cient
for our light wagon and the light outfit, not a pound of which but was
useful (except the brandy) and necessary for our comfort. I had chosen
steers that had never been under the yoke, though plenty of broken-in
oxen could have been had, generally of that class that had been broken
in spirit as well as to the yoke.

The ox has had much to do with the settlement of the country. The
pioneers could take care of an ox team in a new settlement so much
cheaper than a horse team that this fact alone would have been
conclusive; but aside from this, oxen were better for the work in the
clearings or for breaking up the vast stretches of wild prairie sod. We
used to work four or five yoke to the plow, and when dark came we
unhitched and turned them on the unbroken sod to pasture for the night.

I have often been asked how old an ox will live to be. I never knew of a
yoke over fourteen years old, but I once heard of one that lived to be
twenty-four.

On the Plains, oxen were better than horses for getting their feed and
fording streams. There was another advantage, and a very important one,
to oxen: the Indians could not run them off at night as easily as they
could horses.

[Illustration: The tin reflector used for baking.]

The first day's drive out from Eddyville was a short one. When we got to
plodding along over the Plains, we made from fifteen to twenty miles a
day. That was counted a good day's drive, without unusual accidents or
delays.

As I now remember, this was the only day on the entire trip when the
cattle were allowed to stand in the yoke at noontime, while the owners
lunched and rested. When it was near nightfall we made our first camp.
Buck excitedly insisted that we must not unyoke the cattle.

"What shall we do?" I asked. "They can't live in the yoke always."

"Yes, but if you unyoke here you will never catch them again," he said.

One word brought on another until we were almost in a dispute, when a
stranger, Thomas McAuley, who was camped near by, stepped in. He said
his own cattle were gentle; there were three men of his party, and they
would help us yoke up in the morning. I gratefully accepted his offer
and unyoked, and we had no trouble in starting off the next morning.
After that, never a word with the least semblance of contention to it
passed between Buck and me.

Scanning McAuley's outfit in the morning, I was quite troubled to start
out with him. His teams, principally cows, were ligh