200 APPENDIX. 



provements, $325,000 ; for the cattle on hand at a low- 

 market value, $75,000 ; leaving $100,000 for a work- 

 ing capital with which to increase the stock and con- 

 duct the business. I propose that the company shall 

 have an office in the East, where the books and accounts 

 shall be kept and always open to inspection by stock- 

 holders. The treasurer of the company should be an 

 Eastern man of undoubted character and responsibility, 

 to whom full returns should be sent from the ranch 

 every month or every quarter, as we now have them. 

 I have no doubt but that the business, properly man- 

 aged, on so large a scale will pay, including increased 

 value of land and cattle, as high as fifty per cent, per 

 annum. The profits are enormous. There is no busi- 

 ness like it in the world, and the whole secret of it is, 

 it costs nothing to feed the cattle. They grow without 

 eating your money. They literally raise themselves. 

 " General Brisbin, writing from the Plains, says, — 

 " ' If $200,000 were invested in Texas cattle, it would 

 double itself in four years, and pay a semi-annual divi- 

 dend of eight per cent. It should be remembered that 

 the larger the original capital put into the business 

 the greater would be the ratio of net profits.' 



" It may be asked, ' How long will this business con- 

 tinue to pay such large profits ? Will not capital flow 

 into it so fast that in a few years the country will be 

 overstocked ?' The answer is plain. There is always 

 a steady demand for beef at home, and the heavy ship- 

 ments of fresh meat to other countries, amounting in 

 the year 1877 to over ten millions of dollars in value, 

 must constantly increase this ; and there is no doubt 



