Vices they had, all too apparent and
deadly, but they were due rather to the circumstances of their lives
than to the native tendencies of their hearts. Throughout that summer
and the winter following I lived among them, camping on the range with
them and sleeping in their shacks, bunching cattle in summer and hunting
wolves in winter, nor did I, for I was no wiser than they, refuse my
part on "Permit" nights; but through all not a man of them ever failed
to be true to his standard of honor in the duties of comradeship and
brotherhood.
CHAPTER III
THE COMING OF THE PILOT
He was the first missionary ever seen in the country, and it was the Old
Timer who named him. The Old Timer's advent to the Foothill country
was prehistoric, and his influence was, in consequence, immense. No one
ventured to disagree with him, for to disagree with the Old Timer was to
write yourself down a tenderfoot, which no one, of course, cared to do.
It was a misfortune which only time could repair to be a new-comer, and
it was every new-comer's aim to assume with all possible speed the style
and customs of the aristocratic Old Timers, and to forget as soon as
possible the date of his own arrival. So it was as "The Sky Pilot,"
familiarly "The Pilot," that the missionary went for many a day in the
Swan Creek country.
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