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Show 318 TEAVELS AND ADVENTUEES IN THE FAE WEST. not be justifiable in His eyes, and in the eyes of prudent, thinking men, under ordinary circumstances. If prudence and economy are necessary at one time more than another, it is when a family or a nation are thrown upon its own resourses, as we are. But you may trace the whole lives of some men, and it will be impossible for you to point out a single portion of time, when they knew how to appreciate and how to use even the common comforts of life, when they had them, to say nothing of an abundance of wealth. Again, there have been more contention and trouble between neighbors, in these valleys, with regard to surplus property, which was not needed by this people, than any other thing. For instance, a widow womln comes in here from the United States, and turns out on the range beyond Jordan, three yoke of oxen and a few cows, for she considers she is too poor to have them herded. Again, a man comes in with ten yoke of oxen; he also turns them out to wander where they please. If he is asked why he does not put them in a herd, he will tell you, " I do not want to pay the herding fee." Another comes on with three or four span of horses, and twenty or thirty yoke of cattle. Has he any for sale ? No, but he turns them all out upon the range and they are gone. By and by he sends a boy on horseback to hunt them, who is unsuccessful in finding them after a week's toil. The owner turns out himself, and all hands, to hunt up his stock, but they also fail in finding them, they are all lost except a very few. He was not able to have them herded, he thought, though he possessed so much property, and knew nothing more than to turn them out to run at large. Thus he consumes his time, running after his lost property. He frets his feel- |
