RANCHLANDS 113 



the best-known cattlemen in our own Western 

 cow country, was an old friend of mine. Dur- 

 ing my term as President he was, on the whole, 

 the most influential of the Western cattle- 

 growers. He was a leader of the far-seeing 

 and enlightened element. He was a most 

 powerful supporter of the government in the 

 fight for the conservation of our natural re- 

 sources, for the utilization without waste of our 

 forests and pastures, for honest treatment of 

 everybody, and for the shaping of governmental 

 policy primarily in the interest of the small set- 

 tler, the home-maker. 



We rode first to Mackenzie's home ranch, 

 about a mile from the railway, and then to an 

 outlying set of ranch buildings ten miles oflF. 

 At the home ranch were the American fore- 

 man and his American wife and their children. 

 The buildings and the food and the whole life 

 were typical of all that was best in the old- 

 time "Far West," in the days when I knew it 

 as a cattle country. We were given a most 

 delicious and purely American lunch, including 

 all the fresh milk we could drink; and the fore- 

 man himself piloted us over the immense 

 stretches of rolling country, and in every ac- 

 tion showed himseK the born cattleman, the 

 born and trained stockman. HaK of the em- 



