luck. Sometimes, I had up as high as
twenty-five or thirty dollars.

"One thing about the cap'n, he'd tell his men--well, we had a sutler's
shop right across from our camp, all kinds of good drinks--and he would
tell his men he didn't care how much they drank but he didn't want any
of 'em fighting'. He kep' 'em under good control.

"You see, they was all dependin' on me for guidin'. There was no way
for them cow rustlers or bandits to get to the cow ranches after they
crossed the river (Rio Grande) excep' to cross that road for there was
no other way for 'em to get out there. You see, there was where it would
be easy for me, pickin' up a trail. I would just follow that road on if
I had a certain distance to go, and if I didn't find no trail I would
come back and report, and if I would find a trail he would ask me how
many they was and where they was goin', and I would tell 'im which way,
'cause I didn't know exactly where they was goin' to round-up. He would
always give 'em about two or three days to make the round-up from the
time that trail crossed. And we always went to meet 'em, or catch 'em at
the river. We got into two or three real bad combats.

"The worst one was on Palo Alto Prairie, one of Santa Anna's battle
grounds. About twelve or fifteen miles east of old Brownsville. They was
sixteen of the bandits and they was fifteen of 'em killed--all Meskins
excep' one white man. One Meskin escaped. The cap'n just put 'em all up
together in a pile and sent a message to Brownsville to the authorities
and told 'em where they was at and what shape they was in. They must
have had two hundred or two hundred and twenty-five head (of cattle)
with 'em. It was open country and they would get anybody's cattle. They
just got 'em off the range.

"They mostly would cross that road at night, and by me gettin' out early
next mornin' and findin' that trail, I could tell pretty much how old it
was. I reckon that place wasn't over thirteen miles from Brownsville and
our camp was thirty-five miles, I guess it must have been twenty-five
miles from our camp to where we had that battle. We sure went there to
get 'em. I trailed them horses and I knowed from the direction they was
takin' that they was goin' to those big lakes called Santa Lalla. They
was between Point Isabel and Brownsville and that made us about a
forty-five mile ride to get to that crossin', to a place called Bagdad,
right on the waters of the Rio Grande.

"We got ou