Contents ▼▲
Front Matter Dreams of a Sheep Ranch Sheep Raising Herding Sheep Something About Texas Land Grants The "Texas Fever" Why I wanted to Go Hunting in Texas Father Spys the Land Our Plantation Father Comes Home The Bigness of Texas Where We were Going What I Hoped to Do Cattle Driving How We Set Out A Laborious Journey Comanche Indians Father to the Rescue Arrival at Fort Towson Preparing for a Storm A Dry "Norther" Two Kinds of Northers How Turkeys Kill Snakes Deer and Rattlesnakes A Corral of Wagons On the Trail Again Mesquite A Texas Sheep Ranch Profits from Sheep Father's Land Claim Spanish Measurements The Chaparral Cock Night on the Trinity Standing Guard A Turkey Buzzard Plans for Building a House The Cook Shanty A Storm of Rain A Day of Discomfort Thinking of the Old Home Waiting for the Sun Too Much Water The Stream Rising Trying to Save the Stock The Animals Stampeded Saving Our Own Lives A Raging Torrent A Time of Disaster The Flood Subsiding A Jack Rabbit Reparing Damages Rounding up the Stock FAfter the Flood Waiting for Father Recovering Our Goods Setting to Work Sawing Out Lumber In the Saw Pit Wild Cattle A Disagreeable Intruder Odd Hunting A Supply of Fresh Meat "Jerking" Beef Searching for the Cattle Our New Home Planting and Building Bar-O Ranch An Odd Cart The Visitors Zeba's Curiosity Possible Treachery Suspicious Behavior Gyp's Fight With a Cougar In a Dangerous Position Hunting Wild Hogs Treed by Peccaries Gyp's Obedience My Carelessness Vicious Little Animals Father Comes to the Rescue Increase in my Flock Unrest of the Indians Texas Joins the Union War with Mexico Selling Wool Peace on the Trinity My Dream Fulfilled

Philip of Texas - James Otis




Planting, and Building Corrals

We had planted no less than three acres of corn and potatoes, all of which promised a bountiful harvest, and gave token of yielding two or three times as much as we could have hoped for on the richest of the Mississippi bottoms.

In addition to the dwellings, we had built a large pen for the sheep, made of mesquite bushes stuck so firmly into the ground that the coyotes would not dare attempt to force a passage through.

[Illustration] from Philip of Texas by James Otis

We also had smaller pens for the sheep with lambs, perhaps a dozen or more of them; for, as you know, the mother sheep very often will not take kindly to her young, and it is necessary either to tie her up, or put her in some small inclosure with the little fellow, during two or three days, until she becomes acquainted with him and is willing to admit that he belongs to her.

During the season the last work done by the negroes was the splitting of rails. With these and with the wagons, we made a corral for the mules, where they could be inclosed at night, or whenever there was promise of a norther which might stampede them. For those fierce storms came, as it seemed to me, very often.