THE CATTLE COUNTRY OF THE FAR WEST 



THE MIDDAY MEAL. 



are carried perhaps two or three hundred miles from the nearest town, 

 either in the ranch-wagons or else by some regular freighting outfit, the 

 huge canvas-topped prairie schooners of which are each drawn by several 

 yoke of oxen, or perhaps by six or eight mules. To guard against the 

 numerous mishaps of prairie travel, two or three of these prairie schooners 

 usually go together, the brawny teamsters, known either as "bull-whack- 

 ers " or as " mule-skinners," stalking beside their slow-moving teams. 



The small outlying camps are often tents, or mere dug-outs in the 

 ground. But at the main ranch there will be a cluster of log buildings, 

 including a separate cabin for the foreman or ranchman ; often another 

 in which to cook and eat ; a long house for the men to sleep in ; stables, 

 sheds, a blacksmith's shop, etc., the whole group forming quite a little 

 settlement, with the corrals, the stacks of natural hay, and the patches of 

 fenced land for gardens or horse pastures. This little settlement may be 

 situated right out in the treeless, nearly level open, but much more often 

 is placed in the partly wooded bottom of a creek or river, sheltered by the 



usual background of somber brown hills. 

 3 



