The American cowboy has long been a popular figure in fiction, motion pictures, and studies of the West, but over the years inaccuracies have distorted the image of the "real" cowboy. Philip Ashton Rollins sets out to provide a complete, accurate handbook on the everyday life of the cowboy - trailing, herding, branding, round-up and horsebreaking. He also discusses tools of the trade, including types of saddles, bits, riatas, boots and spurs. Most vivid is his presentation of the cowboy's personality, code, mores and amusements. The new paperback edition is a reprint of the 1936 edition. In a new foreword, Richard W. Slatta discusses Rollins's life and compares modern histories of the cowboy with Rollins's classic volume.