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.
When he said that, he pronounced the doom of the old frontier.
Chapter IX. The Homesteader
His name was usually Nester or Little Fellow. It was the old
story of the tortoise and the hare. The Little Fellow was from
the first destined to win. His steady advance, now on this flank,
now on that, just back of the vanguard pushing westward, had
marked the end of all our earlier frontiers. The same story now
was being written on the frontier of the Plains.
But in the passing of this last frontier the type of the
land-seeking man, the type of the American, began to alter
distinctly.
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