The Story of Wool Part 5

The sheep were fed into the troughs, hurried on and away, only to give place to others. Whenever the dip cooled a fresh, hot supply was added.

Within an hour Donald counted a hundred sheep swim their way through the one trough near which he chanced to be standing.

Sandy McCulloch was everywhere at once--now here, now there, giving orders. Gladly the herders obeyed him. They all liked Sandy, not only for his own sake but for the sake of Old Angus, his father, under whom most of them had worked in years past.

"Sandy's a fine lad!" Donald heard one of the herders say.

"There's not a better on Crescent Ranch!" was the prompt reply from a grizzled old Mexican who was ducking the heads of the herd that sped past him.

"He wouldn't make a bad boss of the ranch," murmured another in an undertone.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "HE WOULDN'T MAKE A BAD BOSS"]

Sandy did not hear them. He was too intent on his work. He went about it simply, yet with his whole soul. Day after day his cheery voice could be heard:

"Your dip is cooling, Bernardo! Warm it up a bit. Dinna you know you'll have your labor for your pains unless the stuff is hot as the sheep can bear it? Hurry your flock ahead there, Jose. Think you we want to be dipping sheep the rest of the season? If those ewes have drained off enough let the dogs drive them back to the pens. They'll rub their sides up against the boards and cleanse the pen as well as themselves. Now bring out the new herd that came last week from Kansas City. You'll find them in pens seventeen and eighteen. We kept them by themselves so they would scatter no disease through the flock. After they are dipped they can be put with the others."

The men took all he said good-naturedly. Sandy used no unnecessary words, but what he did say was crisp and to the point, and the herders liked it. They liked, too, to watch his face when his lips parted and his glistening white teeth gleamed between them. Sandy had a very contagious smile. He worked tirelessly, and ever as he moved about among the sheep two great Scotch collies tagged at his heels. Busy as he was he often bent down to pat one of the s.h.a.ggy heads, and was rewarded by having the beautiful dogs thrust their long noses into his hand or rub up against his knees. It was amusing to Donald to watch these dogs dash after the sheep and drive them into the pens. Sometimes they leaped on the backs of the herd and ran the entire length of the line until they reached the ones at the front. They then proceeded to bite the necks of these leaders until they turned them in the desired direction. This done, the collies would run back and by nipping the heels of the sheep at the rear they would compel them to follow where they wished to have them go.

Donald had never seen anything like it.

During the time that the dipping process continued he did not lack for entertainment, you may be sure.

"You'll soon have nothing more to do, Sandy," the boy said one night when he and the Scotchman were sitting in the twilight on the steps of the big barn.

"How's that, laddie?"

"Why, the dipping will be over to-morrow, won't it?"

"Yes; but that is only the beginning of trouble. We shall then put the herd out in the wet gra.s.s a while and soften their hoofs so they can be trimmed before the flocks start for the range. Then the bells must be put on, and the bands of sheep made up for the herders."

"What do you mean by making up the herd?"

"I'll try to tell you. Sheep, you must know, are the queerest creatures under the blue of heaven. It ain't in the power of man to understand them. Some minutes they are doing as you'd likely think they would; the next thing you know they are all stampeding off by themselves, and try as you will you cannot stop 'em. They dinna seem sometimes to have a bit of brains."

Donald laughed.

"Aye! You may well laugh, sitting here, but it's no so funny when they go chasing after the leaders and jumping over the face of some cliff.

Think of seeing a hundred of 'em piled up dead at your feet!"

"Did such a thing as that really ever happen, Sandy?" questioned Donald incredulously.

"It did so. Didn't bears get after a flock on one of the ranges and didn't the whole lot of scared creatures start running? If they had but waited either the dogs or the herders might have driven off the bears.

But no! Nothing would do but they must run--and run they did. One after another they leaped over the edge of the rimrock until most of the flock was destroyed. Folks named the place 'Pile-Up Chasm.' It was a sorry loss to the owner."

"But I don't see why----"

"No, nor anybody else," interrupted Sandy. "That's the sort of thing they do. When they are frightened they never make a sound--they just run. If n.o.body heads them off they are like to run to their death; and when anybody does head them off it must be done carefully or the front ones will wheel about and pile up on all those coming toward them. Lots of sheep are killed in this way. They trample each other to death. Why, once a man down in Glen City was driving a big flock along when around a turn in the road came a motor-truck. The sheep got scared and the front ones whisked straight about. That started others. Soon there was a grand mix-up--sheep all panic-stricken and tramping over each other. The owner lost half his herd. Now you see why we have to have leaders."

"Leaders?"

"Yes. That is one part of making up the herds. We must put some sheep that are wiser than the rest in every flock that they may lead the stupid ones. I dinna ken where they'd be if we didn't. We take as leaders sheep that are 'flock-wise'--by that I mean old ewes or wethers that have long been in the herds and know the ways. Sometimes, also, we put in a goat or two, for a goat has the wit to find water and food for himself. Not so the sheep! Never a bit! You have to lead sheep clean up to gra.s.s and to water as well. They can never find anything for themselves."

"Do they know anything at all, Sandy?" queried Donald, laughing.

"They do so. In some ways they are canny enough. They will scent a storm, and when one is coming never a peg will they stir to graze. They give a queer cry, too, when they find water--a cry to tell the others in the flock; and if the water is brackish or tainted they make a different sound as if to warn the herd. Sheep are very fussy about what they drink. It's a strange lot they are, sure enough!"

"I shouldn't think they would know enough to follow their leaders even if they had any," remarked Donald.

"Well, you see there is a sort of instinct born in 'em to tag after each other. Besides, they learn to follow by playing games. Yes, indeed,"

protested Sandy, as Donald seemed to doubt his words, "sheep are very fond of games. There are a number of different ones that they play. The one they seem to like best is 'Follow the Leader.' I don't know as you ever played it, but when I was a lad I did."

"Of course I have played it. We used to do it at recess."

"Well, the sheep like it as well as you, and it is a lucky thing, for it teaches them one of the very things we want them to learn. They will often start out, one old sheep at the head, and all the others will fall into line and do just what that sheep at the front does. So they learn the trick of keeping their eyes on a few that are wiser than they, and doing what the knowing ones do. They seem to have no minds of their own--they just trail after their leaders. If we can get leaders that are able to see what we want done it is a great help."

"I should think so!"

"When we have selected our leaders we then scatter markers through each band of sheep."

"And what are markers, Sandy?"

"For a marker you must take a black-faced sheep--or, mayhap, one with a crumpled horn; he must have something queer about him so you will know him right off when he is mixed in with the flock. We put these markers at the beginning of every hundred sheep. It makes it easier to keep track of the herd."

"I'm sorry to be so stupid, Sandy," Donald said, "but I don't think I just understand about the markers."

"We have two thousand sheep in a band," explained the herder kindly.

"Now if one of our markers is missing we reckon that a hundred sheep are gone. No one sheep ever strays off by himself, you may be sure of that.

When sheep stray they stray in bunches. If a marker wanders off you can safely figure that a lot of those around him have gone too. Roughly speaking we call it a hundred."

"But when you have such big bands of sheep and they are moving about I should not think the markers would be in the same place twice,"

persisted Donald, determined to fathom this puzzling problem.

"You dinna ken sheep, laddie! They are as jealous to keep their rightful place in the flock as school children are to get the first place in the line. They will fight and fight if another takes the position that belongs to them. It is a silly idea, but an aid to the herders."

"And so the leaders and these markers really help the shepherds to manage the flock?"

"Aye. But you're leaving out the shepherd's best helper."

Sandy's face suddenly softened into tenderness.

"His best helper?" repeated Donald.

"Aye, laddie! His dogs!"

Bending down the Scotchman thrust his hand into the ruff of s.h.a.ggy hair about the neck of one of the collies beside him. There was a low growl from the other dog, who rose and rested his pointed nose on Sandy's knee.

The man laughed.

"Robin," he said, addressing the collie before him, "must you always take it amiss if I have a word for Prince Charlie? You're no gentleman!