the report of his gun. I jumped to one side and
gave the bear a shot. I got in two shots and
Fiske four. After receiving this amount of lead
the bear ran but a short distance and dropped dead.
All of the shots were near the bear’s heart.
We dressed him and started home and we had bear meat
enough to last for some time to come. In the
mean time Mr. Fiske had told me about a man four miles
from, his place who had a ranch for sale, consisting
of three hundred and twenty acres of deeded land,
one hundred acres in cultivation, eighty bearing fruit
trees and two acres of a vineyard. He said the
place could be bought cheap, and he also told me that
there was a vacant quarter section adjoining this
land that I could take up, and I would have the finest
goat ranch in the country. Mr. Fiske and I took
a trip down and found the owner very anxious to sell.
After looking the ranch over and getting his figures,
I made him an offer of four thousand dollars for everything,
which offer he accepted, he reserving nothing but
one span of horses, his bed and clothing. We then
went to Santa Rosa, the county seat, to get an abstract
of title and a deed to the property, and now I am
once more an honest rancher. While in Santa Rosa
I hired a man and his wife by the name of Benson, by
the year. Mr. Benson proved to be a good man and
his wife a splendid housekeeper. All went well
for about five months, and having filed on the quarter
of vacant land adjoining me, of course I had to move
over there. I had noticed a change in Benson’s
appearance, but had not thought much about it till
one Saturday I sent him to haul some pickets over
to my preemption claim. That night, having company,
I did not go to the cabin on the claim, but stayed
on the other place. Benson was not at supper that
evening, but I paid no attention to it nor thought
it strange, supposing he was just a little late getting
home. The next morning I noticed that he was
not at the breakfast table, and I asked Mrs. Benson
why Mr. Bensen didn’t come to his breakfast.
She asked if I had not told him to stay on the preemption
claim that night. I told her that I had not and
that I had the key and he could not get into the house,
and besides there was no feed there for the mules.
She commenced to feel uneasy then. So as soon
as breakfast was over I took one of my hired men and
started out to hunt for him. We struck the wagon
trail and tracked him around for some time. He
had traveled in a terribly round about way. We
finally came to him where he had run his team against
a tree, and when we came upon him he was down in front
of the mules whipping them around the fore legs trying
to make them get down and pray. He did not notice
us until I spoke to him and told him to quit whipping
the mules. When he looked at me I could see that
he was perfectly wild. It took us both three
hours to get him back to the house. I sent for
the constable, who took him to Santa Rosa and from
there he was taken to the insane asylum. His
wife went East to her folks, and I was told afterwards
that he got all right.