There was a Texas cowboy who could steal an entire herd of wild mustangs without a rope, without a gunshot, and without another soul to help him. He did it by becoming a horse. Bob Lemmons would ride out alone into the brush country and simply disappear into a herd of wild mustangs for days on end.
Born into slavery in 1847 and freed as a teenager, Lemmons came to know the mustangs better than any man alive. He would shadow a wild herd until they stopped fearing him, eating when they ate, moving when they moved, sleeping when they slept, until the horses accepted him and his mount as part of the family. I acted like I was a mustang, he said. Made them think I was one of them.
Then, once the herd trusted him completely, he would slowly, patiently take over as their leader, and one day just walk the whole wild herd straight home to the corral, calm as a Sunday morning. Other men chased mustangs across the brush and lost half of them to broken legs and broken necks. Bob Lemmons never had ...