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




Wild Cattle

Before we had worked out by this slow process all the lumber that would be necessary for making our home, we were surprised to find that our herd of cattle had been increased by three handsome beasts, two cows, and a bull, black as coals, with glistening, long, white horns.

They suddenly appeared among our herd, causing me, who first discovered them, the greatest possible surprise. It seemed almost like some work of magic that we should have gained these fellows without raising a hand. Thinking that they might be branded, as is the custom in Texas, I tried to come near enough to find out, but I soon understood that I might as well have tried to make close acquaintance with the shiest antelope that ever crossed the prairie.

[Illustration] from Philip of Texas by James Otis

These cattle were so wild that at the first sight of a man they would toss up their horns, bellow, and set off across the country with their tails raised high as a signal of danger, putting the very spirit of mischief into our cattle.

After making two or three vain attempts to come up with them, I realized that unless I would take the chances of stampeding our whole herd, I must leave them alone.

When I told father of the wonderful discovery that we had grown the richer by three cattle, he treated the matter very calmly and explained the seeming mystery by saying that we were not the only persons who had found additions to their live stock, for during his first visit to Texas he had heard much concerning such cattle.

During the years from 1834 to 1836, when the Mexican army was retreating, the Indians ravaged the country between the Nueces and the Rio Grande to such extent that the Mexicans, owners and herdsmen, abandoned their stock ranches, leaving behind them large herds of cattle which could not be carried away save at great risk, and these beasts had since then multiplied rapidly.