HUNTING WITH HOUNDS. 175 



use of the rope is unknown among them. A 

 couple of years ago the famous western rifle- 

 shot, Carver, took some cowboys out to Aus- 

 tralia, and I am informed that many of the 

 Australians began themselves to practise with 

 the rope after seeing the way it was used by 

 the Americans. An Australian gentleman, 

 Mr. A. J. Sage, of Melbourne, to whom I had 

 written asking how the saddles and styles of 

 riding compared, answered me as follows : 



" With regard to saddles, here it is a moot 

 question which is the better, yours or ours, for 

 buck-jumpers. Carver's boys rode in their 

 own saddles against our Victorians in theirs, 

 all on Australian buckers, and honors seemed 

 easy. Each was good in his own style, but 

 the horses were not what I should call really 

 good buckers, such as you might get on a 

 back station, and so there was nothing in the 

 show that could unseat the cowboys. It is 

 only back in the bush that you can get a 

 really good bucker. I have often seen one of 

 them put both man and saddle off." 



This last is a feat I have myself seen per- 

 formed in the West. I suppose the amount 

 of it is that both the American and the 

 Australian rough riders are, for their own 

 work, just as good as men possibly can be. 



One spring I had to leave the East in the 

 midst of the hunting season, to join a round- 

 up in the cattle country of western Dakota, 

 and it was curious to compare the totally dif- 

 ferent styles of riding of the cowboys and the 

 cross-country men. A stock-saddle weighs 



