Identifier: youngnimrodsinno00knox (find matches)
Title: The young Nimrods in North America : a book for boys
Year: 1881 (1880s)
Authors: Knox, Thomas Wallace, 1835-1896
Subjects:
Publisher: New York : Harper & Brothers

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d to be sworn at, and itis the belief of many a plainsman that a team cannot be made to pull apound in a difficult place unless encouraged by the peculiar vocabularyof the driver. If you want to make a picture of the bullwhacker, you must draw arough but well-formed man, with a face as brown as an overdone loaf, bv o f v reason of its exposure to the weather, and with hair and beard rarely vis-ited by a comb; a slouch hat covers his head, and a long knife hangs at A PLAINSMAN AT HOME. 237 his waist, ready for use on an Indian during a fight, or for the more pro-saic occupation of cutting up meat for breakfast and dinner; his feet areincased in tall boots that half conceal his trousers, and these indispensa-ble garments are often half-soled in the rear with broad patches ofbuckskin, to give additional strength to new cloth, or cover serious rentsin old ; a red or blue shirt covers the upper half of his body; and as thisgarment is rarely washed, its appearance is by no means attractive.
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IKAIKIK-SCHOONER AND BULLWHACKKK. The whip of the bullwhacker is a remarkable contrivance, and whenhe uses it the effect is something fearful. The handle is not more than o a yard in length, but the lash often measures eighteen or twenty feet.It is made of rawhide, cut in strips and braided, and there are various 238 THE YOUNG NIMRODS. fancies concerning the proper shape to be given to it. The most ap-proved form is one that swells as it leaves the handle, and continues todo so for five or six feet; then it decreases gradually to the end, whereit is like a thong of iron wire. It is popularly known as the blacksnake,and when it is flung at an ox and takes him fairly on the side, it dou-bles him up as though he had been struck with a hammer. The oldteamsters are wonderfully skilful in throwing the lash, which is no morethan we should expect when we remember that they have a life-longpractice with it. Sometimes a bullwhacker will hold a coin in his fin-gers for another to knock it out wi

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