I then went to the Pacific Coast, against the advice of friends who gave it as their opinion that my style of plays would not take very well in California.

I opened for an engagement of two weeks at the Bush Street Theatre, in San Francisco, at a season when the theatrical business was dull, and Ben DeBar and the Lingards were playing there to empty seats.

I expected to play to a slim audience on the opening night, but instead of that I had a fourteen hundred dollar house.

Such was my success that I continued my engagement for five weeks, and the theatre was crowded at every performance.

Upon leaving San Francisco I made a circuit of the interior towns and closed the season at Virginia City, Nevada.
On my way East, I met my family at Denver, where they were visiting my sisters Nellie and May who were then residing there.
Some time previously I had made arrangements to go into the cattle business in company with my old friend, Major Frank North, and while I was in California he had built our ranches on the South Fork of the Dismal river, sixty-five miles north of North Platte, in Nebraska.
Proceeding to Ogalalla, the headquarters of the Texas cattle drovers, I found Major North there awaiting me, and together we bought, branded and drove to our ranches, our first installment of cattle.