The log cabin Democrat., 1909-10-21

itors to the metropolis. Whether it was the undesirable amount of at tention paid him by the police or mere love of roaming that impelled him to go west l am not prepared to state. At any rate, he finally landed in Arizona where he drifted around for year or so, had his ten derfoot" gloss rubbed off, and when I first saw him was riding range with the Lone Star outfit north of Phoenix
 Ii he found the life a rough one he made no complaint, and being nervy active young fellow, managed to keep his end up with the rest of the boys. It was the habit of the cattlemen in that part of the country to feed their steers on mesquite beans and cottonwood bark and finish up by driving them down to Salt river valley, where they were fat tened Gp for the market in the alfalfa fields. There was a good-sized crowd in the employ of the Lone Star but as Jack Harrington, the owner of the ranch, did business on pretty large scale, there was always plenty of work for his cowpunchers. The nickname of Gentleman Dick was bestowed upon l.eahy soon after his arrival in AriZo ma. on account of a tendency to dress in rather f1ashy style, which character ized him. as well as a smooth flow of language probably gained during many practice stunts of talking unwary strangers to New York out of their hard earned coin.
 He soon learned to drop eastern fashions in dress. but his smoothness of tongue remained and Gentleman Dick, with his never failing stock of funny stories and ready jokes, was voted a highly entertaining companion by all he came in contact with. An other happy gift which endeared him to his co-workers on the ranch, was remarkable quicknes of fingers which enabled him to perform various little sleight of hand tricks for the edifica- tiou of the COW punchers He was con tinually performing such tricks as tearing up cigarette paper into pieces, rubbing it between his fin gers and then bringing it cut whole, palming coins and so on, with the deX- terity of stage magician. These feats won him unstinted applause from q not too eXacting audience and in the course oi time he became one of the most popular men that ever worked cu tho Lone Star. Cowboys are very much like big overgrown chil- drep in some respects. not much harder to amuse and ready to welcome any distraction that comes to break the daily round of rather monoton- ous existence.
 Christmas was drawing near and Harrington was heset with fears lest the festive season might prove the means of depriving him of the services of several of his best men. In other words, he was afraid that they would pay a visit to Phoenix, imbibe large quantity of doubtful whisky and for get that such place as the Lone Star rancho ever existed on the map. For this, as Harrington knew only too well, was q regular annual happening. Ii was the only time when his men were given a good chance to cele. hrate and they always availed them selves royalty of the opportunity. The preceding year had been particularly unlucky one in this respect, nearly half of his force having failed to re turn to the ranche. and filling their places was not an easy task. So liar rington pondered how to avert the scheduled evil and finally called his foreman, Jack Andrews, into consul tation.
 gee here, Jake" said he, I've been wondering if we cant fix up plan Q dodge the troubles of the usual cele-