As only about half of the night herd had been brought back, the circle
riding was particularly heavy, and it was ten hours before we were back
at the wagon. We then changed horses again and worked the whole herd
until after sunset, finishing just as it grew too dark to do anything
more. By this time I had been nearly forty hours in the saddle, changing
horses five times, and my clothes had thoroughly dried on me, and I fell
asleep as soon as I touched the bedding. Fortunately some men who had
gotten in late in the morning had had their sleep during the daytime, so
that the rest of us escaped night guard and were not called until four
next morning. Nobody ever gets enough sleep on a round-up.

The above was the longest number of consecutive hours I ever had to be
in the saddle. But, as I have said, I changed horses five times, and it
is a great lightening of labor for a rider to have a fresh horse. Once
when with Sylvane Ferris I spent about sixteen hours on one horse,
riding seventy or eighty miles. The round-up had reached a place called
the ox-bow of the Little Missouri, and we had to ride there, do some
work around the cattle, and ride back.

Another time I was twenty-four hours on horseback in company with
Merrifield without changing horses. On this occasion we did not travel
fast. We had been coming back with the wagon from a hunting trip in
the Big Horn Mountains. The team was fagged out, and we were tired of
walking at a snail's pace beside it. When we reached country that the
driver thoroughly knew, we thought it safe to leave him, and we loped in
one night across a distance which it took the wagon the three following
days to cover. It was a beautiful moonlight night, and the ride was
delightful. All day long we had plodded at a walk, weary and hot. At
supper time we had rested two or three hours, and the tough little