Chapter I: Front Matter

Copyright, 1896, by HARPER & BROTHERS. All Rights Reserved.

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PUBLISHED WEEKLY. NEW YORK, TUESDAY, APRIL 7, 1896. FIVE CENTS A COPY.

VOL. XVII.--NO. 858. TWO DOLLARS A YEAR.

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HOW TO START IN LIFE.

RANCHING.

BY HON. THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

There are in every community young men to whom life at the desk or behind the counter is unutterably dreary and unattractive, and who long for some out-of-door occupation which shall, if possible, contain a spice of excitement. These young men can be divided into two classes--first, those who, if they get a chance to try the life for which they long, will speedily betray their utter inability to lead it; and, secondly, those who possess the physical capacity and the peculiar mental make-up necessary for success in an employment far out of the usual paths of civilized occupations. A great many of these young men think of ranching as a business which they might possibly take up, and what I am about to say is meant as much for a warning to one class as for advice to the other.

Ranching is a rather indefinite term. In a good many parts of the West a ranch simply means a farm; but I shall not use it in this sense, since the advantages and disadvantages of a farmer's life, whether it be led in New Jersey or Iowa, have often been dwelt upon by men infinitely more competent than I am to pass judgment. Accordingly, when I speak of ranching I shall mean some form of stock-raising or sheep-farming as practised now in the wilder parts of the United States, where there is still plenty of land which, because of the lack of rainfall, is not very productive for agricultural purposes.

The first thing to be remembered by any boy or young man who wishes to go West and start life on a cattle ranch, horse ranch, or sheep ranch is that he must know the business thoroughly before he can earn any salary to speak of, still less start out on his own accord. A great many young fellows apparently think that a cowboy is born and not made, and that in order to become one all they have to do is to wish very hard to be one. Now, as a matter of fact, a young fellow trained as a bookkeeper would take quite as long to learn the trade of a cowboy as the average cowboy would take to learn the trade of bookkeeper. The first thing that the beginner anywhere in the wilder parts of the West has to learn is the capacity to stand monotony, fatigue, and hardship; the next thing is to learn the nature of the country.

A young fellow from the East who has been brought up on a farm, or who has done hard manual labor as a machinist, need not go through a novitiate of manual labor in order to get accustomed to the roughness that such labor implies; but a boy just out of a high-school, or a young clerk, will have to go through just such a novitiate before he will be able to command a dollar's pay. Both alike will have to learn the nature of the country, and this can only be learned by actual experience on the ground. Again, the beginner must remember that though there are occasional excitement and danger in a ranchman's life, it is only occasional, while the monotony of hard and regular toil is not often broken. Except in the matter of fresh air and freedom from crowding, a small ranchman often leads a life of as grinding hardness as the average dweller in a New York tenement-house. His shelter is a small log hut, or possibly a dug-out in the side of a bank, or in summer a shabby tent. For food he will have to depend mainly on the bread of his own baking, on fried fat pork, and on coffee or tea with sugar and no milk. Of course he will occasionally have some canned stuff or potatoes. The furniture of the hut is of the roughest description--a roll of blankets for bedding, a bucket, a tin wash-basin, and a tin mug, with perhaps a cracked looking-glass four inches square.

He will not have much society of any kind, and the society he does have is not apt to be over-refined. If he is a lad of a delicate, shrinking nature and fastidious habits, he will find much that is uncomfortable, and will need to show no small amount of pluck and fortitude if he is to hold his own. The work, too, is often hard and often wearisome from mere sameness. It is generally done on horseback even on a sheep ranch, and always on a cow ranch. The beginner must learn to ride with indifference all kinds of rough and dangerous horses before he will be worth his keep.

With all this before him, the beginner will speedily find out that life on a Western ranch is very far from being a mere holiday. A young man who desires to start in the life ought, if possible, to have with him a little money--just enough to keep body and soul together--until he can gain a foothold somewhere. No specific directions can be given him as to where to start. Wyoming, most of Montana, the western edge of the Dakotas, western Texas, and some portions of the Rocky Mountain States still offer chances for a man to go into the ranch business. In different seasons in the different localities business may be good or bad, and it would be impossible to tell where was the best place to start. Wherever the beginner goes, he ought to make up his mind at the outset to start by doing any kind of work he can. Let him chop wood, hoe, do any chore that will bring him in twenty-five cents. If he is once able to start by showing that he is willing to work hard and do something, he can probably get employment of some kind, although this employment will almost certainly be very ill paid and not attractive. Perhaps it will be to dig in a garden, or to help one of the men drive oxen, or to do the heavy work round camp for some party of cow-punchers or lumberers. Whatever it is, let the boy go at it with all his might, and at the same time take every opportunity to get acquainted with the kind of life which he intends ultimately to lead. If he wishes to try to ride a horse, he will be given every chance, if for no other reason than that he will continually meet men whose ideas of fun are met by the spectacle of a tenderfoot on a bucking bronco.

By degrees he will learn a good deal of the ways of the life and of the country. Then he must snatch the first chance that offers itself to take a position in connection with the regular work of a ranch. He may be employed as a regular hand to help cook on the ranch wagon, or taken by a shepherd to do the hard and dirty work which the shepherd would like to put off on somebody else. When he has once got as far as this his rise is certain, if he is not afraid of labor, and keeps a lookout for the opportunities that offer. After a while he will be given a horse himself, and employed as a second-rate man to do the ordinary ranch work.

Work on a sheep ranch is less attractive but more profitable than on any other. A good deal of skill must be shown by the shepherd in managing his flock and in handling the sheep dogs; but ordinarily it is appallingly dreary to sit all day long in the sun, or loll about in the saddle, watching the flocks of fleecy idiots. In time of storm he must work like a demon and know exactly what to do, or his whole flock will die before his eyes, sheep being as tender as horses and cattle are tough.

With the work of a cow ranch or horse ranch there comes more excitement. Every man on such a ranch has a string of eight or ten horses for his own riding, and there is a great deal of exciting galloping and hot riding across the plains; and the work in a stampede at night, or in line-riding during the winter, or in breaking the fierce little horses to the saddle, is as exciting as it is hard and dangerous. The wilder phases of the life, however, are steadily passing away. Almost everywhere great wire fences are being put up, and no small part of the cowboy's duty nowadays is to ride along the line of a fence and repair it wherever broken. Moreover, at present the business of cattle or horse raising on the plains does not pay well, and, except in peculiar cases, can hardly be recommended to a boy ambitious for his future.

So much for the unattractive reality of ranch life. It would be unfair not to point out that it has a very attractive side also. If the boy is fond of open-air exercise, and willing to risk tumbles that may break an occasional bone, and to endure at need heat and cold, hunger and thirst, he will find much that is pleasant in the early mornings on the great plains, and on the rare days when he is able to take a few hours' holiday to go with his shot-gun after prairie-chickens or ducks, or, perchance, to ride out with a Winchester rifle to a locality where on one of his working days he has seen a small band of antelope standing in the open, or caught a glimpse of a deer bounding through the brush. There is little temptation to spend money, unless he is addicted to the coarsest kind of dissipation, and after a few years the young fellow ought to have some hundreds of dollars put up. By this time he should know all about the business and the locality, and should be able to gauge just what he can accomplish.

For a year or two perhaps he can try to run a little outfit of his own in connection with his work on a big ranch. Then he will abandon the latter and start out entirely on his own account. Disaster may overtake him, as it may overtake any business man; but if he wins success, even though of a moderate kind, he has a pleasant life before him, riding about over the prairie among his own horses or cattle or sheep, occasionally taking a day off to go after game, and, while working hard, not having to face the mere drudgery which he had to face as a tyro. The chances are very small that he will ever gain great wealth; and when he marries and has children of his own there are many uncomfortable problems to face, the chief being that of schools; but for a young man in good health and of adventurous temper the life is certainly pleasanter than that of one cooped up in the counting-room, and while it is not one to be sought save by the very few who have a natural liking for it and a natural capacity to enjoy it and profit by it, still for these few people it remains one of the most attractive forms of existence in America.

BIOGRAPHY OF A STARBOARD ANCHOR.

BY H. PERCY ASHLEY.

The big Anchor rested on the smooth green lawn in front of the house, all glistening in the sunshine with its new coat of white paint, and there was nothing about it to show how it had once taken a very important part in the lives of the youngsters who were even then playing around on the grass not far away. But the old Bo's'n came along one day, and he knew the story, and as near as I can remember it, this is what he said the Anchor told him:

I came out of the ground a great many years ago, and my appearance at the time was somewhat crude. I was put on a train and taken to a place where they gave me a bath, and afterwards I was melted, hammered, and pounded until it seemed as if my last days had come. I had a chance to cool off after this ordeal, however, and a new suit of galvanized clothing was given to me. I felt very proud a few days later as I lay in state at the door of a large ship-chandler's shop on South Street in New York city. Frequently men who passed by in the crowd would stop to look at me, and some of them would remark upon my beauty and my strength, which made me expand with pride and give them one of my brightest looks. Those were the days, you must remember, when I was new and foolish, for up to that time I had never seen the ocean, except for the occasional glimpses I caught over the corner of the dock and through the tangle of shipping.

Spring came, and all was hurry and bustle in the shop behind me. One particularly fine morning a truck backed up against the sidewalk, and some men loaded me on to it, and took me away and transferred me to a steam-freighter, which landed me the next day at Newport. Soon afterward I was shipped to the bow of a large schooner yacht. As long as I live I shall never forget how the Captain and the mate looked me over; and as they patted my arms and flukes they remarked that I was very well made. Mr. Summerville, the owner of the yacht, also came forward to admire me, and after him ran two of the prettiest children I had ever seen. Laying his hand upon my arm, he said:

"Children, this is the new Right Bower. We all place a great deal of dependence upon him."

I was so much overcome at this that I could not speak, but I extended my palm and gave them my very best bow.

I did not meet my associate Anchor until several days afterwards, since he was on duty at the bottom of the bay; but the Chain, to which he was very much attached, gave me his respects. A few days after my arrival, my future chum, Patent Link Chain, came aboard, and we were introduced by the mate. Patent Chain extended his shackles in a friendly way, and I grasped them firmly in my ring. Little did we foresee the many trials before us.

It is needless for me to relate how I nearly fainted when thrown overboard for the first time, and how my dear friend Patent Chain never lost his hold upon me. Nearly all my duty was at night, for I was very much stronger than the Port Bow Anchor. There was another Anchor on board, called Kedge, but my partner and I did not take very kindly to him, as he seemed to be stuck up, and spent most of his time aft. We therefore let him severely alone, and we learned that he remarked to the Chains one day that the Kedge family were called upon to do duty only on special occasions, and to be rowed about in small boats.

The Chains of this yacht for some reason never seemed to get along very well together, and frequently when two of them were on duty at the same time they would get in a tangle, and the mate would have to go out on the bob-stay and chastise them with a marlinspike before they could be separated. But, as my friend Patent Chain frequently remarked, the other chain was very common and had a bad heart. Events proved his opinion was well founded.

We were on a cruise toward Maine when the turning-point in my life occurred. As we sailed along one day I heard the mate say that bad weather was ahead. That evening we came to anchor early in a sheltered bay, and night came on dark and stormy. The wind increased, and sighed and moaned in the rigging. Port Anchor had gone overboard several hours before, but they soon found it necessary to send me down with him. I felt a kind of foreboding of evil as I plunged into the water, and when I reached the bottom I sank one of my arms as deeply into the mud as possible, and groped with my fluke for solid rock. Patent Chain told me he had not reached for such a length before, and he added that the Kedge had been brought forward in case he might be needed.

The storm increased to a hurricane, and soon Port Anchor cried out to me that he felt his strength was giving way. Poor fellow! he seemed to realize that he was too old to stand the terrific strain that he was now being called upon to endure, and his Common Chain couldn't be counted on to hold. Already some of the links were making preparations to part. I called back words of cheer, but received no reply, and a moment later I experienced a terrible shock, for Common Chain had broken, and poor old Port Anchor had been left to his fate in the mud. I felt myself dragged through the stones and the rocks along the bottom, and wondered what was going to happen, for my good friend Patent Chain was telling me that they were praying on deck that I might hold. Little Kedge sank down near me, and tried hard to get a grip on the rocks, but he was so small that he could do but little. Patent Chain shrieked in agony that he was being torn apart, but entreated me at the same time to make final and desperate efforts to save the yacht. Up above the Captain, the mate, and the crew were working frantically to get the storm try-sail set, and they had lashed two hempen cables to Patent Chain so that he could go out further. In the mean time, however, I had found a ledge of rocks, to which I seized with my flukes as well as with my stock, and Patent Chain, spreading himself full length in the mud, clung to the bottom.

How long this dreadful tension lasted I shall never know, but it seemed years to me. It was probably only a few hours. And when I was finally assisted to the surface by old Windlass the next morning, I found the yacht was under way in tow, and headed for the nearest shipyard. She had sustained considerable damage from the hurricane, and as I reached the deck I was surrounded by awed and sympathetic faces. Everyone said I had saved the yacht; and that is why I am placed here and why I am so well treated.

BOY TROOPERS.

BY RICHARD BARRY.

ILLUSTRATED BY INSTANTANEOUS FLASH-LIGHT PHOTOGRAPHS OF "TROOP A" CADETS.

The cavalry has always been the most popular branch of army service in song and story, and, beyond doubt, in the mind of the public. To a boy who has a leaning towards military things it has an absolute fascination, and if he likes a horse (and what boy does not?) it is his choice beyond all others.

In New York city there exists a troop of boy cavalry that has been drilling and exercising faithfully, and under such able direction that it may be taken as a model for what a boys' organization of this kind should be. Soldiering means really serious work, whether it is in the service of a State, a country, or merely entered into for the love of it, and a boy who has not the proper spirit cannot long remain a member of "Troop A" Cadets. It is astonishing to find how quickly and how well the boy recruit learns to ride, how much he learns about a horse, and how his muscles and his eye and his self-reliance develop under the drill. The writer has seen riding that no cowboy need be ashamed of done by a boy of fourteen who a year before had never thrown his leg over anything but a Shetland-pony, and many of the young troopers never mounted a horse at all until they first made their appearance in the tan-bark ring of the troop riding-school. If a boy is a "muff," he does not stay at it long; it takes a lad with the "proper stuff" in him, as the riding-master tells you, to stand the thumping and sometimes the falls of the first month's drill. A horse is a very complicated piece of machinery to the novice, and he must be managed by the eye, the whole body, and the mind. He knows when the rider on his back is timid or determined, and he often acts accordingly. Horses have an individuality that bicycles haven't, and the young trooper must learn to govern besides learning merely to guide and "stay on."

But to take in order what a boy cavalryman must learn. In the first place he must be strong and willing, and quick to listen; that is a great thing--listening. He will find out a great deal about himself, and if he has the right stamina and spirit he improves in every way most wonderfully.

As soon as the recruit has been proposed for membership, which is done in the same way it is done in the National Guard--that is, his name is proposed by two members in good standing, then voted on by a committee, and lastly by the whole troop--as soon as all this is done he takes his first lesson. It is not on horseback--that comes later--but on foot; the setting-up exercise has to be gone through with. This is quite a trial, for it means standing erect, and going through various exercises with the arms, the legs, the whole body; bending over with knees stiff, and touching the ground until he wonders where so many aching muscles come from.

Then he learns the facings and marchings, a good deal like an infantryman. But at last a sabre is put in his hand, and he is taught to use it, standing firm on his out-stretched legs, and making wonderful cuts and points to right and left--"cut at head, cut at body, at infantry, at cavalry," etc., over and over. At first some of his wonderful strokes in strange directions would cleave his horse in two, and others would relieve him of his head or mayhap his tail; but soon he learns the proper positions of all these things, and acts as if he were on horseback. When this has been accomplished he is taught the drill with the carbine, loading and firing, and the manual on foot. The lieutenant in charge of the cadets informed me that boys learn quicker and improve much more rapidly than grown men in all this, and that they seldom remain in the "awkward squad" for any length of time. But now comes the riding, and a great deal more; for the cavalryman must look after his own mount, and be able to saddle and bridle.

The first lesson means much. It is a good thing that grace does not count, for it is hard to be graceful or at ease on a bumping, thumping nag with nothing on his back but a blanket. In a little time one learns to hang on with the knees and balance with the body, and then it looks more like fun--the instructor lets go of the bridle-rein and ceases his everlasting words of advice, and the recruit "goes it alone." When he sits in a saddle after undergoing a long course of tan-bark drill, he feels as comfortable as if he was in a chair, and wonders how he ever thought it hard to do.

Now comes the drill on horseback at a walk, a trot, and a gallop. If the horse is an old hand he helps the new trooper out amazingly; he seems to understand the orders, and whisks into place and dresses into line promptly as could be wished for.

After the trooper gets out of the awkward squad for good and all, the drills become exciting; every meeting is a series of games on horseback; he learns to cut at the ball on the wooden post--"the Turk's head"; he slashes at imaginary enemies afoot and mounted; he learns "tent-pegging," which is riding full tilt down the arena at a wooden peg driven into the ground, which he endeavors to pick up on the point of his sabre, and soon he becomes part of his horse. It is exciting to see three troopers playing the "ribbon chase." One of them has a knot on his right arm, and the other two (they are all mounted without saddles) try to get this ribbon off. It can only be taken off from the left side, and they play tag and manoeuvre every which way to get a position. If the one who is "it" is clever, he dodges and doubles, turns and backs, and if he can keep his ribbon for three minutes he wins. But the others push him hard, and here it is where good riding tells. I have seen a little shaver who had to be helped up on to a fifteen-hand horse do some riding that would be credit to a Comanche Indian. They wrestle--these boy troopers--on horseback, and I have seen one leap from his own horse astride that of his opponent, and then succeed in dismounting him. All this brings out the best thing in a boy; it teaches him to be self-reliant and quick in judgment, and it makes his big brother feel proud of him--if he has a big brother.

When they grow old enough (most of them are between fifteen and seventeen) they generally get into the troop itself, and their preliminary work puts them on a par with the best of the older troopers.

Of course it costs something to organize and maintain a squadron of mounted men, and the members pay yearly dues which cover the expense of horse hire. Their uniforms they own themselves, and they cost about twelve dollars.

In any good-sized town or city it is perfectly possible for a number of boys, with the help of their fathers, to organize such a troop if they go about it in earnest and work in a systematic way.

First of all a competent instructor must be obtained, and every one should realize that money cannot be judiciously saved in his salary. He should be the best man obtainable after a somewhat extended search. Usually he is an old cavalry officer, or perhaps some cavalry officer who has retired. Such men are to be had after some search, and apart from their knowledge of cavalry movements they are valuable because they take a personal interest in all that has to do with their work.

Having secured the instructor a hall is then necessary, and this is by far the most difficult thing to find of the whole outfit. Few towns and not many cities have any hall the ground-floor of which can be used for horses. If the troop is to be a serious affair, and it is impossible to organize one unless it is to be serious, the cheapest way in such cases is to build a huge shed with the earth for a flooring. Here is a proportionately large expense, and the result is that most cavalry cadet troops will have to be formed under the auspices of National Guard troops, which already have armories for cavalry practice.

Once you have an armory and an instructor, the rest is merely detail. Much objection is made of late to military drill and the encouragement of the love of war. Boy troopers have nothing to do with war. They should not wish to fight, even to grow up to fight some day, except in defense of their country. There is no more question of war in a cadet troop than there is in a bicycle club. It is merely that the discipline, the training, the exercise that are good for boys can be obtained in this healthy, manly way, and cannot be obtained with equal efficiency in any other way.

AN "OLD-FIELD" SCHOOL-GIRL.[1]

[1] Begun in HARPER'S ROUND TABLE No. 857.

BY MARION HARLAND.