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BUNCH GRASS

A CHRONICLE OF LIFE ON A CATTLE RANCH


BY HORACE ANNESLEY VACHELL

AUTHOR OF "BROTHERS" "THE HILL" ETC. ETC.

1913




TO MY BROTHER

ARTHUR HONYWOOD VACHELL

I DEDICATE

THIS BOOK




FOREWORD

The author of _Bunch Grass_ ventures to hope that this book will
not be altogether regarded as mere flotsam and jetsam of English and
American magazines. The stories, it will be found, have a certain
continuity, and may challenge interest as apart from incident because
an attempt has been made to reproduce atmosphere, the atmosphere of a
country that has changed almost beyond recognition in three decades.
The author went to a wild California cow-country just thirty years
ago, and remained there seventeen years, during which period the land
from such pastoral uses as cattle and sheep-raising became subdivided
into innumerable small holdings. He beheld a new country in the
making, and the passing of the pioneer who settled vital differences
with a pistol. During those years some noted outlaws ranged at large
in the county here spoken of as San Lorenzo. The Dalton gang of train
robbers lived and died (some with their boots on) not far from the
village entitled Paradise. Stage coaches were robbed frequently. Every
large rancher suffered much at the hands of cattle and horse thieves.
The writer has talked to Frank James, the most famous of Western
desperados; he has enjoyed the acquaintance of Judge Lynch, who hanged
two men from a bridge within half-a-mile of the ranch-house; he
remembers the Chinese Riots; he has witnessed many a fight between the
hungry squatter and the old settler with no title to the leagues over
which his herds roamed, and so, in a modest