Excerpt from Hope Hathaway: A Story of Western Ranch Life Jim Hathaway was an old-time cattleman. He still continued each summer to turn out upon the range great droves of Texas steers driven north by his cowboys, though at this time it was more profitable to ship in Western grown stock. He must have known that this was so, for every year his profits became less, yet it was the nature of the man to keep in the old ruts, to cling to old habits. The old-time cowboy was fast disappearing, customs of the once wild West were giving way before an advancing civilization. He had seen its slow, steady approach year after year, dreading - abhorring it. Civilization was com ing surely. What though his lands extended beyond his good eyesight, were not these inter Iopers squatting on every mile of creek in the surrounding country? The open range would some time be a thing of the past. That green ridge of mountains to the west - his moun tains, his and the Indians, where he had en joyed unmolested r