Connecticut western news., 1881-04-13
Texas Letter.

SmNug Spring is with us once again the :rass bogus to look green. and the buds to ! .how themselves on the hees and shrubs. ! Usually by the frst of March sAsre are plenty
 h leaves on the elms, but not thu year.
 The drover has also made his annual ap pearance, ready to buy any kind of hon stock
 hat is for sale. He puts up at some smsll
 own, and buys few at time until he .as enough tor a drove, and takes the trail tt- Kansas about the first of April. From 1000 I 10 200 head is the usual slzs for a drove. | less than that number not paying to handle, | and more being too unwieldy and troublesome | Each drove is placed in charge of 8 boss hand. 1 and he has 8 cook and five herders to assist him. They average about 12 miles & day cook does not have have an OK team and wagon | there are number of pack horses to carry l their camp equipage. There is 6 great deal 1 said about the hard life of common sailor, ut if his lot is any harder than the Texan COW | boys, it is hard indeed, for the COW boy has l The night is divided into watches of four ] tours of and two on, but he is liable to be | 'alled upat any time, for the herd frequently | stampedes. Sleeping on the ground in cold and heat, wet and dry, his life is anything but
 an easy one, and his pay is not first-class, con- sidering the hardships he has to undergo; a lol!ar day and grub is the standard price.
 but some good hands get more. l imagine u . live on corn bread, bacon and coffee four ! ifths of his time. There IS but one being on ! the face of the earth of more importance in his wn estimation, than the COW boy. and that is l the clerk in a second-class hotel. In what this tancied superiority consists is something never | latisfa factorily explained to me, for other men can ride fractious pony and throw the lariat {; perhaps it is the very scientific manner in which he can curse, for with him, cussLn is re iuced to one of the exact sciences. If my pen nnkf foil int okt nj I fr i've description of this august being: He rides very good pony, sometimes his own 'metimes belonging to the owner ofthe herd.
 but the saddle is almost sure to be his own.
 and good full rigged one. A Northern man
 would think it load enough for one mustang j;
 ou the right side is 8 leather case with Win
 chester repeater in it on the left, his larat Of
 ,raided horse hair or rawhide. On his head is
 vertigo ;" on his back, blacK or grey woolen
 shirt, on his hands (for he is as choice of his
 hands as any fine lady,) are buckskin gaunt-
 let's; on his legs aD ordinary pair of pants.
 tnd on his feet, ah those boots. of the finest
 French calf, with heels about two inches high,
 and blacked until they shine again; in fact,
 he seems to think that if his boots are blacked
 it does not matter whether his shirt iS washed
 'ftener than once in three months, or not
 He never wears a vest, and seldom coat.
 He runs with the herd for two or three.
 months, and then with from two to dozen
 boon companions, and his pay in his pocket,
 he starts out to capture some frontier town.
 but he does not always. for he sometimes gets
 ,ap pured himself by his inveterate foes. tht
 sheriff and hls deputies. His first proceeding
 on arriving in town, is to ..'set lem up" for all
 hands, then he patronizes the bootblack, then
 if there is barber in the place he gets his
 nustache blacked He considers himselt i'm
 nense at sll games of chance and is ready to ''rattle the bones'' or "sling the paste board with anyone, and imbibing frequently. He proceeds in this way until he gets hilarious. then mounts his pony and rides through the streets bowling like Comanche, and firing
 if his carbine into the air that is his idea of fun He institutes reign of terror for 8 few hours sometimes, but oftener gets captured, an! after exhausting his vocabulary of exple tives against the minions of the law, he pulls 1 out his last dollar, pays his fine: goes back to the herd, and ia seen no moro till he has earn l ed some more money. My opinion of this in- l dividual is formed from what I have seen of him around the towns That there are good men and true, herding COWS in Texas, no one | can doubt, but the grea ter part of them are such as have described. end when they go to town, put on more airs than turkey gob I bier on 8 May morning. TEXAN. Blanco, MaEch 1881.