The Dickinson press., 1884-12-13
CALIFORNIA CATTLE mTas.
Some Of the snobs and snobooracy OF he
Pacific Coast.

CAI1EORNA CATTLE Kings.
Some sf the snobs and snobooraoy Of the
Pacific Coast.
San Francisco Letter to Post-Dispatch.
This is the land ofluck, and fortunes
t@avors, like the rain, fall pretty much
alike on the just and the unjust. OF all
the kings, I have seen up to date,
whether mining, cattle or railroad king,
The last-named go to the front in the
matter of assumption and ridiculous
self-importance. It is small wonder
chat Californians detest the railroads;
the real wonder is that the antagonism
between the people and corporations
has not gone to sanguinary extremities.
Fortune has favored some shockingly
unjust men, and they abuse their power
and position very much as one might
suppose Warren Hastings did his as
tendency in India.
The magnates here are veritable ma
bobs, and their attendants even assume
q languid superciliousness to the last
degree presumptuous and insane. A
millionaire whose interest lies largely
with the roads assured me that those
corporations had entirely overdone the
extortion business, although he believed
their enemies had, in some instances,
unnecessarily abused them. Atthe den
of a railroad king ali the underlings,
and they are legion, come and go at the
call of an electric bell, and the autocrats
are as difficult to approach as the Gear
of Russia, but when one meets them
there seems to be little in the intellect
ual or general ability to warrent their
exclusiveness. Their homes are places
their grounds are Shaw's gardens, and
their attendants and equipages are gor-
geous and innumerable. The cattle
kings of the coast, Miller and Lux, are
rated at $4,000, 900 to $40, 000, 900, and
were poor men twenty years ago. Mr..
Lux told me that they had about 80, 600
head of cattle and lis 900 head of sheep,
of which latter theykill 6, 900 per month.
They own an irrigating canal worth
81, 200, 900, fences 800 miles in length
q fortune IN itself; in California 600, 900
acres of land; i'll Nebraska 10, 1000 acres
and $4,000 acres of alfalfa grass. They
lately bought 5000 cattle in Nebraska,
with large land and water privileges.
Speaking of ranches and herding, he
said:
"Our free grass is amatter of the past.
The Legislature is against us. We are
compelled to take are of the stock. Il
u cattle do any damage at all we must
pay heavily, Is the people are prejudic.
ed against any one they may be pleased
to call a monopolist. And yet, by theil
severe measures they are constantly en-
HANGING the price of meat. We are com
PEELED to buy land and fence it, which in
wolves a vast outlay ofmoney away. They
must build fences anyway, and, if the
smaller holders would fence securely
against stock, We could Craze at less
expense and they would have cheaper
meat, but you can't make anear-sighted
man see a long distance-he must pay
for his spectacles. California, as a
grazing State, is a thing of the past
And then, you see, we are heavily tax
ed. We are rated arbitrarily ct a fix.
ed sum per head, and there is no dodg.
ing or securing a r%evaluation at a lowe,
figure. We are interested largely
i'll Oregon, Nebraska and Montana
and in everything that pertains
to the cattle interests of those
localities, and will either be pres
ent in st. Louis personally or by repre-
sentative. The convention is a neces-
sity to the business, and no cattlemar
should fail to lend his c~onntenance o.
counsel; we must stand together or al
will suffer. And the people, the con
sumers, will suffer. I have no doub
that if the citizens of the United State'
could understand the matter, the,
would see that their interests and ours
are identical.
One thing has hindered the growtl
Of the cattle interest, which as a hurtfu
influence will, to a great extent disap
pear after the convention in st. Louis
and that is the timidity of capital will
respect to cattle-growing. Formerl,
banks and bankers only loaned to a cat
tie man at rates of interest which n
other business could pay, and the con
sequence has been the ranchmen hav'
had to thrive under grievous loads
Now that the matter has become bette:
understood the cowman gets more rea
sonable rates, but even yet the feeble
men are unfairly death with, and the,
must all look to the convention and it
result for relief from many discrlmina
tions against them"