“There was a time when the name of ’cowboy’ was one with which to frighten children, and it carried with it it everything of absolute disregard for law and order,” Emerson Hough wrote in The Story of the Cowboy, published in 1897 with illustrations by Russell. “In the early days of the drive, it was a regular and comparatively innocent pastime to ’shoot up the town.’ To shoot out the lights of a saloon was a simple occupation, and to compel a tenderfoot to dance to the tune of a revolver was looked upon as a legitimate and pleasing diversion such as any gentleman of the range might enjoy to his full satisfaction.” Although Hough went on to lament such activity as part of a period long since over, the popular image of a cowboy as a ribald, lawless character was firmly established. During the time Russell was working on the roundups, newspapers commonly carried accounts of drunken cowboys’ wild sprees. Russell was fond of relating stories about his range companions’ errant behavior, and he may well have participated in a few escapades himself before the West became constrained by civilization. Russell modeled this subject of a carousing cowboy during his first visit to New York City in January 1904, in a studio belonging to a friend the artist John Marchand. It is tempting to relate this subject to the drunken cowboys in Frederic Remington’s bronze Coming Through the Rye, which Russell surely knew. This was the first of the artist’s bronzes to be cast and the only instance where the casting rights were subsequently sold to an outside party. This bronze is one of approximately five examples that were produced in 1904 and 1905, with the Russells’ peripheral involvement. It is somewhat unique in that it is marked with a number 4—the only instance so far known where a group of Russell bronzes were given cast numbers. The example shown here originally belonged to Nancy Russell and was the only cast of the subject listed in the estate inventory conducted after her death. After the casting rights were sold by Mrs. Russell, a great many inferior posthumous casts of this work were created, much to her lasting regret.