Evening star., 1925-08-04
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
/. G. NJ.
THE DIARY OF A DUDE WRAN.
GLER Struthers Burt Charles


GLER. Struthers Burt. Charles
Scribner's Sons.
Dude ngling is, in years.
mere baby of business. one of the
great infant brood of avocations
springing out from the recent years
of innovation and change. A minor
occupation, to be sure-one of the
overactive, oversophisticated> age. In
effect, dude-wrangling' is medium
! by way of which one may revert to
earlier simplicities and more robust
| enjoyments than the modern clutter
of pleasure e-seeking seems able to pro-
vide.
Taking the main motor road through
Yellowstone Park, you recall the trail
for horsemen running along beside it..
| For miles on stretch this trail is d
staid compa nion to the highway. Then
in mood of sudden vagrancy it whisks
away on it's own through brief mo-
| ments of concealing thicket and
behind bouldered barricades. This is
! the Howard Eaton trail. named in
| honor Of the man who did so much
| Howard Eaton, big gray man out of
the East. is the one also who invented
the business of dude-wra ngling, who
| gave 1t its name, and set it down in
F., the romantic picture-land of Wyoming
! as a playground for those who take
! their pleasure from the good earth
itself straight and untailored.
! Howard Eaton's dude" is not the
dictionary dude. nor is he the one
indicated by the prettified loafers OF
! Instead, the dude-in this connec-
tion-is the man, or woman, who
! hires some one else to guide him
| through the wild country either tor
! the purpose of hunting game or
merely that of exploring the country
| roundabout TO good advantage. The
| dude-Wrangler is "ranch-owner, a
cowman. a horseman. guide. a
wholesale chambermaid a cook. a
storekeeper. rolled into one so
! Struthers Burt says. And the ranch
! that serves as headquarters is the
| dude. ra nch."
Interesting to read here how
Struthers Burt, author of this Diary
and of certainly one outstandi novel.
became a dude-wran angler. A schoolman.
! to start with. Graduate of Princeton
and later teacher in that institution.
| Unlikely material this-so 1t looks
out of which to fashion the head of so
strenuous a business as wrangling for
! vacation folks. But. caught up by
the beauty of Wyoming and recogniz-
! ing its clear call to him, Burt simply
, organized TO the business of wran-
Cling the whole of himself-scholar.
! ship, pedogoGic habit outlook and
customs of the East, authorship. One
| takes II that If any part of this outfit
refused to come in and be organized
it was thrown into the discard So
for better for worse-he is today an
avowed and devoted dude wrangIer
! He pays high tribute to Howard
Eaton. the inspired inventor and or
ganizer of the business. And TO all
of the tribe. besides. he gives en-
thusiastic praise. 1t is they who have
proved that beauty may he a busi-
ness asset: that game need never dis
appear: that neither need an intelli-
gently controlled and restricted will.
! derness he swept away: that tourists
are the biggest future for the high
| sections of the Rocky Mountains. .
The crooked water-power
man, the crooked DEVELOPMENT man.
the poacher and the game hog hate
the wrangler." He has turned out to
ne or the army of ConServdtioniStS 6
that are so persistently fighting to
save the natural resources of the
country from complete spoliation.
! x x y
The Diary" is. as its name implies,
a daily record of the affairs of the
ldude-ranch. On the one hand. this
record is so definitely clear and or
tderly and painstaking as to constitute
a fair business guide to one minded
toward the enterprise in hand Just
the plain story, this. of the days run
a story that reaches back TO the be
ginnings of Burt's own experience
with its setbacks and discoura gements
On the other hand. the story is one OF
wide sweep and high outlook. Here
it is pure adventure, personal ad
venture. so vividly put that one feels
the pull of his own muscles the
pounding of his own heart. Then
there is the pause in some stiff climb
for the marvel of landscape. or mo.
ment of Unlocking upon the ways of
ianimals wiser than man in the pure
technic of keeping themselves alive
A plain-dealing account, or one as
plain rs the theme permits. Certain
sly a record that is all alive with the
zest of the author, alive also with
ready humor and an unfailinC stock OF
good humor Struthers Burt SCOTS