[Illustration: THE STAMPEDE] THE LOG OF A COWBOY A Narrative of the Old Trail Days BY ANDY ADAMS _ILLUSTRATED BY E. BOYD SMITH_ “Our cattle also shall go with us.” --_Exodus_ iv. 26. [Illustration: The Riverside Press] BOSTON AND NEW YORK: HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY, The Riverside Press, Cambridge _1903_. TO THE COWMEN AND BOYS OF THE OLD WESTERN TRAIL THESE PAGES ARE GRATEFULLY DEDICATED CONTENTS CHAP. I. UP THE TRAIL II. RECEIVING III. THE START IV. THE ATASCOSA V. A DRY DRIVE VI. A REMINISCENT NIGHT VII. THE COLORADO VIII. ON THE BRAZOS AND WICHITA IX. DOAN’S CROSSING X. NO MAN’S LAND XI. A BOGGY FORD XII. THE NORTH FORK XIII. DODGE XIV. SLAUGHTER’S BRIDGE XV. THE BEAVER XVI. THE REPUBLICAN XVII. OGALALLA XVIII. THE NORTH PLATTE XIX. FORTY ISLANDS FORD XX. A MOONLIGHT DRIVE XXI. THE YELLOWSTONE XXII. OUR LAST CAMP-FIRE XXIII. DELIVERY XXIV. BACK TO TEXAS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS THE STAMPEDE MAP SHOWING THE TRAIL HEAT AND THIRST MEETING WITH INDIANS CELEBRATING IN DODGE STORY-TELLING SWIMMING THE PLATTE THE LOG OF A COWBOY CHAPTER I UP THE TRAIL Just why my father moved, at the close of the civil war, from Georgia to Texas, is to this good hour a mystery to me. While we did not exactly belong to the poor whites, we classed with them in poverty, being renters; but I am inclined to think my parents were intellectually superior to that common type of the South. Both were foreign born, my mother being Scotch and my father a north of Ireland man,--as I remember him, now, impulsive, hasty in action, and slow to confess a fault. It was his impulsiveness that led him to volunteer and serve four years in the Confederate army,--trying years to my mother, with a brood of seven children to feed, garb, and house. The war brought me my initiation as a cowboy, of which I have now, after the long lapse of years, the greater portion of which were spent with cattle, a distinct recollection. Sherman’s army, in its march to the sea, passed through our county, devastating that section for miles in its passing.