He found us cutting some long yearlings for twos, and said, "Dick, a Texan is going to receive those cattle, and he knows ones from twos." Anyway, we cut and got our supply, then pulled out over to the North Platte up to Sidney Bridge, then followed the Deadwood road. When near the Red Cloud Agency I saw my first Indian buried on a scaffold. I was ahead of the herd at the time, and saw something I took for a well and, being pretty dry, I decided to go to it and get a drink. But instead of being a well it was a dead Indian on a scaffold. It was the custom of the Indians to bury in that fashion, and everything the dead Indian had owned in life was left there. After that we saw a great many Indian graves like that.

Reaching the ranch where we were to deliver these cattle I found the Texan that Mr. Ellison said knew oneyear-old steers from twos, and we went to work classing the cattle. We never disagreed on a single steer, and when we were through I found that out of 1,000 yearlings and 700 twos, I had delivered 800 ones and 900 twos. When we got back to Ogallala I gave Mr. Ellison the receipt, and after looking at it he said, "Dick, bring all the boys to the hotel for dinner," and he paid my fare home.

Early in January, 1881, I commenced buying cattle for Mr. Ellison. That year, when starting up the trail, I went through the mountains by way of Llano and Brady City. I had bought 500 head on the Colorado near Buffalo Gap and had to take that route to receive them. They had been gathered when I reached there, so I roadbranded them and pulled out for Fort Griffin, Doan's Store on Red River, Dodge City, and Ogallala. When we reached Ogallala Mr. Ellison told me he had 6,500 cattle he wanted me to take to Belle Fourche, Wyoming, deliver them and bring the horses back to Ogallala, sell them, pay the men off, and return home. So I got my supplies, pointed the herd over to the North Platte, followed that

stream up to Sidney Bridge, where we took the Deadwood road to Running Water, then turned west to Crazy Woman, thence to the Cheyenne, up that river to Lodge Pole, leaving the Black Hills and Devil's Tower to our right. Then there was nothing there but a ranch, but now there is a railroad and the town of North Craft.

I am living at Boyes, Montana, now about one hundred miles from where I delivered those cattle on the Belle Fourche River below the old ranch. I went from Lodge Pole down the canyon to the Belle Fourche River, and within a week had the cattle branded and delivered. That was in September, and as some of the boys wanted to wash up before starting back to Ogallala, several of our outfit went buffalo hunting and we killed all the buffalo we wanted. Those were the last buffalo I have seen.

In 1882 Mr. Ellison sent me to East Texas and Louisiana to buy cattle, as they were getting scarce in our country. I bought two trainloads and shipped them from Longview, Texas, to Kyle. In March we began rounding up for the spring drive. Mr. Ellison said he wanted me to drive a herd of beef cattle, and told me to pick out my remuda. Out of five hundred horses I selected ninety head of the best that ever wore the Y brand. I started on this trip with 3,520 fours and over, and delivered 3,505. Mr. Ellison asked me just before we started when I would get to Dodge City. I figured a while, and then told him June 10th. He said he didn't think I could make it by that date, "But," he added, "if you do, you can make it to Deadwood, South Dakota." He informed me that it was an Indian contract and had to be made on time. "You make it on time and I will pay your way home and give you a good suit of clothes," said Mr. Ellison. I got my clothes and my fare paid back home.

That was the most enjoyable trip I ever made. I could drive as far in a day as I wanted to. Those steers walked like horses, and we made good time all the way. Mr. Ellison went broke that year.

CORNBREAD AND CLABBER MADE A GOOD MEAL

By Joseph Cotulla of Cotulla, Texas

I was born in Grosslelitch, Germany, then Poland, March 19, 1844, and came to America with my mother and grandmother in 1856. We landed at Galveston in December of that year, from whence we journeyed to Indianola and then to San

Antonio in an ox wagon, arriving in San Antonio in 1857. From San Antonio we went to Gallinas, Atascosa County, where my aunt and sisters lived. They came to America only the year before we came. I secured work with a Frenchman at four dollars per month, remaining with him a year and a half, saved my wages and bought a horse for forty dollars. I rode that horse just half a day and he died. Thus I gained my first real experience. I was next employed by Joe Walker, the first county clerk of Atascosa County, for six dollars per month. I remained with him until 1862, when I went to work for Ben Slaughter, who lived at La Parita, and he paid me seven dollars per month Confederate money. Later Ben and John Slaughter, Lee Harris, the two Forrest boys and an Englishman named Moody, and myself, started to Mexico, and while on the way we stopped one day and took dinner with John Burleson. The dinner was fine, the menu consisting of cornbread and clabber, and we enjoyed it immensely, for we were all very hungry and could have eaten the skillet the bread was cooked in.

JOSEPH COTULLA

After bidding John good-bye we resumed our journey down the river, crossing the Presidio to our destination. After a short stay in Matamoras, John and Ben Slaughter returned to Texas, Moody went to England, and I went to New Orleans, where I enlisted in the Federal Army in 1863, remaining with the troops nearly two years. After receiving my discharge in San Antonio I went back to Gallinas and began to work for myself, branding mavericks. In March, 1868, I went to Nueces and drove a herd from the Altito to Abilene, Kansas, for L. B. Harris. We crossed these cattle below San Juan Mission, going by way of Austin, Waco and Dallas, crossing the Red River about eight miles above Fort Arkansas, passing through the Indian Territory and crossing Little Arkansas River, then on to Abilene. When we reached Abilene we found only a log cabin and three houses on Smoky River. We remained there until fall, then returned with our horses and wagon.

In November, 1868, Dick Hildebrandt, Ed Lyons, Gilbert Turner, L. P. Williams and myself came out to Nueces and located. We gathered fed beeves that year and sold them to Fred Malone, Joe Collins, Thomas and Shanghai Pierce (the man who introduced the walking stick in Kansas). In the spring of 1869 I went back to Atascosa County, where I remained until fall, then came back and we started a ranch, all working together until 1873, when we started up the trail with two herds of cattle. I drove the first herd to my place in Atascosa County, from where I put them on the trail, going by way of San Juan Mission and Austin. We never saw a house until we crossed the trail where the town of Sherman is now located. On this trip we saw a number of Indians, but they did not molest us. When we reached Wichita, Kansas, I sold my cattle to a man named Polk, who beat me out of five thousand dollars. I lost seven thousand dollars on that trip. When I came back in the fall I bought Dick Hildebrandt's interest in cattle and in

1874 drove a herd by myself, which I sold for enough to make up the money I had lost, and I never went up the trail any more.

Now, at the age of seventy-six, I am still in the cattle business and living in the same place I located in 1868.

ONE OF THE BEST KNOWN TRAIL DRIVERS

Sketch of John R. Blocker of Big Wells, Texas

The history of the old-time trail drivers would not be complete without a sketch of the above named gentleman, who is too modest to write of his experiences on the trail, and it therefore falls to the lot of the editor to perform this task.

John R. Blocker was born in South Carolina, in the Edgefield district of the Palmetto State, about sixtyseven years ago, and came to Texas with his parents in 1852, locating at Austin when that city was just a "wide place in the road." He grew to manhood there, being educated in the schools of that place, and in 1871 he engaged in the cattle business in Blanco County with his brother, W. R. Blocker. At that early date Blanco County was but sparsely settled, the ranches being many miles apart, for it was truly on the frontier and a wild, uncivilized country.

When trail driving started with the opening of the Northern markets after the Civil War, the Blocker brothers were among those to realize the opportunity afforded the cattlemen, and, starting with 500 head of stock, they soon became extensively engaged in the cattle industry. John R. Blocker, being a hardy, self-reliant young man, and a good horseman, was especially fitted for trail life. He was a good judge of live-stock and realized the possibilities that awaited the man who started out with a determination to succeed in the stock business. His first drive up the trail was to Ellsworth,