118 WESTERN GRAZING GROUNDS AND FOREST RANGES 



brimmed black hats or even Fedoras, which will turn 

 down over their eyes on a sunny day and do not weigh 

 so much as the great broad-brimmed hats. They stay 

 on the head better, too. The long hat strings, which 

 every man once spent hours to plait from strings cut 

 from the tops of his old boots, and whose long tails or- 

 namented with fancy turk's heads and other knots hung 

 down his back, are also gone. 



The high-heeled boots are not so prominent. Once 

 no self-respecting puncher considered himself dressed 

 for work until he had his feet inside of a pair of $15 

 boots made by one of the favorite boot-makers, whose 

 merits they discussed about the camp fires night after 

 night. Great high tops they had with stars in red and 

 blue, and fancy sewing all over them. At the bottom of 

 the three-inch heel the real "top waddy" had a silver 

 quarter fastened as a plate. 



Then the "chaps" are also gone. Probably the aver- 

 age easterner will see more men wearing chaps in a 

 year if he attends the Buffalo Bill and other tent shows 

 and keeps track of the various theatrical offerings that 

 furnish pictures of western ranch life than he would if 

 he spent five years on the western ranges. Here and 

 there one will find a man wearing chaps on the range, 

 but they now are generally conspicuous by their ab- 

 sence. 



Old-time Equipment. But in the old times Ah. 

 what money was spent on such things ! Silver-mounted 

 spurs, Spanish "spade bits" that cost from $15 to $30, 

 headstalls that took hours upon hours to plait, reins that 

 were twenty-four-strand and plaited from the finest 

 grade of whang leather ornamented with wonderful 

 knots, fancy buttons and tassels. Then there were 



