The Guthrie daily leader. [volume] (Guthrie, Okla.) 1893-1996, 1901-12-26
CHAPTER /
ANGUS THE FIRST.


u',e9eal<able for me, and altogether
indescribable to any who have
never lookes upon the soul-quelling
g1ories Of a Colorado mountain sum
set. Macpherson had propped me with
two bcar-skins and a spare poncho
on the squared log which served as
q door-stone for the ranch house,
and had given me the field-plass
whorewith TO amuse myself. 1t was
my first sane glimpse Of the shell
tered upland valley watered by the
Torolto. Taree days before, when
Macpherson had brought me up from
Fort Cowan swathcd in blankets and
Iashed lengthwise on his bucbboard,
had been too ill to know or care
greatly about the whence or whittier.
It was a stockman's paradise, tho
park-lilge little valley shut in by lofty
mountains. and from the heaving
swell crested by the ranch buildings
and corral the mctes and bounds of
Macpherson small kingdom were
well within eye-swccp Eastward. no
more than o riAe-shot from the hons
ranch, black cash i'm Gringo noun
tain marked the portal Of Six-Mila
canyon. the only gateway to the par
adise; and from thence the inclosing
ranges diverged TO meet again in tho
snow-coifed summit of Jim's peak at
she head of the valley. The "X-bar-
y" men, with the exception of the
dnild-mannered desperate who cooked
for US, were still out; and Macpher-
son sat beside me, naming the mighti-
Desses in their order, and pointing
them out with the stem Of his black
ontty pipe. When ] lowered ,he field
glass in sheer WEAKNESS, he told me
about the single fy in his pot Of oint-
ment.
Now it may chance that when one
has given hostages TO death. pano-
ramic sunsetsa and friendly condolences
may become alike mere fotsam and
jetsam on the ebbing tideway Of
time; but Macpherson was too good
a fellow to be fouted In his time Of
asking. Wherefore, when he had
made an end I was fain to put
little life, galyanic or otherwise into
she moribund body of human inter-
est.
"Then you think this land company
will ultimately drive you out of the
Torolito?" said J.
"surc. It's only a question Of time
If the syndicate once gets hold. The
stocik-raiser Is like the Indian; he
must move on when the farmer
comes"
THE relentless march of civillza-
ton, ana all that. eh?" quoth I, lying
in wait to spring upon him.
"Yes; it's the survival Of the fit-
test, I suppose"
A near-hand view Of eternity is
subversive of many theories, and
lashed out in fine scoru.
what an internal lot of cant we
can swallow when it's sugar-coatod
with the ipse dixit Of the theoristsl
Why don't you call things by their
right names and say THAT when the
strong man comes. the weak have TO
give him the wall? You drove up
here five years ago when everybody
said that the first winter in this alti-
tude would cost yon every hoof you
owned. You proved the contrary;
and now, when you've set up your
little kingdom in one of the waste
places of the earth lot of capital
lists come along ana invite you TO
abdicate. I'd see them hanged frgtl"
Macpherson made dumb show Of
applause. He is latter-dav re-
crudeseence Of the physically-ft he
roes Of the Hcmeric age, with square
-
who can bend nails in his bare hands,
and who has never found the bottom
of his well Of strength; but he has
laughing brown eyes with a woman
ish tenderness in them eyes that
may glow with righteous indiena-
tion, but which know not vindictive-
ness
"Oh, YOU be damned" he said. af-
fectionately. "What would you do?"
'rd be governed by circumstances
and fight for my own to the last
gasp. You can do that as well as
another. can't you?"
He took time TO think about IT.. "I
don't know. II setter would stand
by me-"
.'Who Is selter?r As / have said,
81 was only my third day In the T0ro-
Ito, and the first two had been spent
in the spare bunk of this ranch house.
"I'll have TO begin back biz 20
account for him. Three years ago
a rattletrap Of a prairie schooner
but say; you're sick and I don't
want to bore You with folklore"
eco on; I'm three planetary orbits
beyond the boring point"
sAre you? Wen. as was going TO
say q shaoSly old schooner drifted
mp six-Mile canyon and into the park.
Jake Setter was It's skipper, and
the crew consisted of wife, a half
grown daughter, and flock Of little
ones. They were homesteaders look
ing for a bit Of prairie with a stream
convenient which could - damned
and ditched, and the old man drove
up to ask me what I thought of the