AGRICULTURE. 217 



the ranches, the rodeos of which he attends. It is only in 

 times of extraordinary scarcity of grass, that the rancheros are 

 particular to drive the cattle of other owners off their lands. 



The rodeo season being over — that is, when the ranchero 

 has all his cattle on his own ranch, and his alone — he com- 

 mences the work of branding. His vaqueros drive about two 

 hundred cows with their calves into the corral every morning, 

 and two or three good vaqueros will brand these calves in a 

 day. The vaqueros enter the corral with their horses, which 

 they need when the calves are large and strong, for many of 

 them are three and four months old. If the calf be small, the 

 vaquero may be afoot to lasso him. One vaquero throws a reata 

 over the calf's head, and another catches him by the leg ; they 

 throw him down, and one holds him, while the other gets a 

 hot branding-iron and burns the owner's mark upon its hip. 

 Thus the work goes on from day to day, and from week to 

 week, until eveiy calf on the ranch is marked. 



§ 159. Brands. — The law requires that every horse and cow 

 shall be branded, with a brand belonging to their owner. The 

 brand is made of iron, sometimes representing one or two let- 

 ters, sometimes other arbitrary signs, such as a cross, a circle, 

 a triangle, or any other design. The brand may be six inches 

 long by four wide, and the thickness of the iron is about a 

 third of an inch. There is an iron handle, with a wooden 

 cross-piece at the end, so that the brand can be handled when 

 hot, and held down firmly upon the prostrate calf, until the 

 figure is indelibly burned into the skin. A copy of every brand 

 must be burned upon leather, and deposited in the county re- 

 corder's ofiice. Every minor and servant on a ranch must use 

 the bi-and of the owner of the ranch. The brand must be 

 burned, under penalty, upon all horses and neat cattle, before 

 the age of eighteen months. The brand is burned upon the 

 hip, and indicates ownership; when the animal is sold, the 

 brand is burned upon the shoulder, and indicates sale. The 

 purchaser then puts his brand upon the hip ; and thus the skin 

 of a Californian horse or cow contains the history of its owner- 

 10 



