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“Tailing” a Steer.rsIn Kansas, daring the days wheithe cattle-growiDg excitement raihigh, there lived the most recklesidare-devil sort of joung menwrites a Texas correspondent tc the Pittsburg Dispatch, I have evei met. There were no old menamong them. A man of forty was looked upon as a patriarch, out who was entitled to be a candidate for admissiou to the home of theaged and infirm. These young ! men rode up and down the TexasjI cattle trail from Trinity iiver tothe Republican. When in Texas to gather their herds, they rode fariously; they hunted panthers; they coursed after wolves: they ate mavericks almost without number, and on the round-up theywere the most reckless of all thehard-riding men that gathered on the southern ranges. When they returned to Kansas with their cattle they had many stories about the skill of the Texas cowboys to relate. A yonng acquaintance of mine told me of the Texas cowboys tailing steers—that is, riding alongside a running steer and grasping his elevated tail, and by giving it a powerful lifting jetk. throwing it heels over head, much to its discomfiture and subsequent rage. I smiled incredulously, j The yonng man offered to perform the trick. We got into a wagon and drove to where my herd was grazing. The cattle were just off the trail and were not strong. My ffriend contemptuously said there was no need of his mounting oneof the herder’s ponies to “tail those steers,” he could do it on JIfoot. The herders gathered tosee the spectacle. The young man jumped from the wagon and ranswiftly to a steer, which he grasped firmly by the tail. There was 60me hitch in the performance, j The steer didn’t turns somersault.He looked around, and seeing a man fastened to his tail, bellowed with intense rage, and turned to mpale him on his polished horns.My acquaintance,still graspingthedeer’s tail tightly, ran round and { •ound. The steer kicked and bel-Ilowed, and turned faster and faster after him. The entire herd gathered, and stood in a vast circle, looking at the gruesome spectacle. Soon the tail-pulling young man called for help. We could not have helped him if his life depended on it. The herders had laughed until they could hardly sit in their saddles. I held to the sides yf the wagon box to keep from filling out. Bare-headed, with his J ong hair streaming behind him and ncessant calls for aid pouring out f his mouth, and an occasional iowI at the contracting circle of ■attle that were being excited, to16€re variety to the furious uproar, friend sped round and round, nd the steer, with many bellows d intense rage chased his taileand the two-legged animal that had resnmptnonsly fastened on to it. 'inally I recovered my strength,nd drove the wagon close to thesvolying pair, My friend loosen { j
Newspaper Details
Abilene Taylor County News
Abilene, Texas, US
Fri, Jan 15, 1886
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
Max B.
USA 01 Jul 2019
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