Contents ▼▲
Front Matter Dreams of a Sheep Ranch Sheep Raising Herding Sheep Something About Texas Land Grants The "Texas Fever" Why I wanted to Go Hunting in Texas Father Spys the Land Our Plantation Father Comes Home The Bigness of Texas Where We were Going What I Hoped to Do Cattle Driving How We Set Out A Laborious Journey Comanche Indians Father to the Rescue Arrival at Fort Towson Preparing for a Storm A Dry "Norther" Two Kinds of Northers How Turkeys Kill Snakes Deer and Rattlesnakes A Corral of Wagons On the Trail Again Mesquite A Texas Sheep Ranch Profits from Sheep Father's Land Claim Spanish Measurements The Chaparral Cock Night on the Trinity Standing Guard A Turkey Buzzard Plans for Building a House The Cook Shanty A Storm of Rain A Day of Discomfort Thinking of the Old Home Waiting for the Sun Too Much Water The Stream Rising Trying to Save the Stock The Animals Stampeded Saving Our Own Lives A Raging Torrent A Time of Disaster The Flood Subsiding A Jack Rabbit Reparing Damages Rounding up the Stock FAfter the Flood Waiting for Father Recovering Our Goods Setting to Work Sawing Out Lumber In the Saw Pit Wild Cattle A Disagreeable Intruder Odd Hunting A Supply of Fresh Meat "Jerking" Beef Searching for the Cattle Our New Home Planting and Building Bar-O Ranch An Odd Cart The Visitors Zeba's Curiosity Possible Treachery Suspicious Behavior Gyp's Fight With a Cougar In a Dangerous Position Hunting Wild Hogs Treed by Peccaries Gyp's Obedience My Carelessness Vicious Little Animals Father Comes to the Rescue Increase in my Flock Unrest of the Indians Texas Joins the Union War with Mexico Selling Wool Peace on the Trinity My Dream Fulfilled

Philip of Texas - James Otis




A Supply of Fresh Meat

We covered the carcass with the branches of the pecan trees as well as possible, in order to keep the wolves and the turkey buzzards away, for even though we had been here but a short time, I had learned that anything eatable left exposed on the prairie, particularly fresh meat, would soon be devoured by the noisy coyotes or those unwholesome-looking birds. Then we set out on our return to the home camp, leaving the cattle to recover from the fright caused by the report of our rifles as best they might.

[Illustration] from Philip of Texas by James Otis

When we arrived, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, father set one of the negroes to harnessing two mules to the small wagon, and announced that I was to go back with a couple of the men to bring in our game, for we could not well afford to lose so much fresh meat.

The day had been a long one before I found opportunity to crawl into my bed, for it was near midnight when we got back with the carcass of the bull.

When I opened my eyes next morning, I remembered the saw pit, believing I must spend another day at the slow task of making boards and joists from green wood, but father was at work cutting the carcass of the bull into thin strips, while John and Zeba were building a little scaffold on the prairie a short distance from mother's shelter.