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lifted her head about two feet in the air; then I took my pocketknife and punched a hole in the fine cartilage between the two nostrils and about as far up as I could reach in her nose with my hand, sort of like you would put a ring in a bull’s nose. I took the smooth end of the maguey rope and ran it into the cow’s nostril and through the hole in the middle cartilage and then back down through the other nostril. I worked the rope back against her neck and towards hershoulder and out of the stanchion and hollered at Mr. Dairyman to open the door at the back and bring me my mare. He came in with his mouth open and his eyes about the size of goose eggs and handed me the reins from as far as he could stand.
    These maguey ropes were about from forty-five to as much as sixty feet long and, to say the least, this was one of the longer ones. I got on my horse, took my rope, and dallied it around the saddle horn and ole Beauty snorted and looked at that concrete floor when I dallied it, which was as much as to tell me that she wouldn’t have a chance to keep from slipping on that concrete. I told Mr. Dairyman to ease up behind the stanchion where I had been and when that old cow would stand still to trip the little block at the end of the stanchion, and I would be on my way out with her. His nerve failed him some and he picked up a stick about three feet long and used it to trip the little block and free the swinging side of the stanchion. That wild, mean, mad cow caught on fast. She thought she was loose and when she backed out of the stanchion Beauty and I dived through the back door of the barn and turned against the barn; as this cow ran out, she headed for the milk cows that had been turned out during the commotion. When I jerked the end of the rope and that little hard rope burned that hole in the inside of her nostril, she suddenly had a rude awakening—she was still caught—and while she was still giving to the pain to the rope in that hole in her nose, ole Beauty lunged back and turned her a flip. She got up off the ground facing us and made a wild lunge towards my horse. I had lots of slack in my rope. I flipped the slack over her neck asBeauty dodged and jumped out of her way, and we busted her again. This time she got up and stood there quiverin’ and shakin’ and bawlin’, and slobber and a little blood was running out of her nose and mouth. I was between her and the corral gate, so somebody opened the gate and she began to lead as I started outside with her. She made a wild run as we went through the gate, not at me and Beauty, but just to get away into the open. This time I didn’t have to turn her, I just jiggled slack in that rope tied to her horns and through that hole in her nose and she began to take a little friendlier outlook on me and my horse’s acquaintance.
    I started down the road with her and when she would want to trot Beauty would move up enough to keep the slack out of the rope, and when she decided to slow down we would slow down with her, but I did keep my hold on the rope and jiggled it a little to keep her on notice that as far as she was concerned she was still caught by the end of her nose. I had by this time taken a double half hitch on my saddle horn with the rope so that I didn’t have to hold it so tight. This gave me a loose hand to play with the slack in case she got smart.
    I had gotten to the railroad tracks at the foot of the hill and was about to start up the hill to town when I wondered what I should do with this cow. I knew there was no use in trying to take her to the railroad stock pens because they would be locked. I thought Silas Kemp wouldn’t care for me bringing a fightin’ cow to the wagonyard, and I knew I would have her at a place where I could get a lot of help to do whatever Fred Smith decided he wanted to do with her later. Just as I got to the cornerof the wholesale-grocery warehouse where I would turn to go to the wagonyard, I had another bright,