Some of those
spoken to wheeled their horses and rode away. The others settled
themselves in their saddles and began to roll cigarettes.
"Change horses; get something to eat," said he to me; so I swung
after the file traveling at a canter over the low swells beyond
the plain.
The remuda had been driven by its leaders to a corner of the
pasture's wire fence, and there held. As each man arrived he
dismounted, threw off his saddle, and turned his animal loose.
Then he flipped a loop in his rope and disappeared in the eddying
herd. The discarded horse, with many grunts, indulged in a
satisfying roll, shook himself vigorously, and walked slowly
away. His labour was over for the day, and he knew it, and took
not the slightest trouble to get out of the way of the men with
the swinging ropes.
Not so the fresh horses, however. They had no intention of being
caught, if they could help it, but dodged and twisted, hid and
doubled behind the moving screen of their friends. The latter,
seeming as usual to know they were not wanted, made no effort to
avoid the men, which probably accounted in great measure for the
fact that the herd as a body remained compact, in spite of the
cowboys threading it, and in spite of the lack of an enclosure.
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