The daily morning journal and courier., 1894-11-28

when young calf is branded the brand will grow as the calf grows. and when the animal Is full grown will be fully twice as large as it was originally Then, again. sometimes it Will remain just as 1t Is. not growing a particle. This seems to me really a remarkable phenomenon, but 1t is undoubtedly fact. Some stockmen account for IL by saying that 1t depends upon whether the calf is branded in the dark or the light of the moon. while others are in- clined to think 1t depends more upon the depth to which the branding iron burns the hide. The reader may accept either explanation he likes. Between the two I should refer the latter. as 1t would give me much pain if believed that such an innocent-looking moon as ours could be responsible for all the manifold eccentricities and irregulari- ties of earthly things have heard charged to 1t in Texas and elsewhere. It is O fact that branding Is sometimes done much more deeply than at others. If the iron Is hotter than 1t ought to be red hot. for instance-the hair may catch fire and q needlessly sore place be made on the animal. It 1t Is just hot enough, an application for two seconds is long enough. If the iron Is getting cold 1t may be kept on the animal for half a minute. Sometimes the bulldog gers have to hold the animal down for ten or fifteen minutes, while the punch CT goes and heats his irons a second time.
 Perhaps the reader understands by this time that branding big herd in- wolves a large element Of real, hard work. He should also understand that in selecting new brand, cattleran has to exercise good deal of discrimin- attng judgment. To originate a really good brand Is about as hard as to de- wise catching title for modern book or story. Tn fact & new brand Is select ed very much as Is the title of mod ern novel. It is not necessary that either one should mean anything In par ticulnr, providing only 1t Is something nobody uses. For instance, my friends, Messrs. Price and Keith. brand all their cattle with a large V. Of course, V does not stand for Price or Keith either, | but then 1t is an easy letter to make, | and one that is as little likely as any | other to stand for some other fellows s name Then, again, it would be toler- | rbly hard to change 1t into some other letter. To get an altogether new brand in Texas is now very difficult feat. | Every letter in the alphabet has been used long ago, many combinations of letters, and all reasonable combinations of figures. A man must be very hard up when he would devise one like this (777O. A student, by the way, would read that seven thousand seven hun | dred and seventy-seven In parenthes- es," but the cowman calls 1t -four sev- ems in brackets" Similar one are as follows: (9999, (66s. These three are we'll known brands in actual use in western Texas.
 | Sometimes it takes as much ingenuity to read a brand after it is written as 1t does to think it up beforehand. This is especially the case when the designer gives up letters and figures and tries to represent some object, for the punch CT is not always a strictly f1rst-class artist. Not long ago saw horse that seemed so weighed down with the bur. den of the letters ornamenting the
 whole of one of his sides that he had lit
 tie strength for anything else. He rea6 as follows: U. S. I. c. s. X)
 This brand was complete record oi his history. In his younger days he had | been bought for our cavalry service and
 branded U. s. After a while he was
 worn out, and then received the addi. tional I. c. for Inspected and con. demned." When the government solt him he was recorded with an "S," an6 the man that bought him added the CO. If he is sold any more his next owner will have to begin branding hin
 on the other side. The United States
 army officials will not purchase horse
 that already has a brand on it.. Wheth
 CT 1t is because they consider brandins
 sn inhumen device, or because they dc
 not want a horse so disf1gured, or be-
 cause they need all the space for theil
 own brands, I do not know.
 I [ l.