IN COWBOY LAND. 2 1 



on horseback and in wagons, and various am- 

 bitious cities sprang up overnight. The new 

 settlers were all under the influence of that 

 curious craze which causes every true western- 

 er to put unlimited faith in the unknown and 

 untried ; many had left all they had in a far 

 better farming country, because they were true 

 to their immemorial belief that, wherever they 

 were, their luck would be better if they went 

 somewhere else. They were always on the 

 move, and headed for the vague beyond. As 

 miners see visions of all the famous mines of 

 history in each new camp, so these would-be 

 city founders saw future St. Pauls and Oma- 

 has in every forlorn group of tents pitched by 

 some muddy stream in a desert of gumbo and 

 sage-brush ; and they named both the towns 

 and the canvas buildings in accordance with 

 their bright hopes for the morrow, rather 

 than with reference to the mean facts of the 

 day. One of these towns, which when twenty- 

 four hours old boasted of six saloons, a " court- 

 house," and an " opera house," was over- 

 whelmed by early disaster. The third day 

 of its life a whirlwind came along and took 

 off the opera house and half the saloons ; 

 and the following evening lawless men nearly 

 finished the work of the elements. The riders 

 of a huge trail-outfit from Texas, to their glad 

 surprise discovered the town and abandoned 

 themselves to a night of roaring and lethal 

 carousal. Next morning the city authorities 

 were lamenting, with oaths of bitter rage, that 

 " them hell-and-twenty Flying A cowpunchers 



