of the rodeo as long as the riders worked in his territory.  When the company moved to the next point, this loader took his place in the ranks, and cheerfully received his orders from some comrade, who, the day before, had been as willingly obedient to him.  There was little place in the rodeo for weak, incompetent or untrustworthy men.  Each owner, from his long experience and knowledge of men, sent as his representatives the most skillful and conscientious riders that he could secure.  To make a top hand at a rodeo a man needed to be, in the truest sense, a man.

Before daylight, the horse wrangler had driven in the saddle band, and the men, with nose bags fashioned from grain sacks, were out in the corral to give the hard-working animals their feed of barley.  The gray quiet of the early dawn was rudely broken by the sounds of the crowding, jostling, kicking, squealing band, mingled with the merry voices of the men, with now and then a shout of anger or warning as the cowboys moved here and there among their restless four-footed companions; and always, like a deep undertone, came the sound of trampling, iron-shod hoofs.

Before the sky had changed to crimson and gold the call sounded from the ranch house, “Come and get it!” and laughing and joking in friendly rivalry, the boys rushed to breakfast.  It was no dainty meal of toast and light cereals that these hardy ones demanded.  But huge cuts of fresh-killed beef, with slabs of bread, and piles of potatoes, and stacks of hot cakes, and buckets of coffee, and whatever else the hard-working Chinaman could lay his hands on to satisfy their needs.  As soon as each man reached the utmost limit of his capacity, he left the table without formality, and returned to the corral, where, with riata or persuasion, as the case demanded, he selected from his individual string of horses his first mount for the day.

By the time the sun was beginning to gild the summit of old Granite Mountain’s castle-like walls, and touch with glorious color the peaks of the neighboring sentinel hills, the last rider had saddled, and the company was mounted and ready for their foreman’s word.  Then to the music of jingling spurs, tinkling bridle chains, squeaking saddle leather, and the softer swish and rustle and flap of chaps, romals and riatas, they rode forth, laughing and joking, still, with now and then a roaring chorus of shouting comment or wild yells, as some half-broken horse gave an exhibition of his prowess in a mad effort to unseat his grinning rider.

Soon the leader would call the name of a cowboy, known to be particularly familiar with the country which was to be the scene of that day’s work, and telling him to take two or three or more men, as the case might be, would direct him to ride over a certain section, indicating the assigned territory by its natural marks of valley or flat or wash or ridge, and designating the point where the cattle would first be brought together.  The cowboy named would rein