Where the wagon led

the long version

Details the life of the cowboy: what a cowboy ate on roundup, what he had in his bedroll, why he sang while riding night herd, how he broke a horse, what a "heeler" did at branding time, how rustlers could operate undetected, and what happened when a cattle drive reached the railhead. All this is woven into a personal story that ranges from its setting in Saskatchewan and Alberta, south through the great cattle states east of the Rockies, on into Mexico. It is a story rich in incident and character. Battling on horseback through freezing blizzards, fording dangerously flooded rivers in spring--these tasks bred tough, independent men. Symons tells us about many of them and about there women; the hardworking frontier wives, the ranchers' daughters, and the other women "behind the lace curtains."