Union County courier. [volume] (Elk Point, Union County, D.T. [S.D.]) 187?-1913, 1882-04-26
The Life Of a Cowboy.

lie has exactly such a fascination as
the sailors life has for boys of the
Atlantic States. The life is looked
on by them as a career of considera-
ble excitement and adventure. This
is a consideration that appeals more
to boys than to sober minded men,
and yet it is the means of drawing
not little OF the best young brain
and muscle into this channel. AS
compared with the quiet plodding
life of a farmers boy, it does indeed
seem. a life of wild ---excitem ant. As
the red men retire farther and farth-
er into the West and North, the
'cow-puncher' is the first precursor
of civilization. The very great adj
vantage of being the first occupant
of a new range keeps the cattle-men
forever pushing onward and taking
the risks of too close proximity to
the savages. The life on one of
these frontier ranges has a good deal
of adventurous excitement about it
in the way Of encounters with all the
numerous varieties of wild animals
which abound there, and has beside
the various attractions as well as the
hardships that belong to genuine pi-
oneer life. Before a man has been
in the business many years he is
pretty certain to be engaged in one
or more of the long cattle-drives
which transfer enormous herds a.
cross wide stretches of territory. In
this way many workmcn driftin the
course of a year or two from Texas
to Wyoming or Montana, or from
Oregon to Nebraska; and thus the
Cow -puncher" often comes, in time
to have wide and varied expert
cnce of the least-known regions of
| our Wlde country.
Perhaps the greatest attraction
about this life to frugal working
man is the great variety of chances
that exist for profitable investment
of every dollar that he is able to lay
aside. All employers will permit
a good hand, who invests his savings
in horses, to turn his little band in
with the other stock without any
charge. Thus he goes into stock
raising on a small scale without a
dollar of running expenses to pay.
If a man can buy few mares at q
bargain he can often make a clear
annual profit of fifty per cent. on a
few hundred dollars, if he is shrewd
in selling and careful in breeding
up. This is very lavorlte way OF
investing, as it is at once very safe
and very profitable. But there are
many other ways of getting hand
some income for a small investment
in the Far West, though hardly any
of them is so perfectly safe as this
which | have mentioned. There
are well-known opportunities for
re-empting land, investing in ap-
preciating town real estate, mining
stocks and trade which are so easy
to seize in every new country; SO
that man who is industrious, saw
ing and shrcwd can hardly fail to
roll up neat little property from
his savings in few years.
| This cowboy life will not be found
satisfactory to every one who enters
it. 1t is impossible to say certainly
of any individual or any class o
men that they will succeed in it
Some men who at first seem less a
dapted for the work become mos
excellent hands by long pluck ano
: pervermce. But it may be sal,
more emphatically of this than o
other callings that it should be learn
ed in youth. The chances of mark
ed success are against man VIII
! begins the work after he is twent
years old. Men who have bee,
5 trained to it almost from childhoo
I in Texas and Colorado are, as class
q the most successful. Among thos
a who are born farther east, youn
d men brought up on farms, with
II good understanding of the manage
ment of horses, adapt themselvc
= most readily to "cow-puncher's worl
~ Delicately nurtured city boys ha,
y the least chance of success in tn
le rough life, and yet not few of the1
IS have, by long persistence, mao
a. themselves skillful in it.
" A man who believes himself
II have already some training and Fl
= ness to enter at once upon the wol
" would do best to seek cmploymel
9 in Cheyenne or Greely in the sprin
10 That is the season when cattle me
= are making their plans and hirit
= their hands for the year. Most
!" the "round-ups' take their start
y the later half Of May. At that tin
io man who has been trained to Il
y management Of horses and is qui
at home in the saddle need have Ii
% tie fear Of not finding work, evt