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47
Burnett we met a man who had a ranch and some sheep in Bandera County, and we went with him and bought six hundred head of sheep, thus embarking in the sheep business, doing our own herding, shearing, cooking and washing. We had hard sledding for a long time, but finally achieved success. We moved our herd from Bandera County to the southeast corner of "Atascosa County, near the line of Live Oak and Karnes Counties, where I located a ranch of 15,000 acres in 1877 or 1878. There I engaged in sheep raising for several years, finally selling out and buying horses and cattle. I went to the border on the Rio Grande, and bought many horses and mares and drove them to Kansas. The next year I went over into Mexico and bought several hundred horses, which I kept on the ranch for about a year and then shipped them and many more which I had bought at different times to Ohio, New York, Nebraska, Tennessee, "Arkansas and Mississippi.
Like most of the boys of the early days, I had to sow my wild oats, and I regret to say that I also sowed all of the money I made right along with the oats. I went up the trail in 1882 with a herd belonging to Jim Ellison of Caldwell County, delivering the cattle at Caldwell, Kansas. I went again in 1884 with Mark Withers, starting from the Tigre ranch in LaSalle County, where Mr. J. M. Dobie now lives. When we reached the Canadian River it was on a rise, and we drowned a horse which was hitched to the chuck wagon. While making this crossing a negro's horse sank in the middle of the river and left the rider standing on a sandbar. After we crossed the cattle over I swam my horse out and allowed the negro