FRONTIER TYPES 



91 



wages of six months' grinding toil and lonely peril for three days' whoop- 

 ing carousal, spending their money on poisonous whisky or losing it over 

 greasy cards in the vile dance-houses. As already explained, they are in 

 the main good men ; and the disturbance they cause in a town is done 

 from sheer rough light-heartedness. They shoot off boot-heels or tall hats 

 occasionally, or make some obnoxious butt " dance " by shooting round his 

 feet ; but they rarely meddle in this way with men who have not themselves 





MAKING A TF:NDERF00T DANCE. 



played the fool. A fight in the streets is almost always a duel between 

 two men who bear each other malice ; it is only in a general melee in a 

 saloon that outsiders often get hurt, and then it is their own fault, for they 

 have no business to be there. One evening at Medora a cowboy spurred 

 his horse up the steps of a rickety "hotel " piazza into the bar-room, where 

 he began firing at the clock, the decanters, etc., the bartender meanwhile 

 taking one shot at him, which missed. When he had emptied his revolver 

 he threw down a roll of bank-notes on the counter, to pay for the damage 

 he had done, and galloped his horse out through the door, disappearing in 

 the darkness with loud yells to a rattling accompaniment of pistol shots 

 interchanged between himself and some passer-by who apparently began 

 firing out of pure desire to enter into the spirit of the occasion, — for it was 

 the night of the Fourth of July, and all the country round about had come 

 into town for a spree. 

 15 



