378 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



plish it. Nobody could follow an Indian horse round-up 

 and call the red man lazy. When the call for the round- 

 up goes forth the best riders on the reservation, or in 

 the district to be covered, are called into service. This 

 year the round-up fell to the charge of a slender youth 

 named Felix Bear-in-the-Cloud. His name is not a 

 more startling mixture of the civilized and savage than 

 is Felix's costume. He has on a white 'man's hickory 

 shirt and handkerchief, and a white man's felt hat with 

 the inevitable high, pointed crown which the Indian af- 

 fects. To the rim of the hat is fastened the eagle feather 

 the Indian's "good medicine." Felix's hair is braided 

 and tied with bright bits of ribbon, and there is a dash 

 of pnint on either cheek bone. His chaps might be worn 

 by any white cowboy, being plain leather affairs, with 

 fastenings of nickel discs down either seam. His boots 

 are of the conventional cowboy spurs, and Felix sits in 

 his saddle with the ea^e of the star rider of a wild west 

 show. 



Felix has the great mess wagon brought up to the 

 agcni-y storehouse, and soon it is loaded with tents, boxes 

 of provisions and bedding and is started out with instruc- 

 tions to the driver to meet the cavalcade on a certain 

 creek, ten or fifteen miles from the agency. 



The round-up is near the country hallowed by the 

 blood of General Ouster and his men. In fact, the 

 round-up wagon proceeds up Talluc creek, the very 

 stream which Ouster was supposed to be scouting when 

 he disobeyed orders and pushed on to the point on the 

 little Big Horn, where he and his men lost their lives. 

 The creek has dwindled to a mere thread of silver, wind- 

 ing between rolling hills. In midsummer the creek bed 

 is as dusty as any part of the plain is. 



After a quick journey over a fine road the wagon 

 driver comes in sight of a, corral, where he is met by a 

 cavalcade of horsemen, some fifteen or twenty Indians, 

 all clad much like Felix Bear-in-the-Cloud and each 

 man with his best horse under him, his best rope at his 

 saddle and ready for the work of the horse drive. With 

 the men is the herd of extra horses, known as the horse 

 cavvy. Each man has five or six horses for use in the 

 rough work of the round-up, as there is no more weary- 

 ing task than bringing in the mavericks of the plains, 

 and saddle horses quickly drop under the strain. And, 

 by no means the least important feature of cavalcade, 

 one sees the camp cook, Edith Bear-in-the-Clond, the 

 pretty wife of the round-up boss, and Fannie On-Top- 

 of-the-Tepee, a slender Indian girl who is wearing black 

 to show that she is both widowed and childless. 



Camp is made in a hurry. The Indians have lost 

 all the slowness of movement which characterizes them 

 at the agency or in their hours of ease about their 

 villages. Each man works quickly and deftly. The 

 tents are up in a hurry, the bedding is put under the 

 wagon and two beds are unrolled for the night herders, 

 who must snatch their sleep as best they can in the 

 daytime, and the cooks are soon supplied with wood, 

 chopped from the big pieces of timber dragged in at 

 the end of a lariat. Dinner over a few minutes are 

 given to story telling and smoking at the camp fire, 

 but the thunder of hoofs tells that the day herders are 

 coming up with the horse cavvy. Every man jumps 

 to the saddle, unfastens his lariat and makes ready to 

 pick his fresh horse from the bunch that is brought in. 



The saddle horses are more than half wild. To use 

 a cowboy's expression, their breakers merely "took the 

 top off them." They would soon put an unskilled 

 rider on the ground. Kicking, squealing and snorting 



they are bunched into a solid mass and a rope corral is 

 deftly thrown about them. No western , horse that has 

 been broken will try to break out of a rope corral. 

 The very touch of a rope teaches him to be cautious. 

 The cowboys gather about the corral and one after 

 another picks out his mount and ropes him. It re- 

 quires expert roping to get a horse from the dodging, 

 milling mass of ponies, but in an incredibly short time 

 each man has led out his mount and has it saddled 

 and bridled. When the last horse is taken out the horse 

 cavvy is driven away again in charge of the day herders 

 to the feeding grounds. 



There are a few directions from the foreman and 

 then the cowboys are in the saddle and the picturesque 

 cavalcade starts out on the actual work of the round- 

 up. The men "ride circle" that is, they spread out 

 in fan shape, constantly widening the distance between 

 the riders. Soon a bunch of wild horses is sighted and 

 the chase begins. Instead of pelting after the horses 

 the cowboys so place themselves on the prairie that 

 they can ride in relays. A few of them keep directly 

 after the horses, while others ride over the plains in 

 such a manner that they will be able to intercept the 

 flying ponies a few miles ahead. They arrive at the 

 point of interception with their horses comparatively 

 fresh. Those who have been chasing the ponies are 

 "all in." Their mounts have blown and a run of a 

 few more miles would exhaust them. But the cow- 

 boys who have made the cut-off take up the work of 

 the chase, never giving the wild horses an instant's rest. 



A third bunch of pursuers cuts in a few miles 

 ahead, having made another short cut across country. 

 The wild horses are beginning to show the effects of 

 the terrific pace. They are as badly winded as are the 

 heavily mounted ponies of the cowboys. Some of the 

 bunch begin to lag and the swifter ones will not desert 

 them. The little colts, some of which are but a few 

 weeks old, keep up with the herd in surprising fashion. 

 But now the riders have gained the rear of the herd, 

 and a few of the cowboys work around to the sides and 

 eventually to the front. Then the herd is turned until 

 it is headed back toward camp. The ponies are run- 

 ning heavily and much of their spirit is lost. Soon the 

 camp is reached and the "wild bunch" is run into the 

 corral not the rope affair, but the stout inclosure of 

 logs, several of which are scattered about the range 

 and where the work of rounding up is always carried on. 





USE TOO MUCH WATER. 



The editor of the Twice-a-Week Spokesman-Re- 

 vietv, Spokane, attended the irrigation congress and 

 has the following to say: 



Among the attendants at the National Irrigation 

 Congress in Portland were Samuel Fortier, irrigation 

 engineer for California, and Arthur T. Stover, irriga- 

 tion engineer for Oregon. These engineers are under 

 the direction of the offices of experiment stations in 

 the United States Department of Agriculture. Their 

 duties are to make investigations in irrigation and 

 drainage. They are called upon largely to aid indi- 

 vidual farmers and private irrigation enterprises. 



A representative of the Twice-a-W eek Spokesman- 

 Review chanced to meet Mr. Fortier and Mr. Stover 

 together on the Lewis and Clark exposition grounds. 

 In conversation with these men something was learned 

 of the work under their charge. They investigate leaky 

 ditches, faulty methods of water distribution, unskilled 



