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Chapter 50
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Lonesome Dove, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
American Mythology
Family
Luck, Fate, and Chance
The Good Life
The Meaning of Masculinity
Feminine Strength
Summary
Analysis
The next morning, as July and Joe eat their breakfast, they hear cattle on the move. They mount their horses and discover a cattle company nearby. The animals are in motion, but the men are still breaking up camp, so July rides up and introduces himself to the leader, who sits by the campfire reading a book. It’s Wilbarger. Noticing that July is a lawman, he begins to complain about Texas horse thieves. He opines that Roscoe—whom he hasn’t seen—has a name that better suits a clerk than a lawman. He tells July that Jake Spoon will probably pass by there soon on his own cattle drive. He offers Joe a job—July almost takes him up on that, if only to get time for his own thoughts—and warns them that the northern territories (exactly where Ellie is headed) are full of bandits and angry Indigenous warriors.
In many ways, Wilbarger and Gus are kindred spirits. They’re both opinionated and enjoy a debate—if not an argument. Wilbarger’s activity—reading—suggests that, like Augustus, he was once the beneficiary of the kind of education most cowboys didn’t have. But, also like Gus, he seems to have become infatuated with the frontier’s freedom, beauty, and challenges. It’s a stroke of good luck—notably following a run of bad news—that July finds him, because he has the information about Jake’s whereabouts that July needs. But Wilbarger’s assessment of the north offers a harsh reminder of how dangerous life is in the borderlands at this time.
Themes
At first, July thinks about following along north with Wilbarger, hoping to run into Ellie. But then he returns to his earlier plan: finding Roscoe. Thanking Wilbarger for his help, he turns his horse east. His actions make no sense to Joe, who wishes he’d taken Wilbarger up on his offer.
Even though he’s just a boy, Joe can clearly see how aimless July is, and it irritates him. He wants July to make actual choices, even if they’re wrong—something Joe’s mother can do better than her husband.
Themes
