believe this part--that it fed itself with, and it carried so much meat
that just one ham would keep a family like Pete's going all winter. He
said of course I would think he was a liar, but I could write down to Red
Gap to a lawyer, and the lawyer would get plenty of people to swear to it
right in the courthouse. And so now I must hurry up and stock the place
with these animals and have more meat than anybody in the world and get
rich pretty quick. Forty times he stretched his arms to show me how big
one of these hams would be, and he said the best part was that this
animal hardly ate anything at all but a little popcorn and a few peanuts.
Hadn't he watched it for hours? And if I didn't hurry others would get
the idea and run prices up.

I guess Pete's commercial mind must of been engaged by hearing the boys
talk about whales. He hadn't held with the whale proposition, not for a
minute, after he learned they live in the ocean. He once had a good look
at the ocean and he promptly said "Too much water!" But here was a land
animal packing nearly as much meat as a whale, eating almost nothing, and
as tame as a puppy. "I think, 'Injun how you smart!'" he says when he got
through telling me all this in a very secret and important way.

I told him he was very smart indeed and ought to have a job with the
Government at a dollar a year telling people to quit beef meat for the
elephant. I said I was much obliged for the tip and if I ever got to
going good in elephants I'd see he had a critter of his own to butcher
every fall. So Pete went out with all his excitement and told the boys
how I was going to stock the ranch with these new animals which was
better than whales because you wouldn't have to get your feet wet. The
boys made much of it right off.

In no time at all they had all the white-faces sold off and vast herds of