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White Dandy: A Horse's Story

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<h2>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> One morning while waiting for Master to finish talking with a man, we heard a scream, and the next moment Bobby came rushing out, crying: "Uncle Dick! Uncle Dick! come! come! Tommy has stalded my little kitten all dead; hurry! hurry!" With two bounds her uncle cleared the space between himself and the door and disappeared for a moment, to appear again in the kitchen, the window of which was open. Plainly I could see the dripping kitten rushing frantically about the room, and Mrs. Wallace flourishing the broom at it as if it were the offender. Tommy complacently looked on. By the stove stood the pail of hot water into which he had dipped it. Quickly Master put the kitten in cold water, then, drying it, gave a brief order. Reluctantly Mrs. Wallace brought a bottle from somewhere, and he carefully worked some of the contents through the fur on the skin. Mrs. Wallace's face wore a sneer, but Bobby's, sweat and tear-stained, turned confidingly up to his. And then the good man's indignation got the better of his chivalry, and he gave "My lady" a lecture that greatly offended her. Among other things, I heard him say: "As you sow, so you must reap. You may see the time that you will remember this little burned kitten. I would not be a prophet of evil, nevertheless, I say the hand that ruthlessly puts a pet to such torture as this to-day may in in the future as readily slay a fellow man." [Pg 64] Were his words prophetic? We shall see. Very often after his return did I hear Master speaking of things he had seen in the "West," and while, like other men, he spoke often of the country and people, unlike them, he told of the dumb creation. "You're a regular crank, Dick," Fred would say, "soft-hearted as a baby;" but then he would pat him on the shoulder, and I know that there has always been a tender reverence in his heart for this noble brother. To me they were wonderful stories, those about the horses of the plains and the cattle of the ranches. "Seeing is believing," Master said. "I went there in the fall when the creatures were in good condition, and watched every phase of their existence until they—or their survivors—were in the same condition again; but what they endured meanwhile no earthly computation could estimate; I doubt not the record is being all kept straight above. "I made my headquarters with an old friend and schoolmate—one of the most humane ranchmen on the plains, I presume. I told him I wanted no varnish, but reality; and he said I should have it. "He owns a large ranch, his nearest neighbor being eighteen miles distant. There is, in the clearing, the usual ranch-house, stables, sheds, horse corral and the like. "Their horses all come from the wild ones, and a few of them become truly tame. My friend has one—old Mark—who follows him like a dog, and obeys him as readily as Dandy does me, but he is an exception. Sometimes those not in use wander off and are gone for months. When they find them they are as wild almost as ever, and have to be broken all over again. And this breaking was one of the things that seemed so inhuman to me, but you would not believe flesh and blood could stand what they do anyway, and live. And such looking creatures! apparently nothing but skin and muscle, and so hardy that men grow naturally, I suppose, to think they have no feeling. But to me they presented a piteous picture of dumb faithfulness and brute misery. Despite their hardiness, they are as capable of suffering as the man who rides them. Of course, old Mark can[Pg 65] endure more hardships than Dandy, just as his master can endure more than I, but that does not alter the fact that we can all be overworked, abused and suffering. "Immediately after breakfast the men on my friend's ranch gather the horses into the corral. In the centre is what they call the snubbing-post; here the men stand with ropes, and, as the animals race around the corral, they lasso the ones they want to use that day, and then the rest are turned loose again. Some of them get quite tame. I told Charley that if I were a ranchman I would have them every one obedient to my voice. He assured me that—as a rule—it ain't bronco nature. "He had a professional breaker—'bronco busters,' they call them—break a few new horses while I was there, but I only watched the operation twice; that was quite enough for me. These 'busters' get big-wages, for their work is extremely dangerous, and they are always in such a hurry that what they do is done in the quickest way, which is generally the roughest. "Time and again they jerk the poor creatures up, causing them to turn complete somersaults, and sometimes breaking their necks, of course. Then, by the roughest of main force, they saddle and mount them. True to his nature and common instinct for self-preservation, the animal bucks, doing his best to unseat his rider. This he rarely succeeds in accomplishing, and at the end of an hour or two he is submissive through sheer fatigue and pain. Three of these lessons are deemed sufficient. Horses broken by more mild, humane means—even ranchmen allow—make quieter, better servants. Then there is the branding of the ponies, without which the owners could not tell their own property. In accomplishing this, the animal is blindfolded and led up to a roaring fire, where a man with a red-hot branding iron awaits him. Quick as a flash, there is a sickening odor of burning hair and flesh, and the frantic animal goes forth with his owner's initials, mark or whatever it may be, indelibly branded on him. "These horses can climb like a mountain goat, and in winter they subsist on the bark of the cottonwood tree, or on the dead grass that they paw down through the snowdrifts[Pg 66] to reach. Ofttimes their hoofs are worn to the quick, and blood marks their trail. Spring finds them mere shadows, and so weak they can hardly walk. They endure hardships better than the cattle do, though. These last lead woeful lives in the winter season. "I did not get there for the fall 'round-up,' as they call the gathering together of the herds; but when I did see them they were sleek and contented looking. Soon after, Charley and his men moved theirs into the broken lands, where there is some chance for shelter and a bare chance for their subsisting on the natural hay that abounds there. "The past winter has not been a severe one, yet more than half of his cattle perished. Some grew so weak and stupid that they ceased to paw up the frozen grass; some, very many, in fact, perished in ice-storms. Their coats become as cakes of ice, and they die by inches. Some die for want of water, some mired in the spring in their frantic rush for it, and so on. Wherever one goes after the snow melts, the sight that meets their eyes is dead carcases. "The hardened beholder thinks only of the loss to the owner, but to the uninitiated, each gaunt form, with his sunken eyeballs and worn hoofs, tells a pathetic tale, and reminds them of the lingering tragedies that have been enacted there. "Pitiful enough look the forms of brute mothers, lying in a way to show that they defended and sheltered their helpless young to the last. But, looking along the lines of dead, I almost decided that their fate was preferable to that of the survivors who must yet face the living death of the cattle car, and finally be inhumanly butchered. At best the lives of these creatures are full of pain and misery. "Another harrowing scene is the branding of the calves and young cattle at the May 'round-up.' I witnessed it for an hour and then turned away, but I could not shut the terrible din out. "The ordinary method is to corral a large number of cattle, and then rope the calves and unbranded animals, drag them to the fire and proceed as in case of the horse. "Dust, smoke, blood everywhere, and the air full of the smell of burning flesh. [Pg 67] "Then there are calls, oaths, coarse laughter, bellowings, moans and cries of pain and fright, making wildest discord. "I pitied the poor little calves most. They are generally caught by the leg, or legs, and jerked rudely over the ground to the branding place. Here two or more other men grab them and hold them down while the cruel deed is done. The little things seem so terribly frightened and helpless. The little while I watched, I saw several of the older animals badly burned on their shoulders and faces. These were mothers who charged in defence of their young; then the hot iron struck one steer in the eye, completely destroying it. The men scarcely notice such a happening, but I could not forget the suffering. I would rather earn my bread far down in the mines than by trafficking in flesh and blood. "In the spring all the stock is reduced; I may say they are barely alive, but when the rains come and fresh grass springs up they pick up rapidly." Thus would my master talk until it seemed to me that we were pretty highly favored, but there has never been a winter since but I have thought often about the starving, freezing herds "out West." <hr class="chap" /> [Pg 68] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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