“But he got his new uniform. Any of the rest of us would have been stood up against a wall at sunrise. Another time a consignment of shoes came in that was meant for a race of giants. None of us could wear them. Bill was awful proud of his feet, too. He swore he would get a pair to fit. So he put his on, and went to see the Major. “‘Look at these shoes,’ he says. “‘They look all right to me,’ says the Major. ‘Seems like a pretty good fit.’ “‘Yes, but see here,’ says Bill. And he took off the shoes, and there was his other shoes underneath. He got a pair that fit, right away. Nobody else did.” Such initiative otherwise applied might well make a captain of industry of him, were it not that Bill is typical of his kind, his creed “for to admire an’ for to see, for to behold this world so wide.” Free and foot loose they will be, rejecting the bondage of routine that makes of a resourceful man, as they all are, a captain of industry. The world is their playground, not their schoolroom. Independent they will be of discipline. “Aren’t you afraid of losing your job?” we asked a guide who confided some act of insubordination. “Well, I _come_ here looking for a job,” he answered. As Bill put it, in his rhythmic way,--“The Lord put me on earth to eat and sleep and ride the ponies, and I ain’t figurin’ on doin’ nothin’ else.” And he finished, “There’s just three things in the world I care about,--my hawss, and my rope and my hat.” The genius of the west lies, I think, in its power of objectiveness. The east is subjective. When an easterner tells a story, he locates himself emotionally with much concern. He may be vague as to time and place, but you know his moods and impressions with subtle exactness. Every westerner I ever knew begins his first sentence of a story with his location and objective. Then he adds dates and follows with an anecdote of bare facts, untinged by his emotions. His audience fills in the chinks with what he does not say. For example, a guide, telling of a trip, might say---- “I was headed north over Eagle Pass with an outfit of geologists in a northwest storm. The animals had just come in from winter feedin’ the day before. My top-hawss had went lame on me, and I had to borrow a cayuse from an Indian. I had a pack outfit of burros and was drivin’ three empties that give out on us. We was short of grub, and twenty miles to make to the trader’s. The dudes had wore setfasts on their hawsses, and when I ast them could they kinder trot along, the ladies would hit their saddles with a little whip and say ‘gittap, hawsie.’”