the year of 1866 alone by the hoofs of more than a quarter of a
million cattle.

In 1871, only five years later, over six hundred thousand cattle
crossed the Red River for the Northern markets. Abilene, Newton,
Wichita, Ellsworth, Great Bend, Dodge, flared out into a swift
and sometime evil blossoming. Thus the men of the North first
came to hear of the Long Trail and the men who made it, although
really it had begun long ago and had been foreordained to grow.

By this time, 1867 and 1868, the northern portions of the region
immediately to the east of the Rocky Mountains had been
sufficiently cleared of their wild inhabitants to admit a gradual
though precarious settlement. It had been learned yet again that
the buffalo grass and the sweet waters of the far North would
fatten a range broadhorn to a stature far beyond any it could
attain on the southern range. The Long Trail pushed rapidly even
farther to the north where there still remained "free grass" and
a new market. The territorial ranges needed many thousands of
cattle for their stocking, and this demand took a large part of
the Texas drive which came to Abilene, Great Bend, and Fort
Dodge. Moreover, the Government was now feeding thousands of its
new red wards, and these Indians needed thousands of beeves for
rations, which were driven from the southern range to the upper
army posts and reservations. Between this Government demand and
that of the territorial stock ranges there was occupation for the
men who made the saddle their home.

The Long Trail, which had previously found the black corn lands
of Illinois and Missouri, now crowded to the West, until it had