Under the old customs, handed down from the Spanish to the Texans,
corners were always established from natural landmarks. The union of
creeks arid rivers, mounds, lagoons, outcropping of rock, in fact
anything unchangeable and established by nature, were used as a point
of commencement. In the locating of Spanish land grants a century and
a half previous, sand-dunes were frequently used, and when these old
concessions became of value and were surveyed, some of the corners had
shifted a mile or more by the action of the wind and seasons on the
sand-hills. Accordingly, on overtaking our outfit we headed for the
juncture of the Brazos and Clear Fork, reaching our destination the
second day. The first thing was to establish a corner or commencement
point. Some heavy timber grew around the confluence, so, selecting an
old patriarch pin oak between the two streams, we notched the tree
and ran a line to low water at the juncture of the two rivers. Other
witness trees were established and notched, lines were run at angles
to the banks of either stream, and a hole was dug two feet deep
between the roots of the pin oak, a stake set therein, and the
excavation filled with charcoal and covered. A legal corner or
commencement point was thus established; but as the land that I
coveted lay some distance up the Clear Fork, it was necessary first to
run due south six miles and establish a corner, and thence run west
the same distance and locate another one.
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