Cowboy Life on the Sidetrack

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Dorothea Benton Frank. Cowboy Life on the Sidetrack

DEDICATION

PREFACE

CHAPTER I. The Start

CHAPTER II. Chuckwagon's Dream

CHAPTER III. Grazing the Sheep

CHAPTER IV. Letters from Home Brought by Immigrants

CHAPTER V. Eatumup Jake's Life Story

CHAPTER VI. The Schoolmarm's Saddle Horse

CHAPTER VII. Selling Cattle on the Range

CHAPTER VIII. True Snake Stories

CHAPTER IX. Chuckwagon's Death

CHAPTER X. The Disappearance of the Sheepmen

CHAPTER XI. Our Arrival in Cheyenne

CHAPTER XII. The Post-Hole Digger's Ghost

CHAPTER XIII. Grafting

CHAPTER XIV. The File

CHAPTER XV. The Cattle Stampede

CHAPTER XVI. Catching a Maverick

CHAPTER XVII. Stealing Crazy Head's War Ponies

CHAPTER XVIII. The Cattle Queen's Ghost

CHAPTER XIX. Packsaddle Jack's Death

CHAPTER XX. A Cowboy Enoch Arden

CHAPTER XXI. Grand Island

CHAPTER XXII "Sarer."

CHAPTER XXIII. Arrival at the Transfer Track of South Omaha

CHAPTER XXIV. THE FINAL ROUNDUP

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To the readers of this little booklet: I wish to say that while some things in the story seem over-drawn, yet I have endeavored to write it entirely from a cowboy standpoint.

To the sheepmen of the West: I want to say that I couldn't have written this story true to the cowboys' character without making a great many reflections on sheepmen, and I want to tender my apologies in advance for anything they may consider offensive, as some of my old-time and dearest friends in the West are among the large sheep owners. But I have been a cowboy and worked with the cowboys for thirty-two years, and have written the things set down here just as they came from the cowboys' lips on a stock train as we were waiting on sidetracks. The names of the cowboys used are the actual nicknames of cowpunchers whom I worked with on Wyoming ranges twenty years ago, and will be recognized by lots of old-timers.

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Finally we got the cattle loaded and our contract signed. Got a basket of grub, as we were informed there would be no time to get meals on the road. It is to this basket of grub that we all owe our lives to-day, so I will give a partial description of the contents. First, we had four dozen bottles of beer; next, eight quarts of old rye whiskey; next, two corkscrews, a hard boiled egg, a sandwich without any meat in it and a bottle of mustard, as Dillbery Ike said he always wanted mustard. Eatumup Jake was for getting a can of tomatoes, but old Chuckwagon said he never had been empty of canned tomatoes in twenty years and wanted one chance to get them out his system.

Well, we got on the way-car, were hitched on to the cattle train and off at last for the first sidetrack, which was a quarter of a mile from the stockyards. The conductor said we would start right away soon as he got his orders, so Chuckwagon proposed we open the lunch, which meeting with direct approval from the entire party, we proceeded to consume a large section of it, and then went to sleep. When we woke up the sun was sinking in the east, at least I maintained it was east, but Packsaddle Jack said it was in the north. Anyway we argued till it sunk, and never did agree. But we found we were on the same old sidetrack, and as our lunch was about gone we made up a jackpot and sent Dillbery Ike after more lunch. Packsaddle Jack went up and interviewed the agent in the meantime, as he was the only one left in the party who was on speaking terms with that functionary, and found out they were holding us there for the arrival of eight cars of sheep that was expected to come by trail from Idaho. These sheep belong to Rambolet Bill and old Cottswool Canvasback, and these two gentlemen had seen a cloud of dust ten miles away about noon and insisted on having the train held, as they were sure the sheep were coming, which finally proved to be correct. So when they got them loaded, about 11 o'clock that night, we quit quarrelling with the agent, stopped making threats against the railroad superintendent, got Dillbery Ike to put on his coat (he had kept if off all evening to whip the railroad agent who was to blame undoubtedly for all this delay), and finally started, with rising spirits. But as we got up to the depot where the conductor was waiting with his final papers, the head brakeman reported a cow was down up near the engine, and we all walked up there and found that one of Dillbery Ike's critters had become so weak and emaciated that it had succumbed right in the start. We prodded her, and hollered and yelled, and Chuckwagon twisted her tail clear off before we discovered she was stiff and cold in death and consequently couldn't respond to our suggestions. Dillbery asked the advice of a hobo (who was giving us pointers how to get her up before we discovered her dead condition) about suing the railroad company for her. The hobo agreed to act as witness and swear to anything after Dillbery gave him a nip out of his bottle; and after we found out what a good fellow the hobo was, how much he knew about shipping cattle and that he wanted to go east, we concluded to put his name on the contract and make him one of the party. We asked his name and he said 'twas most always John Doe, but we nicknamed him Jackdo for short.

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