[A SUPPLY OF FRESH MEAT]
We covered the carcass with the branches of the pecan trees as well as possible, in order to keep the wolves and the turkey buzzards away, for even though we had been here but a short time, I had learned that anything eatable left exposed on the prairie, particularly fresh meat, would soon be devoured by the noisy coyotes or those unwholesome-looking birds. Then we set out on our return to the home camp, leaving the cattle to recover from the fright caused by the report of our rifles as best they might.
When we arrived, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, father set one of the negroes to harnessing two mules to the small wagon, and announced that I was to go back with a couple of the men to bring in our game, for we could not well afford to lose so much fresh meat.
The day had been a long one before I found opportunity to crawl into my bed, for it was near midnight when we got back with the carcass of the bull.
When I opened my eyes next morning, I remembered the saw pit, believing I must spend another day at the slow task of making boards and joists from green wood, but father was at work cutting the carcass of the bull into thin strips, while John and Zeba were building a little scaffold on the prairie a short distance from mother's shelter.
["JERKING" BEEF]
This was the first process towards "jerking" beef, or, in other words, drying it in the sun, a method of preserving meat which I fancy has come down to us from the Indians. Before the morning was spent I discovered that there are more disagreeable tasks than that of pushing a crosscut saw up and then pulling it down.