The Author was a cowboy, during the period of which he writes, and is thoroughly conversant with every phase of cowboy life. After the lapse of many years, some of the most pleasant recollections engraved on the tablets of his memory are of the open plains, the wild cattle, and the irresistible cowboy.
To travel over the ground where these cattle once grazed in countless numbers and see the domestic kind now driven to the pastures by little children; to see the broad prairies, where formerly a ride of a thousand miles would not reveal a furrow or fence, now checkered over with posts and wires and plowed fields, and the landscape dotted here and there with stacks of wheat, ricks of hay, and farm-houses, makes the old cowboy long to again see the prairies covered with longhorned cattle, picturesque wild horses, and herds of innumerable buffaloes; to once more ride the bucking broncho in pursuit of the wild steer and the fighting maverick; to hear the coyote's howl and the stampede's roar; to inhale the aroma of wild flowers whilst breathing the life-giving air that blows across the free and untrammeled plains, where the sun rises and sets in a halo of glory, where you have that thrilling of the heart, that buoyancy of spirit, that drives away every care and makes you laugh at danger. To portray this wild, active and strenuous life, and to give an accurate pen-picture of this past and forgotten industry, is the mission of Circle-dot.
