the fire, and the social hour of the day is
spent in yarning. The stories told may run from the sublime to the
ridiculous, from a true incident to a base fabrication, or from a
touching bit of pathos to the most vulgar vulgarity.

"Have I ever told this outfit my experience with the vigilantes when I
was a kid?" inquired Bull Durham. There was a general negative
response, and he proceeded. "Well, our folks were living on the Frio
at the time, and there was a man in our neighborhood who had an outfit
of four men out beyond Nueces Canon hunting wild cattle for their
hides. It was necessary to take them out supplies about every so
often, and on one trip he begged my folks to let me go along for
company. I was a slim slip of a colt about fourteen at the time, and
as this man was a friend of ours, my folks consented to let me go
along. We each had a good saddle horse, and two pack mules with
provisions and ammunition for the hunting camp. The first night we
made camp, a boy overtook us with the news that the brother of my
companion had been accidentally killed by a horse, and of course he
would have to return. Well, we were twenty miles on our way, and as it
would take some little time to go back and return with the loaded
mules, I volunteered, like a fool kid, to go on and take the packs
through.

"The only question was, could I pack and unpack. I had helped him at
this work, double-handed, but now that I was to try it alone, he
showed me what he called a squaw hitch, with which you can lash a pack
single-handed. After putting me through it once or twice, and
satisfying himself that I could do the packing, he consented to let me
go on, he and the messenger returning home during the night. The next
morning I packed without any trouble and started on my way. It would
take me two days yet, poking along with heavy packs, to reach the
hunters. Well, I hadn't made over eight or ten miles the first
morning, when, as I rounded a turn in the trail, a man stepped out
from behind a rock, threw a gun in my face, and ordered me to hold up
my hands. Then another appeared from the opposite side with his gun
leveled on me. Inside of half a minute a dozen men galloped up from
every quarter, all armed to the teeth. The man on leaving had given me
his gun for company, one of these old smoke-pole, cap-and-ball
six-shooters, but I must have forgotten what guns were for, for I
elevated my little hands nicely. The leader of the party questione