``Russell writes easily, and in the vernacular. He tells of Indians and Indian fighters, buffalo hunts, bad men, wolves, wild horses, tough hotels, drinking customs, and hard-riding cowboys. . . .He] lived long enough in the West to acquire a vast amount of information and lore, and he has left enough from his brush to prove his place as a sound interpreter of a stirring period and a fascinating country.``-New York Times Brian W. Dippie is a professor of history at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, and the author of Catlin and His Contemporaries: The Politics of Patronage (Nebraska 1990).