When I was a kid, an old Indian told me a story about the badger and coyote and said they hunted together as partners. I had a very good chance to test that story when I was living on Milk River, as the badger and coyote were very plentiful. I have watched them travel together all right—but came to the conclusion the coyote forced his company on the badger. I think the coyote is the smartest animal that stands on four legs and a natural thief. I have watched them travel together for miles. The coyote would be about 50 or 60 yards behind. Now the badger is a natural digger and when he comes to a squirrel hole or prairie dog hole, he digs him out. I have seen a coyote watching him while he was digging and as the badger would always bring his game out of the hole to eat it, the coyote would grab it and run, and the badger being slow on foot and the coyote very fast, he would always get away with the spoils. I am sure there is no affection between them—and the coyote would kill and eat the badger if he could.
I have seen a coyote watch a band of sheep for hours and shift his position every few minutes—always watching behind, too, so that nothing would slip up on him. Then when he thought the time was right, he would dash through the sheep and pick up a lamb right in sight of the sheepherder and his dogs.
The wolf is a better killer than the coyote but not near so smart.
One morning on a roundup, we left camp just at daylight and we had gone about four miles and was riding at a gallop when we came over a little hill. We rode right into a bunch of wolves. They had killed a big fat cow and was eating on her. They evidently had been eating for some time, as there wasn’t much of her left. They were so full of meat they couldn’t hardly run at all. There were about thirty of us and not many had guns that morning—but everybody had ropes and we sure went to making loops. Of course, they scattered every direction and every cowboy was trying to catch a wolf, as the bounty that time was $5.00 a head. It was sure an exciting morning. Some of those cowboys’ horses wouldn’t go near a wolf and when they got a smell of them would snort and run the other way. Sometimes when a cowboy did catch one and took his wraps on the saddle horn, the horse would stampede, wolf and all. Sometimes when they would throw at one, he would snap at the loop and if he hit it, would cut it in two like a razor would.
It was a strange thing to me—but I was riding a young horse that morning that had not been broke long, but he cocked his ears forward and took right after them wolves. I believe he thought he was chasing a colt. I got two wolves and choked and dragged them until they were dead. One had been shot through the shoulder by the boss, so he was easy to catch. I met the boss coming over a little hill. He was sure smoking this one up with his six-shooter, and as I had killed mine, he hollered, “Get this one, Con. I saw a black one back here. I want to get him.” (The others were all gray wolves.) He had lost his hat and he had been chasing those wolves so hard his pants legs was up to his knees and he sure looked wild. He didn’t get back to camp until night—but he didn’t get the black wolf.
We got nine wolves out of the bunch—I don’t know how many got away—but we didn’t have any roundup or gather any cattle that day, as the cowboys kept stringing in all day, one and two at a time.
I have tried several times since that time to rope a wolf but always found them too fast for me when they were empty. Those wolves were a great menace to the stockmen. One couldn’t poison them, as when they got hungry they killed whatever animal they wanted, and they were sure plentiful.
I have seen places on Milk River when it had froze up and fresh snow had fell on the ice, it looked like a bunch of school boys had been playing where there had been a bunch of wolves.
They weighed about one hundred pounds and measured almost seven to eight feet long. Their first move to make a kill was to ham-string the animal by grabbing the animal by the fleshy part of the hind leg. That usually brought the animal to the ground and then, of course, they made short work of the job.
I broke a bunch of horses one time for a man by the name of Gordon near Ubet in the Judith Basin. He told me when I started he would give me sixty dollars for one month’s work—that was all he would pay out on them. He didn’t want them roped, but must catch them in a chute. Above anything else, he didn’t want them to buck, and as there was twelve head of them, it was impossible to do much of a job on them in that length of time.
I got along fairly well with them for awhile. I think I had rode about five head. I was out on the range riding one of them one day and saw a big wolf. This colt was pretty fast. So I thought I would give the wolf a little run. When I got close to him, I seen he was crippled, evidently had been in a fight with another wolf, so I roped him. Now when I started dragging that wolf, the horse went plumb crazy. He whistled, snorted, kicked and bucked and run away, but I still had the wolf and dragged him to the ranch. Of course, the wolf was dead. When I got there—well, that horse never got over that scare. He jumped in the manger, kicked the side out of the barn, and whistled and snorted like a lion and got worse from day to day.
The old man wasn’t there the day I brought the wolf in, but did come out in a few days to see how I was getting along with the horses. When he went in the barn, this horse started kicking and snorting, bumped his head against the walls and run the old man out of the barn—and to make matters worse, he was his favorite colt. He asked me what was the matter with him. I told him I didn’t know—but I didn’t tell him about the wolf. Then another day he saw one buck with me—that did settle it. He said I was spoiling his horses instead of breaking them. Anyway, I stayed the month out and I think him and I were both glad when it was over and I was on my way.
I went from there to the Horse Shoe Bar Ranch on Warm Spring Creek in the Judith Basin. It was owned at that time by T. C. Powers, who was a pioneer of the state and quite a politician of his day.
I remember a rather amusing thing happened to him. He was running for Senator one year and was having a pretty hard race and it was known he was spending plenty money to get votes. There was a precinct about fifty miles from the railroad on the Teton River where there was about fifty votes—mostly half breed Indians. There was a half breed lived there and claimed he had great influence among his people. So he looked up T. C. Powers and told him for one hundred dollars he could swing every vote in his precinct. Powers gave him the hundred. When the votes were counted in that precinct, Powers had not got one vote. Some time after he met this big politician. Powers said, “What was the matter in that precinct of yours? I didn’t get a vote out there.” The breed said, “I just couldn’t get them to vote for you, Mr. Powers.” He said, “Why?” and the names he called him wouldn’t look good in print, “You didn’t vote for me yourself!” He said, “I dassent, Mr. Powers, they would have kill me out there if I do.” Evidently Powers wasn’t very popular in that precinct.
When I got to this ranch I found a man there alone in bed and very sick. The outfit had left a few days before on the fall roundup, and as he was not feeling well at the time he figured to stay at the ranch a few days and when he got better would follow up, but he got worse. I stayed with him a couple of days and still he got worse. At night the only way he could rest was to prop him up in bed, then I would put my back against his and my feet against the wall, and move to any angle that suited him. I would have to change his position every few minutes and his back was becoming hot, as he had a high fever and wanted water very often. So he finally wore me out and I decided to go for a doctor, who was twenty miles away. At this time it was about nine o’clock at night. There was a good-looking horse in the barn, so I saddled him and started. It was very dark and for the first few miles he bucked several times (if anyone reads this that has rode a bucking horse in the dark he will know what the sensation is). I didn’t know where I was half the time—whether I was in the air or in the saddle. But after I got him going, I didn’t give him any time to buck anymore until I got to the doctor.
Well, when I found the doctor he would not come to the ranch that night, as he had been up with a sick woman for a day and a night and was very tired. After describing the symptoms of my patient, he gave me a bottle of quinine and a bottle of morphine with directions. I went back to the ranch.
This fellow was suffering terrible when I got there. I gave him a shot of quinine first, which I believe was in powder form and very bitter. Then shortly after I tried to give him some more quinine but he refused to take it, so I gave him some more morphine, but didn’t seem to relieve him. Now I was very tired and he was cussing me all the time, so when he would get very bad and in pain I would give him some more morphine. Along about morning he went to sleep and wouldn’t wake up, which was all right with me as I was getting some sleep myself.
About noon the doctor came. He tried to wake him up, but he couldn’t. Then he took his pulse. While doing so, he picked up the morphine bottle and said to me, “Where is the rest of that morphine?” I was sure scared then, I knew I had given him too much. I told the doctor I had spilled some of it. He said............