SHERIFF'S WORK ON A RANCH 



121 



"TAKE OFF YOUR BOOTS ! 



into a sullen group some twenty yards off, just the right distance for the 

 buckshot in the double-barrel. Having captured our men, we were in a 

 quandary how to keep them. The cold was so intense that to tie them 

 tightly hand and foot meant, in all likelihood, freezing both hands and feet 

 off during the night ; and it was no use tying them at all unless we tied 

 them tightly enough to stop in part the circulation. So nothing was left for 

 us to do but to keep perpetual guard over them. Of course we had care- 

 fully searched them, and taken away not only their firearms and knives, but 

 everything else that could possibly be used as a weapon. By this time 

 they were pretty well cowed, as they found out very quickly that they 

 would be well treated so long as they remained quiet, but would receive 

 some rough handling if they attempted any disturbance. 



Our next step was to cord their weapons up in some bedding, which w-e 

 sat on while we took supper. Immediately afterward we made the men 

 take off their boots — an additional safeguard, as it was a cactus country, 

 in which a man could travel barefoot only at the risk of almost certainly 

 laming himself for life — and go to bed, all three lying on one buffalo robe 

 and being covered by another, in the full light of the blazing fire. We deter- 

 mined to watch in succession a half-night apiece, thus each getting a full 



