First, you get the money
He no longer recognized his home, and he was starting to think that it was time to get out.
It was not exactly surprising that his discovery of gold had prompted more people to come here, but he wasn't sure he had comprehended *how* many people would come.
The money had come easy at first, it was found in stream beds, or loose on the ground, and, being the first to find it, he had made pretty well for himself. Thing is, having money just sitting around was not something which he had ever experienced, he was used to living hand to mouth. So that first infusion of money had really only gone towards things he could think to spend it on: some alcohol, to be sure, but he'd given some money to the various parts of his family, and they it turn had used it for various small purchases here and there.
Pretty soon, as people kept streaming in, the easy stuff was gone. All of a sudden, the hills leading up to the Sierra Madre were littered with crude mines, some little more than glorified holes in the ground.
The cattle business for all intents and purposes died at that point: the business of digging up gold became all anyone was willing to work in. And why not? It was practically free money, all you had to do was dig it out of the ground. It was a lot quicker and seemed a lot more certain than herding some cattle and hoping for a buyer.
Pretty soon, the amateurs had run out of easy mines and the professionals arrived. It was at that point that things really began changing. The company paid you to dig the gold and paid you, but you didn't keep the gold anymore, they did. What had started as a way for anyone to get ahead had transformed into dangerous, backbreaking labor which other people profited from. And yet people had still come, because while you could no longer strike it rich, you could get a job that paid better and with more certainty than anything else around.
The hills where his cows used to pasture were unrecognizable now, they were dotted with various mines, tunnels, and camps, filled with the teeming masses of mine workers that had become the dominant presence in this community.
He had decided awhile ago that it was time to leave, and now he had the money. There was cheap land up north, maybe he could make a good start there, have a big farm, get married. The usual kind of thing.
----
Up north, the emptiness of the land was a lie, and always had been. The fundamental lie of the new world: the "unpopulated wilderness" was in fact populated by the natives. No one was used to counting them, so this was part of why it was considered "empty", but the fact remained that they were there, and resisted attempts to take what they saw as there.
The weapons they had begun to use were more sophisticated. Manuel didn't really understand how, but every time he tried to buy a farm, he found the land had already been purchased. Where on earth had the natives gotten the money and the organization to found a bank anyway?
Well, he was pretty sure the governor wouldn't be amused by their antics, it was well known that the government was trying to encourage immigration in the north as a buffer against the Americans. He headed off to raise a ruckus. He hadn't traveled all the way here just not to be able to purchase a farm...
---
It was strange, even up here, the impact of the money from his home could be felt.
He could feel it, of course, every time he rode through his farm, it was a good few acres, and he had people working for him now. He still had to work hard as hell himself, but didn't everybody?
Well, he supposed whoever owned the damn railroads was probably not having to work very hard. But it was not given to most men to be that fortunate. There might be more money flowing around Mexico these days, but there was still only so much of it. The government was more energetic about getting its share too. They tried to collect anything that wasn't nailed down, the only saving grace was that they were very bad thieves, and what they did manage to take from him and everyone else amounted to a reasonable amount.
The government, there were another group of people who had it easy. He might even be able to respect the rich men who ran the railroads: at least they did something useful. As far as he could tell, the main thing the government did was take his money and make it vanish into thin air. Probably paying themselves.
He shook his head, clearing it of useless thoughts. The farm wasn't going to run itself, and whatever other people might be able to do, he still had to work to earn a living.