cow camps, the homesteaders fenced in land--so much land that
there came to be no place near any of the shipping-points where a
big herd from the South could be held. Along the southern range
artificial barriers to the long drive began to be raised. It
would be hard to say whether fear of Texas competition or of
Texas cattle fever was the more powerful motive in the minds of
ranchers in Colorado and Kansas. But the cattle quarantine laws
of 1885 nearly broke up the long drive of that year. Men began to
talk of fencing off the trails, and keeping the northbound herds
within the fences--a thing obviously impossible.

The railroads soon rendered this discussion needless. Their
agents went down to Texas and convinced the shippers that it
would be cheaper and safer to put their cows on cattle trains and
ship them directly to the ranges where they were to be delivered.
And in time the rails running north and south across the Staked
Plains into the heart of the lower range began to carry most of
the cattle. So ended the old cattle trails.

What date shall we fix for the setting of the sun of that last
frontier? Perhaps the year 1885 is as accurate as any--the time
when the cattle trails practically ceased to bring north their
vast tribute. But, in fact, there is no exact date for the
passing of the frontier. Its decline set in on what day the first
lank "nester" from the States outspanned his sun-burned team as
he pulled up beside some sweet water on the rolling lands,
somewhere in the West, and looked about him, and looked again at
the land map held in his hand.

"I reckon this is our land, Mother," said he.