trouble, we did not fire at them, but doubled our guards to protect against an attack from the rear.

Our next camp was at Paint Cave. One night we sent our mules and horses out to grass with two guards in charge. Indians crept up and tried to scare the animals. One of the guards, finding that something was not right, gave the alarm, and the fireworks started. We fired some thirty or forty shots, and one of the guards claimed he got an Indian. This Painted Cave is worth a trip to see. It is a big opening under a protruding boulder, large

enough for ten men to ride into on horseback at one time. Its inner walls are decorated with Indian paintings of wild animals, lions, tigers, buffaloes, etc., and all the sign language on the walls-some of which we would not understand if they were played on a phonograph. Besides this it contains the autographs of some of the pioneers carved in the rock, whose carvers have long since started on the "long trail." I was told by a friend of mine the "I other day, who had been there lately, that he ran across my name, carved there at that time-forty years ago.

I was born December 5, 1858, in the old Ripps home

stead in the western part of San Antonio on the property where Geo. W. Saunders fed cattle for many years.

The only thing that is left to remind us of the olden days is the barbecue. In preparing barbecued meats I gained some proficiency, and have been, and am, called on a number of times a year to superintend these honestto-goodness barbecues. What is there nicer than a nice slice of barbecue and a (if Volstead wasn't so bad

in figuring percentage) little of 2.75 plus- .१

If a bunch of stockmen get together, you can rest assured there is going to be a barbecue somewhere. A number of times at their different conventions and gatherings I have had from 1,500 to 2,000 pounds of meat roasting over the hot coals and, I believe, to their satisfaction.

SKETCH OF COL. J. F. ELLISON

By His Son, J. F. Ellison, Jr., Fort Cobb, Okla.

My father, Col. J. F. Ellison, was born in Winston County, Mississippi, November 6, 1828, and moved to Caldwell County, Texas, in 1850, settling on the San Marcos River a few miles west of Prairie Lea, where he lived until the Civil War came on, and at the beginning of the war, in 1861, he answered his country's call, leaving behind him an humble, noble Christian woman with five little children, the writer being one of them. For four long years he was engaged in the great struggle, returning home in 1865, like most of the other true Confederate soldiers, a bankrupt, with nothing left but the faithful wife and five children. With turning plow, an old-fashioned sweep and a yoke of oxen, he went to work to try and make a living for himself and those dependent upon him.

I think the first cattle that were driven from Texas

to Northern markets was in 1867. In 1869 father bought and gathered about 750 head of mixed cattle, all kinds, from calves to grown cows,

and started them up the trail. He bought these cattle on credit, to be paid for on his return. I accompanied him on this trip and we went to Abilene, Kansas, crossing the Colorado at Webberville and going by way of Fort Worth. We followed the old Fort Arbuckle trail through the eastern part of Indian Territory, now the splendid state of Oklahoma, and of which I am today a citizen. All the trouble we had with the Indians was their begging for something to eat. We found that if you fed them at meal time you could count on them being right there the next time your chuck was set out. After disposing of our cattle and outfit we came back through Mississippi, where father was raised, and from there to Galveston by boat from New Orleans. This was my first experience on a boat and it made an impression on me that I will never forget. I didn't want any breakfast next morning.

This trip proved to be a profitable one. After paying for the cattle as soon as he returned home, father had $9,000 cash, which was a lot of money in those days. He drove again in 1870, and after returning home that year Colonel John O. Dewees, then of Atascosa County, who was an old soldier comrade with father, wrote him that he would sell him all the cattle on time he wanted, so the next year he bought about 2,000 grown beef steers from Colonel Dewees and drove them in two herds. He contracted these steers, or a part of them, to a man named

Powers to be delivered at his ranch on Smoky River, between Ellsworth and Abilene, Kansas, at two and a half cents per pound. They weighed about a thousand pounds each. This was a hard year, and but for this deal he would have lost money. Soon after this father and Colonel Dewees became partners in driving cattle over the trail, which partnership continued until 1877, and was quite satisfactory all around.

Father followed trail driving for thirteen years, the last cattle he drove being in 1882.

In 1867 Ellison & Dewees and Millett and Maberry drove together, and they drove from South and Southwest Texas fully 100,000 cattle to the Northern markets, delivering some of them as far north as the Black Hills in North Dakota.

Father died November 13, 1904, at his home in San Marcos. He followed the cattle business until 1880 with great success, but in that year he met with reverses which he never fully overcame. He was known to all of the old trail men and the hands of that time, and was held in highest esteem by all with whom he came in contact.

SIXTY-EIGHT YEARS IN TEXAS

By Pleasant Burnell Butler, Kenedy, Texas

I was born in Scott County, Mississippi, in 1848, being the eleventh child of Burnell Butler, who was born in Kentucky in 1805, and Sarah Ann Ricks, born in North Carolina in 1811.

In 1849 my oldest brother, Woodward, then a youth of twenty years, left the home in Mississippi to seek out a new location for the family. He crossed the Mississippi River into Louisiana, where he remained long enough to make a crop and, selling out, journeyed on until he reached Karnes County, then a part of Goliad County, in 1850, where he stayed on a tract of land that is now the Pleasant Butler homestead, near the San Antonio River.

In September, 1852, father sold out in Scott

P. B. BUTLER

County, Mississippi and started to join my brother in Texas. I was at that time four years old, but remember distinctly the start for Texas, father and mother, twelve children, and seven negro slaves, traveling in covered wagons, each drawn by two yoke of oxen, mother driving a hack with a team of big horses and father riding a fine saddle horse. I recall clearly a stop made near Jackson, Miss., to bid good-bye to my aunt, Mrs. Porter, and how my aunt drove down the road with us in a great carriage with a negro driver on a high seat in front-a barouche of the real old South.