As soon as we reached Holland Creek my cowboys all wanted to go to Abilene. I divided them into squads and picked up two straws, one long and one short, and informed them that the ones that got the long straw would be allowed twenty-four hours in Abilene, when they would return and let the others go. The young man, Wash Wolf, who furnished me the sash that saved my herd, was in the first squad and never returned. He immediately got on a spree on arriving in Abilene and was killed in a dance hall there and I saw him no more. The herd was delivered and I received instructions from my brother to return to the Young county ranch with the outfit.

My fourth drive was in 1871. I had charge of the herd as in the previous year. I went from Young county where Graham is now situated, through Lost Valley, known as the old J. C. Loving ranch, on due north by Buffalo Springs, out by Victoria Peak, where Stephens & Worshan had a cattle ranch, about 20 miles north to the upper sand timbers. It commenced raining, about the time to bed the herd. We noticed northeast of us in another grove of timber a fire which later proved to be a band of Indians. Our herd stampeded that night. Next morning we counted the herd and found we were short 200 cattle. We soon found the trail which went southwest about two miles and split into two parts, part of them going south and part going west. Myself and another man followed the trail south about ten miles and found part of the cattle and brought them back to the main herd. We waited on the other two men to return until the next morning and as they did not return we went to where the cattle had separated and took the trail of the two horses, following the ones that went west about eight miles and found the two men had been murdered by the Indians, scalped and their bodies badly mutilated. We buried them there and returned to our herd and moved rapidly until we reached Red River Station, getting on the old Chisholm Trail.

In 1872 I went the same route but stopped the herd twenty-five miles south of Wichita and held them there until they were sold, which was in August. I had instructions to return to the Jack county ranch, on what is now known as Dillingham Prairies, and receive a herd of cattle from J. C. Loving and Charlie Rivers, a brother-in-law, Charles Rivers, a son-in-law of Oliver C. Loving, learned the business under his father-in-law, who had made two or three trips with Loving by the way of Ft. Sumner in New Mexico. The day I commenced receiving the cattle from Loving and Rivers on Dillingham Prairie we tallied out part of the herd and Mr. Loving waited for the arrival of Mr. Rivers for enough cattle to fill this contract. Mr. Rivers was on his way from Lost Valley to Dillingham Prairie. He arrived that evening and the cattle were penned and he made his camp nearby and guarded his horses. The Indians made a raid on the horses and in trying to protect them Charlie Rivers was shot, from which wound he later died at Weatherford, Texas.

In 1873 I drove a herd for my father to the head of Fall River. That spring in February I stopped at Ft. Worth several days and made a trade with E. M. (Bud) Dagget and Jake Farmer for a herd of young steers on my own account, as I had saved considerable money and my father endorsed for me at the First National Bank at Emporia, Kansas, for an additional amount to pay for the herd. As soon as the herd I went up with in the spring was turned over I immediately returned to Fort Worth and received this herd from Dagget and Farmer and drove them on the same route as I went before until I reached Chiloche Creek, south of the Arkansas River, and went due east to the mouth of Grouse Creek on the Arkansas River and wintered this herd there. Next spring they were carried to Verdigris River, Greenwood county, where Mr. Martindale had a large ranch. I sold this herd to him and returned to Texas.

In 1874 I drove a herd from Elm Creek, Young county to Dodge City, Kansas, and sold them to a Mr. Rob who represented one of the packing houses at Kansas City. I returned to Texas in 1875, bought a herd of cattle from John Gamel and Christy Crosby of Mason, Texas. I had a letter of credit from the City National Bank of Dallas, but they would not take checks, which forced me to go to San Antonio and get $15,000 in currency from Mr. Brackenridge, which I carried back to Mason to pay for this herd of cattle, traveling only at night until I got the money in Mr. Ranck's bank at Mason. I drove this herd to Jack county and returned and bought another herd from Charlie Lemburg of Llano county. Colonel I. T. Pryor, now of San Antonio, was his foreman at that time. I carried them to Jack county and wintered them there. In the spring of 1876 I drove one part of these cattle to Dodge City, Kansas, and sold to J. L. Driskill & Sons who had a ranch; but his home was at Austin, Texas.

In 1877 I drove a herd to Dodge City again and also my brother, Colonel C. C. Slaughter, drove two herds there and we sold the three herds to Hunter, Evans & Newman, who had secured the contract to furnish beef to the Indians in the Territory. I delivered this herd at Fort Reno, to Jesse Evans, who had charge of the outfit.

In 1879 I drove a herd of steers from Blanco Canyon, Crosby county, to Hunnewell, Kansas, and sold to Hewens & Titus, who were heavy buyers for good Texas steers. That year I got my first experience on the Texas fever proposition. Striking the trail at Rush Creek, east of Ft. Sill, following it for five days I saw that something was the matter with some of my steers, and I threw them east of the trail. I had been skeptical up to this time on Texas fever but the loss of steers sustained on this drive fully convinced me that there was such a thing as Texas fever.

In 1881 I drove two herds of steers from Palo Pinto

county, to Caldwell, Kansas, sold one herd to A. Golson, a hotel man at Caldwell and the other to Barbecue Campbell.

In 1882 I drove a herd to Trail City, Colorado, on the Arkansas River and sold to Jones Bros. of Los Animas, Colorado. In 1883 I moved two herds of stock cattle from Crosby county, Texas, to American Valley, Socorro county, in the western part of New Mexico. In 1885 I drove a herd of steers from Socorro county, New Mexico, to Laramie Plains on the Laramie River, just west of Laramie City, Wyoming. This was the hardest drive I think I ever made.

In 1886 I drove a herd from Blanco Canyon, Crosby county, Texas to Chino Valley, near Prescott, Arizona. In 1887 I drove a herd from Socorro to Laramie Plains, Wyoming, onto Crow Creek and sold them in small lots. They were shipped out over the Rock Island Railroad to Nebraska. In 1889 I moved two herds, one from New Mexico and one from Panhandle of Texas, to Malta, Valley county, Montana, situated on Milk River. In 1890 I drove a herd from Clayton, New Mexico, to the Cypress Hills on the south line of Canada.

In 1901 I carried a herd from Clifton, Arizona, to Liberal, Kansas. My wife was with me on the trail this time.

During all this time I had moved many herds in Texas from one part of the state to the other and also in New Mexico. My last drive and the only one of its kind so far as I know by anyone, was when I moved 104 buffalo from Dalhart, Dallam county, Texas, to Fort Garland, Colorado. I had no trouble with this herd of buffalo-as I had with herds of cattle. They had become domesticated by feeding them cottonseed cake and each night I would move them about one-fourth of a mile north of where I located my camp and about dark gave them about 50 pounds of cake. They would consume the cake and lay down until about midnight and get up to graze

on the buffalo grass and lick up what waste cake was left and bed down until daylight next morning, at which time I would be up, (for I had an alarm clock) and head them on north. One of the large buffalo bulls became vicious when we reached Fort Garland. We killed him and sent him by express back to Pueblo, Colorado, where he was held in cold storage twenty-one days. The State Bankers of Colorado met with the Bankers of Pueblo that year and he was barbecued.and served to them.

A PIONEER MOTHER'S EXPERIENCE

Mrs. Mary Kate Cruze, R. F. D. Box 178, San Antonio, Texas

I was born October 21, 1849 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, daughter of Peyton and Mary Cox. My father died in 1850 and in 1851 mother married Mr. Albert Heaton from Washington, Maine. He was a kind and just step-father. He took mother and her two children to Pattersonville, La., where he had a good home.

Then we moved to Franklin, La., mother and father going overland in the buggy, while the old negro nurse and we children, with the household goods and my old cat went on steamboat. We settled near the bayou and father established a cooper shop and wharf where boats came and loaded with his product of barrels, casks, etc. He had nine men working in his shop, when a terrific scourge of yellow fever swept over Louisiana and when the fever abated there was only one man left out of the nine. Whole families died. Mother and father both had the fever, though somehow we children escaped. My father never went into his shop again because he imagined he could see and hear his men working as he had seen them last. He sold the cooperage and engaged in the hotel business, though at one time he was judge of St. Mary parish. He had heard so much about the "great state of Texas" that he finally decided to cast his lot in this land of promise, so in 1856, in com