, it created a neighborhood row, I believe,” answered Ned, indifferently. “It certainly did; and you would never want to live through another if you had lived through that one. You will need a fence around your field, and it must be high and strong, too; and if anybody’s cattle break in, as they will, most likely, no matter how good your fence may be, you mustn’t take satisfaction by shooting them.” “You’ll see whether I will or not. If I can raise a fuss as easily as that, I’ll do it. The people here seem to think that I’m a nobody, but they will find that they are very badly mistaken. I can draw a trigger as well as the next man.” “I hope you won’t draw it on anybody’s cattle,” said George, earnestly. “If you do, you’ll set the whole settlement together by the ears. I’ve seen one ‘neighborhood row,’ as you call it, and I never want to see another. I can remember, for it was not so very long ago, when my father did not dare go to the door after dark for fear that there might be somebody lying in wait to shoot him. I can remember when I used to lie awake night after night with my head under the bed clothes, starting at every sound, and expecting every minute to hear the crackling of flames, and to rush out to find the house surrounded by armed men, who would shoot us down as fast as we came out. That very thing was threatened more than once. You don’t know anything about it, for you were not here at the time; but I do, and I—Whew!” exclaimed George, pushing his chair away from the table and drawing his hand across his forehead, at the same time shuddering all over as he recalled to mind some of the thrilling scenes through which he had passed during those days and nights of horror. “If you are going to bring those times back to us you had better make arrangements to leave here at once, for the country will be too hot to hold you.” There had indeed been troublous days in Miller county a few months previous to the beginning of our story. In the first place the county was settled by men who devoted themselves exclusively to raising cattle and horses for market. Some of them purchased land, but the majority did not own an acre. They lived in the saddle, slept in the open air the year round and subsisted principally upon the game that fell to their rifles. They followed their herds wherever they went, and the raising of them never cost their owners a dollar, for the prairie afforded abundant pasturage and was free to any one who might choose to occupy it. In process of time other settlers came in, some turning their attention to stock raising, while the others purchased farms from the government, surrounded them with fences to keep their neighbors’ cattle from trespassing on them, and put in crops. Unfortunately ill-feeling existed between these two classes of men, the farmers and the ranchemen, almost from the very first. The latter did not want the farmers there for the reason that every farm that was fenced in took away just so many acres of their pasture; and the farmers declared that the ranchemen were a nuisance and ought to be driven out of the country, because their cattle broke through the fences and destroyed the crops that had cost so much labor. These feelings of hostility grew stronger as the farmers increased in numbers, and the ranchemen saw their limits growing smaller every year, and the rich pastures they had so long occupied being turned up by the plough. The fences that were hastily erected by the farmers were not strong enough to keep out the half-wild cattle which roamed the unoccupied territory, and when one of these immense herds gained access to a cultivated field they made sad work with it. Whenever this happened the farmers sued the owners of the cattle in the courts for damages; and as they were by this time largely in the majority and could control the juries, they always gained their cause. This made the stockmen very angry, and they had recourse to a law of their own—that of force. They drove off cattle belonging to the farmers, sold them and divided the proceeds among themselves. The farmers took revenge by shooting the cattle that broke into their fields; the ranchemen retaliated by shooting the farmers; and this led to a reign of terror of which our readers may have some very faint conception if they chanced to live in Chicago, Pittsburgh, Buffalo or Baltimore during the riots that took place in July 1877. Things very soon came to such a pass that no man went abroad, even in the day time, unless he was loaded with weapons, and even then he expected to be bushwhacked by some angry neighbor. Every house was converted into a little fortress, and people were very careful how they ventured out of doors after dark, or showed themselves in front of a window opening into a lighted room. This state of affairs might have continued until the present day, or until the thinly-settled county was entirely depopulated, had it not been for the interference of some lawless men who lived just over the border. One dark night, a party of Mexicans, headed by renegade Americans, made a raid across the Rio Grande and drove off a thousand head of cattle and horses. The robbers were so delighted with their success that they came again and again, and the settlers, being divided against themselves, could do nothing to protect their property. This brought them to their senses, as nothing else could have done. Advances and concessions were made on both sides; old differences were forgotten; the farmers repaired their dilapidated fences; the stock-raisers employed extra herdsmen to keep their cattle within bounds; and a company of Rangers was promptly organized, composed of the very men who had been bushwhacking one another for 24 25 26 27 28 months. The Mexican raiders did not come again immediately, for their spies told them of the preparations that had been made to receive them; and when at last all fears of another visit from them had passed away, the company which the settlers had called together for mutual protection ceased to exist as an organization. But it had served more than one good purpose. It had not only compelled the raiders to remain on their own side of the river, but it had brought the stockmen and farmers into intimate relations with one another, and led to the determination on the part of all of them that the cause of their troubles should be carefully avoided in the future. Since that time Miller county had been one of the quietest and most orderly portions of the state. Peace and plenty reigned, and the farmers and stockmen were the firmest of friends. But now it appeared that a vindictive boy, who was too lazy to win a name for himself in any honorable way, was willing and even eager to put an end to this happy state of affairs just because he wanted the settlers to notice him—to see that he was not a nobody. The shooting of a single steer that had broken into a farmer’s field would have been like throwing a blazing fire-brand upon a dry prairie while the wind was blowing a gale. George was frightened at the bare thought of such a thing. 29 I CHAPTER III. NED’S EXPERIENCE IN CAMP. t was plain enough to George that Ned wanted to take satisfaction out of the settlers for their refusal to notice him and make much of him, as he seemed to think they ought to have done. He said all he could to induce him to give up the idea, but Ned was stubborn, and George finally abandoned the attempt in despair, hoping that when the trouble came, as it certainly would come if Ned held to his resolution, he could in some way protect him from the consequences of his folly. “I can at least guide him out of the country, for it will not be safe for him to stay here,” thought George. “Uncle John will go, too, if he is wise; but I shall have to remain and shoulder the whole of it.” The conversation recorded in the preceding chapter was but one of the many Ned had with his father and cousin on the subject of farming, and the result was that the following winter saw him the owner, for the time being, of fifty acres of rich bottom land, which had been fenced and planted to wheat. By the terms of the contract made with his father in George’s hearing, Ned was to pay the same rent for the ground that he would have had to pay had he leased it from an entire stranger. “You know the ranche doesn’t belong to me,” said Uncle John. “I am managing it for George’s benefit, and must make all the money I can for him. You ought to clear a nice little sum by your venture, and can afford to pay the usual rent.” “O, I’ll pay it after my crop is sold; that is, if I feel like it,” said Ned to himself. “George has money enough already. A boy who owns six thousand dollars’ worth of stock ought to be willing to allow his only cousin the free use of fifty acres of land. I shall have need of every red cent I make.” Ned, who was extravagantly fond of company and pleasure, could hardly endure the lonely life he was compelled to lead. He hoped that as soon as it became known throughout the settlement that he had made up his mind to go to work, he would be in a fair way to gain the favor of the people; and perhaps he would, if he had gone about it in the right way. He laid aside the objectionable broadcloth suit and white shirt, it is true, and put on what he called “working clothes;” but they were more gorgeous than any that had ever been seen in that part of Texas before outside of an illustrated story paper. His boots were expensive Wellingtons, and were made of patent leather, too. He wore gray corduroy trowsers, a fawnskin vest, a finely-dressed buckskin coat, with silver buttons, and a Mexican sombrero ornamented with gold cord and tassels. It was a “nobby” suit, to quote from its delighted owner, and must have astonished the natives, if one might judge by the way they stared at him when they met him on the trail; but it did not bring him any more company than he had always had. Ned led a lonely and discontented life all that winter. There were no boys with whom he could associate except his cousin, and Ned had come to the conclusion that he would much rather be alone than in George’s company. The latter did not suit him at all. He was much too industrious. He was in camp with his herdsman more than half the time, and when he was at home he was always busy. Ned had expected to see unbounded pleasure in living on the prairie and sleeping in the open air, as his cousin did more than six months in the year, and once he had spent two weeks with him in camp; but that was his first and last experience in cattle-herding, and as it was not at all to his liking, we must stop long enough to say something about it. This is a story of camp life, you know. Ned had not been away from the ranche more than three days before he found, to his great surprise and disappointment, that life in the open air was not what his lively imagination had pictured it. Many a boy has been deceived on this point, just as others have been deceived in looking upon the life of a sailor as one of ease and romance. Ned thought that those who lived in camp had nothing to do but sit on the grass, under the spreading branches of some friendly tree, and dream away the days which would be all sunshine; and that when they grew hungry, some fat black-tail or antelope would walk up within easy range of their rifles just on purpose to be shot. The nights would be mild and pleasant, the fire would somehow keep itself burning all the time, whether the necessary fuel was supplied or not, and cook his meals for him without any care or exertion on his part. But one short week’s experience banished all these absurd ideas, and taught him what a cattle-herder’s camp-life really was. It was one of almost constant drudgery and toil. George had three hundred cattle to watch, and as he had only one herdsman to assist him, he was kept busy from morning until night. He and Zeke (that was the name of his herdsman, of whom we shall have a good deal to say by and by), were up and doing long before the sun arose, and while one cooked the breakfast and performed the necessary camp-duties, the other drove the cattle out to pasture and watched them to see that they didn’t stray away. Ned, being inexperienced, and an invited guest beside, was not expected to do anything except to eat his share of the rations, and enjoy himself as well as he could. Sometimes he went out with the cattle-herder, and then he stayed with the camp-keeper; but he soon grew tired of both of them and of their way of life, too. George knew but little about the city and cared less. He took no interest whatever in his cousin’s glowing descriptions of the numerous “scrapes” he had been in, and neither did Zeke, who bluntly told him that he might have been in better business. Ned, on the other hand, cared nothing for the things in which George and Zeke were interested, so there was little they could talk about. But there was plenty of hunting, and in this way Ned passed a portion of each day. He had no luck, however, for he never saw anything in the shape of game larger than Jack rabbits, and he never bagged one of them. The only thing he brought back to camp with him from these hunting excursions was a ravenous appetite, and he had to satisfy it with fried bacon, hard corn-cakes and coffee without any milk. The juicy venison steaks and other luxuries he had expected to fatten on were never served up to him. It rained, too, sometimes, and Ned could find no shelter under the dripping trees. There was no fun at all in going to bed in wet clothes, and Ned always shuddered and wished himself safe at the rancho when his 30 31 32 33 34 35 cousin said to him, as he did almost every night— “Don’t forget your lasso. The rattlers are tolerable plenty about here.” Ned knew that, for he had seen two or three of them killed in the camp. George had told him that the neighborhood of a fire was a bad place for rattlesnakes, and Ned could hardly bring himself to believe that his hair lasso, laid down in a coil about the place where he made his bed, was a sure protection against these dangerous visitors. A few days before he went home, Ned had an experience such as he had never had before, and which he fervently hoped would never be repeated. On this particular day he went out with George, whose turn it was to watch the cattle. He soon grew tired of talking to him, so he mounted his horse and set out in search of antelopes, which, so his cousin told him, were often seen in that neighborhood. He rode slowly in a circle around the place where the cattle were feeding, at distances varying from a half to three-quarters of a mile from them (there was small chance of finding an antelope so close to the herd, but Ned dared not go any farther away for fear of the Apaches, concerning whom he had heard some dreadful stories told by Zeke the night before), and he had been gone about an hour when he was suddenly startled by hearing the faint report of a rifle. Turning his eyes quickly in the direction from which the report sounded, he saw his cousin sitting in his saddle, and waving his hat frantically in the air. When he found that the sound of his rifle had attracted Ned’s attention, he beckoned him to approach. “What’s up, I wonder?” thought Ned, not a little alarmed. “George must have shot at something, for I saw the smoke curling above his head. Are the Mexicans or Apaches about to make a raid on us?” Ned, who had drawn rein on the summit of a high swell, looked all around but could see no signs of any horsemen. He did see something to increase his alarm, however. He saw that the cattle, which were quietly grazing the last time he looked toward them, were now all in motion, and that they were hurrying toward the belt of post-oaks in which the camp was located. That was enough for Ned. He put his horse into a gallop and hastened to join his cousin, who now and then beckoned to him with both hands as if urging him to ride faster. “What’s the matter?” shouted Ned, as soon as he arrived within speaking distance of George. “Raiders?” “O no! We’re going to have a norther, and if there should happen to be rain with it we don’t want it to catch us out here on the prairie.” “Is that all?” exclaimed Ned, somewhat impatiently. “That’s a pretty excuse for frightening a fellow half to death, isn’t it? I thought something was going to happen.” “Something is going to happen!” replied George. “You seem to have grown very much afraid of the rain lately,” continued Ned. “It was only a day or two ago that you stood out in a hard shower, and never seemed to care for it.” “Yes; but if we have rain now, it will be a different sort, as you will find.” “I don’t see any signs of it yet,” said Ned, looking up at the sky. “I hope it will cool the air a little,” he added, a moment later, pulling off his hat and drawing his handkerchief across his face, which was very much flushed, “for I am almost roasted. I declare, I must have ridden fast. Just see how my horse sweats!” “Mine sweats just as badly,” replied George, “and he has been staked out ever since you have been gone.” Ned looked at his cousin’s horse, then glanced at his own, and was very much surprised at what he saw. Both animals were wet with perspiration, and stood with their heads down and their sides heaving, as if they had been ridden long and rapidly. There was not a breath of air stirring, as Ned found, when he came to look about him. The atmosphere was close and oppressive, and filled with a thick haze, which seemed to magnify every object within the range of his vision, and overhead, the sun rode in a cloudless sky, sending down his beams with fearful intensity. “Whew!” panted Ned. He dropped his reins, hung his rifle upon the horn of his saddle, peeled off his coat, vest and neck- tie, and threw open the collar of his shirt. “Whew!” he gasped. “We shall be overcome with the heat before we can reach the timber. I had no idea it was so hot! I don’t see how you can stand it, with those thick clothes on.” “I am pretty warm now, that’s a fact; but I shall be cool enough by and by, and so will you!” While the boys were talking in this way, they were riding toward the post-oaks, which were now about a mile and a half distant. The sun’s rays seemed to grow hotter with every step of the way, and the atmosphere to become more stifling, until at last Ned would gladly have welcomed a hurricane or an earthquake, if it would have brought him any relief from his sufferings. Finally, a small, dark-colored cloud appeared in the horizon, rising into view with wonderful rapidity, spreading itself over the sky and shooting out great, black arms before it, until it looked like a gigantic spider. Then the first breath of the on-coming norther began to ruffle the grass, whereupon George faced about in his saddle, and began unfastening a bundle, in which he carried his rubber poncho and heavy overcoat, while Ned pulled off his hat again and turned his shirt- collar farther back. “Aha!” exclaimed the latter, with a great sigh of relief. “Isn’t that a delightful breeze? What are you going to do?” “I am going to bundle up,” was George’s reply, “and if you will take my advice, you will do the same. You see——” “O, let it rain!” exclaimed Ned, without waiting to hear what else his cousin had to say. “It will be most refreshing, after such a roasting as we have had!” George said no more, for he had been snubbed every time he tried to give his city relative any advice, and he had long ago 36 37 38 39 40 resolved that he would not willingly give him a chance to snub him again. We ought also to say that there was another reason why George kept silent. A Texan takes unbounded delight in seeing a greenhorn caught out in a norther. It is so very different from any storm he ever saw before, and his astonishment is so overwhelming! George opened his bundle, put on his overcoat, threw his poncho over that and drew on a pair of heavy gloves. He looked as if he were preparing to face a snow-storm. All this while the norther had been steadily, but almost imperceptibly, increasing in force, and now, without any further warning, it burst forth in all its fury, and the roar of the wind sounded like the rumble of an approaching express train. “Whew!” exclaimed Ned, suddenly; “how it blows and how fearfully cold it is!” As he said this he drew his collar together and hastily put on his vest and coat; but when he tried to button the coat his fingers were so benumbed that he was almost helpless. “Why, I’m freezing,” gasped Ned, as his cousin rode up beside him and offered his assistance. “O, no!” answered George, cheerfully. “No one was ever known to freeze to death or even to take cold from exposure to a norther. You’ll be all right as soon as you get to a fire.” “I never saw such a country,” said Ned, as plainly as his chattering teeth would permit. “Summer and winter all in one day.” “Yes, in less than a quarter of an hour,” said George, who was busy untying the bundle Ned carried behind his saddle. “The thermometer has been known to fall sixty degrees almost instantly.” George took his cousin’s overcoat and gloves out of the bundle, but after they were put on they did not seem to afford the wearer the least protection from the bitter blast which came stronger and stronger every moment, and chilled him to the very marrow. It could not have been colder if it had come off the icebergs within the Arctic circle. It seemed to blister the skin wherever it touched, and was so cutting and keen that the boys could not keep their faces toward it. Even the horses began to grow restive under it, and it was all their riders could do to control them. “O, I shall never see home again!” cried Ned, who was terribly alarmed. “I shall freeze to death right here. I can’t stand it!” “You can and you must,” shouted George, as he seized his cousin’s horse by the bridle. “Now, pull your hat down over your face, throw yourself forward in the saddle, and hang on for life. I’ll take care of you.” An instant afterward Ned was being carried over the prairie with all the speed his horse could be induced to put forth. He did not know which way he was going, for he dared not look up to see. He sat with his hat over his face, his head bowed over to his horse’s neck, and his hands twisted in the animal’s mane, while George sat up, braving it all and leading him to a place of refuge. It seemed to Ned that they were a very long time in reaching the timber, and that he should certainly freeze to death before that mile and a half of prairie could be crossed; but he didn’t, and neither did he afterward feel any bad effects from what he suffered during his cold ride. He found that Zeke, having been warned by signs he could easily read that the norther was coming, had moved the camp to a more sheltered locality, and that he had a roaring fire going and a pot of hot coffee on the coals. Ned drank a good share of that hot coffee, and forgot to grumble over it, as he usually did. George showed him the way home as soon as the storm abated, and there Ned resolved to stay, having fully made up his mind that there was no fun to be seen in camp-life. Ned was more lonely and discontented than ever after that. It was harder work to pass the days in doing nothing than it was to stand behind a counter, selling dry-goods; and that was what he had done before he came to Texas. There was literally no way in which he could enjoy himself. Books, which were his cousin’s delight, Ned did not care for; there was not game enough in the country to pay for the trouble of hunting for it; the boys in the settlement were a lot of boors, who would not notice him, because he was so far above them; and all Ned could do was to spend the day in loitering about the house, with his hands in his pockets. “If I only had some of the jolly fellows here that I used to run with in Foxboro’!” said Ned to himself, one day, after he had spent an hour or two in wandering from room to room, in the vain hope of finding something to interest him. “Wouldn’t we turn this old house upside down! They all promised to come and see me, but I know they won’t do it, for they’ll never be able to save money enough to pay their fare. If I ever see them, I shall have to send them the money to bring them here, and I——Well, now, why couldn’t I do that? It’s a splendid idea!” Ned, all life and animation now, hurried to his room to act upon his splendid idea, while it was yet fresh in his mind. He wrote a long letter to one of the cronies, Gus Robbins by name, whom he had left behind in Foxboro’, giving a glowing description of his new home, recounting, at great length, a thrilling hunting adventure he had heard from the lips of George’s herdsman, and of which he made himself the hero, instead of Zeke, and wound up by urging Gus and his brother to come on and pay him a long visit. “You must not refuse,” Ned wrote. “If money is what you need, let me know, and I will send you enough to foot all your bills. I am rich now, and can afford to do it. Your father ought to be willing to give you a short vacation, after you have worked so hard in the store.” The letter was mailed in due time, and Ned impatiently counted the days that must elapse before an answer could arrive. It ca...