ange in the way affairs were going,
and the allied cattlemen began to win the disputes which were
constantly coming up. There were not many more attempts to prevent the
round-up from being carried on in concert, but there was no lessening
of the bad temper and the bad words with which the work was done. Each
side constantly harassed and defied the other, and each constantly
accused the other of all the cattle-crimes known to the raisers of
hoofed beasts. The mavericks were an unfailing source of quarrels.
According to the Law of the Herds, as it is held in the southwest,
each cattleman is entitled to whatever mavericks he finds on his own
range, and none may say him nay. But the leagued cattle growers and
the Fillmore people struggled valiantly over every unbranded calf they
found scurrying over the hillsides. Each side accused the other of
driving the mavericks off the ranges on which they belonged, and the
_vaqueros_ belonging to each force declared that they recognized as
their own every calf which they found, no matter where or on whose
range it chanced to be, and they branded it at once with small saddle
irons if the other side did not prevent the operation.

Mead was the leader of his side, and, guarded always by his two
friends, rode constantly over the ranges, helping in the bunching,
cutting-out and branding of the cattle, giving orders, directing the
movements of the herds and deciding quarrels. Colonel Whittaker came
out from Las Plumas, and was as active in the management of the
Fillmore Company's interests as was Emerson Mead for those of his
faction. Ellhorn and Tuttle would not allow Mead to go out of their
sight. They rode with him every day and at night slept by his side. If
he protested that he was in no danger, Ellhorn would reply:

"You-all may not need us, but I reckon you're a whole heap less likely
to need us if we're right with you in plain view."

And so they saw to it that they and their guns were never out of
"plain view." And, possibly in consequence, for the reputation of the
three as men of dare-devil audacity and unequalled skill with rifle
and revolver was supreme throughout that region, wherever the three
tall Texans appeared the battle was won. The maverick was given up,
the quarrel was dropped, the brand was allowed, and the accusation
died on its maker's lips if Emerson Mead, Tom Tuttle and Nick Ellhorn
were present or came galloping to the scene.

The look of smiling good nature