Ten thousand head of steers were waiting for cars at Dundee. There was the Bar Cross, the VV, the California outfit, the Double Ess Bar, the 7 T X, the Bar A Bar, the Sacramento Pool outfit and the Tinnin-Slaughter wagon, all the way from Toyah. This last named had bought six hundred steers on Crow Flat, road branded with two big Y’s, and drove. When they got to Dundee they were just a few shy of nine hundred head. This is by the way, and inserted only as a tribute to New Mexico’s unequaled climate. The herds were camped in a circle around the lake, keeping an interval of about two miles from each other. Each herd had three watches of three to five men each for night-guard. But four or five men were ample for day herding; so the men took turns at that, day about, the unoccupied riding to Dundee in search of diversions. Forty or more saddle-ponies stood patiently unhitched, with dangling reins, in the plaza. The hotel did a rushing business, Mrs. Stanley’s output making a pleasant contrast to camp-cooking. Norah, the bright-eyed, was besieged in form by relays of admirers, the more favored ones being allowed to help cook or wash dishes. Perhaps it should be stated in this connection that Norah was the only girl in a section fifty miles square. All the same, she was a jolly, pretty girl. Now, when steer-shipping time comes the season’s hard work is over, and all except the “old hands” get their time. And while most men of the cow countries drink colored fluids on occasion, the superfluent ones, who consider the putting down of liquor the first duty of man, are not the stuff of which old hands are made, the law of survival obtaining on the free range as elsewhere. So, after the first few days, drinking at Jim Gale’s place became perfunctory, though, as Dundee consisted of one hotel, one saloon, one depot, one store, the section house and two other buildings, the saloon was necessarily the prime center. The boys would not be paid until the cattle were sold, so gambling was barred by etiquette, “jaw-bone” games being viewed with disfavor as tending to unseemly contention. Similarly the code forbade more than two or three persecuting Miss Norah at once, and time ticked slowly. Sun in the east at morning-- Sun in the west at night, a cloudless sky, and a daily statement by a badgered agent that the cars would be in at once. Given seventy-five full-blooded, vigorous, healthy cow-boys, twenty-four hours in a day, seven days in a week, and no work, and the Purveyor of Mischief may be depended upon to uphold their idle hands. Inhospitality is mortal sin in all thinly-settled countries, but all things have their limit. For ten days a plague of tramps had overrun the chuck-wagons, feasting on steaks, hot biscuits and the like, getting a meal at one wagon and on to the next. And when one left he spread the glad tidings up and down, sending back seven others worse than the first, making hospitality act like a camel.