Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 1122

Beadle's Half-Dime Library, No. 1122 (February 1902) "The Wild-Horse Hunters" by Captain Mayne Reid and Frederick Whittaker is a Western adventure serial depicting the professional capture of wild mustangs on the Texas prairie near the Trinity River. The opening chapter details a mustang drive: three hunters on mules pursue a herd of over a hundred wild horses across days and nights, deliberately exhausting them through relentless chasing, deprivation of food and rest, and strategic pursuit patterns using diagonal shortcuts. The horses are herded into a prepared corral—a funnel-shaped enclosure of split-rail fence supplemented by steep riverbanks—where they can be lassoed and broken. Chapter II introduces Colonel William Magoffin, a former Jackson-era military officer, leading an emigrant party (including enslaved workers, his daughter Tennessee, niece Louisiana, and nephew Eugene) across the prairie to establish a new settlement. They halt to scout the Cross Timbers region of Texas as a potential plantation site, discussing the viability of cotton cultivation and discussing the natural resources available.