The Road to Dumbiedykes 



the north you would strike the famous 

 ranch of Charles P. Taft, property of 

 the brother of our worthy and most 

 outrageously maligned ex-President. 

 Far in the south where the Nueces 

 enters the great gulf is Santa Gertrudes, 

 the 2,000,000 acre ranch under the 

 clever management of Robert Kleberg, 

 son-in-law of the late proprietor, Cap- 

 tain Richard King of ante bellum fame. 

 In the west you will not have far to 

 drive before you will come to the en- 

 trance gate of the Rancho de los 

 Laureles, late the property of the Texas 

 Land and Cattle Company, and, in the 

 hands of that corporation under the 

 supervision of a canny Scot, one Cap- 

 tain John Todd. 



You are here in a land of magnificent 

 distances. This Laureles Ranch has 

 in recent years been sold to Mrs. King, 

 and added to the royal domain of 

 Santa Gertrudes which it adjoined 

 along the Nueces boundary; but at the 

 time Billy and I visited it some years 

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