THE WASTEFUL WEST 



Working by day, gambling by night, drinking un- 

 til the whisky gave out, and grumbling until the 

 load was made for the trip to the railroad town 

 this was the life of one sort of American citizen 

 at one time in our Western history. Untold num- 

 bers of high-topped wagons rolled into these scores 

 of railroad towns, each with its burden of shaggy 

 brown bales, each leaving behind the ghastliness of 

 an unparalleled slaughter and waste of life, and of 

 the means of life, to an appalling total. Those were 

 the days before the cowboy came, but they were wild 

 and hard as any of the wild, hard Western days. 



The skin outfit sold its hides for only a fraction 

 of what they were really worth. Then they bought 

 more whisky, drank, fought, made more frontier 

 history, and departed again for the range. The 

 skin-hunter's calling was one easily entered. It in- 

 vited some good men and a great many bad ones. It 

 was a calling distinct in itself. There were not 

 many skin-hunters who later became bone-gatherers 

 that was done by another wave of population. Be- 

 tween these skin-hunters and the bone-gatherers 

 came the wolfers yet another distinct gentry. The 

 carcasses of the buffalo attracted thousands of gray 

 wolves, and the wolfers made a business of poison- 

 ing the carcasses or did so until the wise wolf-beast 

 learned much cunning about traps and poison. Fol- 



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