LET 'ER BUCK 



up the river valley from the prairie. Two tented cities 

 had sprung up near the city edge and hundreds of sin- 

 gle tents white-dotted the yards of residents. The 

 church, where one turns to go up the hill, hospitably 

 announced both cots and meals within. Months pre- 

 viously every hotel room had been engaged and every 

 private citizen who could do so offered accommoda- 

 tions. Now even box cars for quarters had been 

 shunted in on the sidings. 



If you lived within a thousand miles of eastern 

 Oregon, you would know why, and if you were a ten- 

 derfoot, even from as far as the outer edge of Cape 

 Cod at low tide, you ought to. In fact, some travelers 

 journey across the seas, that for three whole days 

 they may live the spirit of the Old West and feel them- 

 selves a part of that epic drama for which Pendleton 

 stands — the Round-Up. 



For some days before the Round-Up the vanguard 

 of visitors comes in, in the comfortable Pullmans, on 

 the smooth lines of steel laid along trails where once 

 hardy pioneers, with bullock-spanned prairie schooners, 

 had pushed back the frontier toward the western sea. 



Even today, however, one feels the touch and senses 

 the romance of the passing West, as along every 

 trail and road which converges toward Pendleton, 

 cowboys and cowgirls come riding in to the jingling of 

 spur and the retch of leather. So, too, come the 

 Amerinds from their reservations — bucks, squaws, and 

 papooses — with tepee-poles and outfit, stored in every 

 kind of wheeled rig, and drawn by every variety of 

 cayuse, nigger pony to "calico." A few traveled as did 

 their fathers — with belongings lashed to long, trailing, 

 sagging travois (travoy). Over half a thousand strong, 

 these redmen of mountain and plain soon had their 



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