Helena Weekly Herald

DIMOND-DICK'S LARIAT.
BY EILLY Y. BUTTES, THE COLORADO COWBOY.
Any more stories of Di'mond Dick.
Why, bless your gizzard, they crowd so thick
Besides that yarn of the wolves at bay?
That I might rattle them off all day.
What was the mooniest thing he done?
Well, Richard wasn't a moony man;
Kept his wits handy, every one,
Struck pay-dirt without wasting a pan.
They called him rash, but he wasn't that—
Cool he was as a gob of lead.
And under that flopping yaller hat
He carried a wonderful level head.
You've been down there on the Rio Grand'
Where they've built the Espanola bridge.
That skutes across the alkali sand
And over the water to the ridge?
Well, five years since the bridge wasn't there,
The Denver and Rio didn't run,
There was only sand and river and air,
And a dobe pueblo flat in the sun.
Dick and I were herding it then
For Sancho—Jimmy-rot his hide!
Three hundred steers, and only two men,
On a ranch six miles and a quarter wide.
The gramma skirted the edge of the dunes,
And the river ran six miles away;
I tell you, boys, we had lively tunes
Driving to water twice a day.
Those wide-horned brutes were an ugly lot;
Couldn't head them, we let them run
And the way they swooped when the day was hot.
Down to the river, was lots of fun.
They were sloshing along one scorchy day,
Like wild bull buffaloes, over the sand
When we saw a baby right in their way,
Fast asleep on the edge of the Grand.
I knew it meant death. my heart flipflopped.
I spurred to turn them, but, true as I'm born.
Those Mexican steers would never have stopped
If I'd been Gabriel tooting his horn.
What did Dick do? His spurs dug deep.
His broncho flew. and I saw him whee!.
With his lariat whirling the daisiest sweep,
His teeth set tight, and his eyes like steel
The loop swung out thirty feet away.
Hovered. and settled down on the sand
Making a noise where the baby lay.
And then Dick reeled in. hand over hand.
And yanked up the child and rode like steam,
As the cattle rushed on, hot and thick:
And the baby woke with a healthy scream,
Safe in the arms of Di'mond Dick
Well. it was only a Pueblo brat.
A pi'son Mexican-Indian snake
But Di'mond Dick didn't think of that-
He'd saved a life. with his own at stake.
And I somehow thought, with a choky wheeze,
Of Christ's own promise by Galilee-
"As you have done to the least of these.
To a little child, you have done to me."