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1017
the herd. And something more singular than that was that after Gotch had done this about three times my cattle would no sooner catch sight of him trotting around over the prairie and looking like he meant business than, as if by one accord, they would detach themselves from the bunches with which they were grazing and come lowing toward the herding place. As it was only when we turned Gotch loose that they did this, I am satisfied every one of them felt it was no use to try to sneak away from him."
"I never had a cow pony as intelligent as either of those you fellows have told about," said Hart Mussey, "but I did have a smart dog when I was ranching on the Pecos. One morning he went nosing around a steel trap I had set for a wolf and got the end of his tail caught, and what do you reckon he did?"
"Just turned around and bit his tail off," suggested Buck Gravis.
"Just pulled up the stake the trap was tied to and dragged it, trap and all, to the ranch," suggested Briscoe.
"No sir," said Hart, "he didn't do either of those fool things."
"What did he do then?" asked Gravis and Briscoe.
"Why he did what any other sensible dog would have done," said Hart. "He just set up a howl and kept it up until I heard and went out and released the poor brute."
In 1870 I joined Captain John Sansom's company of Rangers, stationed at Camp Verde, Texas, and in the spring of 1871 we went to Fort Griffin on the Clear Fork of the Brazos, where we were told that 400 colored