My wife was dazed
and delighted over the success of the summer's drive, and when I
offered her the money with which to build a fine house at Fort Worth,
she balked, but consented to employ a tutor at the ranch for the
children.
I had a little leisure time on my hands that fall. Activity in wild
lands was just beginning to be felt throughout the State, and the
heavy holders of scrip were offering to locate large tracts to
suit the convenience of purchasers. Several railroads held immense
quantities of scrip voted to them as bonuses, all the charitable
institutions of the State were endowed with liberal grants, and the
great bulk of certificates issued during the Reconstruction regime
for minor purposes had fallen into the hands of shrewd speculators.
Among the latter was a Chicago firm, who had opened an office at Fort
Worth and employed a corps of their own surveyors to locate lands
for customers. They held millions of acres of scrip, and I opened
negotiations with them to survey a number of additions to my Double
Mountain range. Valuable water-fronts were becoming rather scarce,
and the legislature had recently enacted a law setting apart every
alternate section of land for the public schools, out of which grew
the State's splendid system of education. After the exchange of a few
letters, I went to Fort Worth and closed a contract with the Chicago
firm to survey for my account three hundred thousand acres adjoining
my ranch on the Salt and Double Mountain forks of the Brazos.
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