There was no activity
in live stock during the winter in Texas, and there would be no
trouble in putting up herds at prevailing prices of the spring before.
I spent an inactive winter, riding back and forth to my ranch, hunting
with hounds, and killing an occasional deer. While visiting at Council
Grove the fall before, Major Hunter explained to our silent partner
the cheapness of Texas lands. Neither one of my associates cared to
scatter their interests beyond the boundaries of their own State, yet
both urged me to acquire every acre of cheap land that my means would
permit. They both recited the history and growth in value of the lands
surrounding The Grove, telling me how cheaply they could have bought
the same ten years before,--at the government price of a dollar and a
quarter an acre,--and that already there had been an advance of four
to five hundred per cent. They urged me to buy scrip and locate land,
assuring me that it was only a question of time until the people
of Texas would arise in their might and throw off the yoke of
Reconstruction.
At home general opinion was just the reverse. No one cared for more
land than a homestead or for immediate use. No locations had been made
adjoining my ranch on the Clear Fork, and it began to look as if I had
more land than I needed. Yet I had confidence enough in the advice of
my partners to reopen negotiations with my merchant friend at Austin
for the purchase of more land scrip.
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