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 I 35 
 
 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 BEQUEST 
 
 OF 
 
 STEWART HENRY BURNHAM 
 1943 
 
Cornell University Library 
 
 3 1924 027 770 704 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924027770704 
 
IN CITY AND CAMP 
 
 BY 
 
 Tames Otis, Kate Foote, Mary Hartwell Catiiek 
 WOOD, J. E. Collins, Ernest Ingersoll, Flora 
 Haines Apponyi, C. E. S. Wood, F L. 
 Stealey, Ellen Olney Kirk, Helen 
 E. Sweet, Alice Well- 
 ington Rollins. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED 
 
 BOSTON 
 D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY 
 
 Franklin and Hawley Si'reets 
 
/\ 77^ iSb 
 
 Copyright, i8S6, 
 by 
 
 D. LOTHROr &; COMPAHY. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 A District Messenger Boy . 
 
 James Otis. 
 Wagon-Tire Camp .... 
 
 Kate Foote. 
 The Gypsies . . ... 
 
 Mary Hartwell Catherumod. 
 Hunted by a Wild Stallion 
 
 J. E. Collins. 
 Wild Horses .... 
 
 Ernest Ingersoll. 
 How Walter found His Father 
 
 Flora Haines Apponyi. 
 After the Buffalo 
 
 C.E.S, Wood. 
 
 OSITO 
 
 F. L Stealey. 
 
 Jap 
 
 Ellen Olney Kirk. 
 
 The Rich Man of the Mountains 
 
 Helen E. Sweet. 
 One Way to be Brave 
 
 Alice Wellington Rollins. 
 The Gypsy's Prophecy 
 
 Anna Leach. 
 Plum Blooms .... 
 
 Mary Hartwell Cathenvood. 
 
 Page. 
 7 
 
 47 
 
 75 
 
 "3 
 
 123 
 
 141 
 
 IS7 
 167 
 178 
 204 
 217 
 223 
 236 
 
A District Messenger Boy. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 
 
 WHAT is your name, boy?" 
 " Joe Curtis, sir." 
 " And your number ? " 
 " Two hundred and ninety-seven." 
 " Very well, now listen to what I say, and see 
 that you do exactly as I tell you. I am going to 
 Providence by the Sound steamer that sails in an 
 hour and a half; take these tickets, go to the office 
 of the boat, get the key of the state-room I have 
 engaged and paid for, and put these satchels in it." 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 "Then wait near the gangway of the steamer 
 until I come,for I shall probably be late, as I have 
 7 
 
8 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 to take a sick friend with me. Be sure to have 
 the room ready, so that I can have him carried 
 directly from the carriage to his berth." 
 
 " I will wait for you, sir." 
 
 " What are the rates ? '-' 
 
 " For an hour and a half, ninety cents, sir, and 
 car fare extra if you want m6 to get there in a hurry." 
 
 "Very well, here is a dollar, and see that you do 
 exactly as I have told you." 
 
 Joe touched his cap, took the two valises that 
 the gentleman pointed out to him in one corner of 
 the office, and, staggering under the heavy weight, 
 started for the nearest elevated railroad station. 
 Joe was scarcely large enough to carry the valises ; 
 but when he succeeded in getting a situation in 
 the messenger service he knew that he would have 
 plenty of hard work to do, and was fully prepared 
 for it. Besides, this acting the part of porter was by 
 no means so difficult a job as some that had been 
 assigned to him in the post six weeks and he went 
 about it as philosophically as if he had been aman, 
 instead of a boy only twelve years old. 
 
 Arrived at the dock, he had no trouble in getting 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 9 
 
 the State-room key, and, after caring for the bag- 
 gage, it was only necessary to wait near the gang- 
 plank until his employer should appear. 
 
 It was by no means hard work for Joe to wait for 
 the gentleman; in the bustle and confusion every- 
 where around him he found plenty to occupy his 
 mind, and, forgetting how hard he had struggled to 
 get the baggage down there, he thought he had been 
 particularly fortunate in being assigned to the work. 
 
 The moments went by so fast that when the last 
 bell sounded, and Joe heard the cry of " All ashore 
 that's going," he could hardly believe it possible 
 that he had been on the boat more than an hour, 
 waiting for the gentleman and his sick friend. 
 
 " He's got to come pretty soon, or else his state- 
 room won't do him much good," Joe said to him- 
 self as he stood close by the gang-plank with the 
 key in his hand, ready to deliver it without delay. 
 
 But although carriage after carriage was driven 
 up just in time for its occupants to get on the boat, 
 Joe's employer did not come, and the boy began 
 to understand that unless he made some decided 
 tjjove at once he would be carried away. 
 
lO A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 " He told me to look out for the baggage until he 
 came ; but I don't s'pose he meant for me to go to 
 Providence if he didn't come." 
 
 The sailors were pulling the gang-plank ashore, 
 and Joe saw that his time was indeed limited. Since 
 he had been ordered to care for the baggage until 
 the gentleman came, he had no idea of leaving it on 
 the steamer, neither did he propose to make a trip 
 to Providence. 
 
 " I'll get the things out of the room, an' then 
 wait on the pier," he said to himself as he ran up 
 to the saloon where the state-room was located. 
 
 There were a large number of passengers on the 
 boat, and, despite all Joe's efforts, he could not 
 get through the crowd quickly. He struggled and 
 pushed, even at the risk of incurring the displeas- 
 ure of those gentlemen who were in his way, until 
 he reached the state-room. To get the valises out 
 after he was once there was but the work of a few 
 moments, and then he had another difficult task to 
 reach the main deck. 
 
 When he did get there, breathless and excited, he 
 sfvw thfii his efforts had been in yain, for the steamer 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. II 
 
 had already left the dock, and was so far out in the 
 stream that unless he had been Mr. Giant-Stride of 
 fairy-tale fame, he could not have leaped ashore. 
 
 "Well, this is nice ! " exclaimed Joe as" he stood 
 looking at the dock on which he fancied he could 
 see the man who had been the cause of his invol- 
 untary voyage. " Now what'll I do ?" 
 
 He stood looking about him in doubt and per- 
 plexity, uncertain whether to go to ihe captain of the 
 boat and demand that he be landed at once, or to 
 explain the situation to some of the> passengers in 
 the vain hope that they might be able to aid him, 
 when he heard the sound of sobs close beside him. 
 
 " Hello : did you get carried away too ? '' he asked 
 as he saw a boy not more than eight or nine years 
 old crying bitterly. " Come here, sonny, an' tali 
 me what the matter is, for it looks as if you an' I 
 were in the same scrape." 
 
 " They 're takin' me away from mamma an' papa, 
 an' I'll just jump overboard,'' was sonny's answer. 
 
 "O don't get like that," said Joe soothingly, as 
 he placed the valises carefully in one corner, and 
 took the child by the hand to reassure him', " They 
 
12 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 ar'n't to blame, 'cause they told everybody to go on 
 shore that wanted to, an' we didn't go." 
 
 "I couldn't,'' sobbed the boy, "he held me, an' 
 when I cried he struck me in the face." 
 
 " Who did ? " 
 
 " The man that made me come here with him. 
 Mamma let me go out in the street to play if I 
 wouldn't go away from the block ; but nhat man 
 came up an' asked me if I did not want a real live 
 pony, an' I did, an' I went with him to get it. " 
 
 "An' you forgot what you promised your 
 mother," said Joe sagely. 
 
 " Yes, 'cause he said it was only a little ways off ; 
 but when we'd walked two blocks, I wanted to 
 go home, an' he told me he'd cut my throat wide 
 open if I said anything ; and then we come here," 
 
 " Why, he's up an' stole you, that's what he's 
 done," said Joe, as with his hands deep in his 
 pockets he stood contemplating the boy whose 
 trouble was so much greater than his. 
 
 " Oh dear ! " wailed the child, as he hid his head 
 in the corner and gave way -^to his grief. " I'm gc 
 in' right straight home, an' I wofft stay h?re." 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 1 5 
 
 Joe was touched by the boy's distress ; he for- 
 got his own troubles, which were light as com- 
 pared to the little fellow's, and did his best to 
 comfort him. 
 
 "Now see here — what's your name, though? " 
 
 " Ned." 
 
 " Well, Ned, you couldn't get home now, so you'd 
 better stop crying, an' we'll see if we can't fix it in 
 Some way. Where's the man ? " 
 
 " He went down-stairs when the boat started, 
 an' he told me he'd beat me black an' blue if I spoke 
 to anybody while he was gone." 
 
 "An' prob'ly he would," said Joe. " If he dared 
 ttt reg'larly steal you he'd dare to do anything else ; 
 but I'll get away before he comes up, an' I'll go an' 
 tell the captain of the boat. Then I rather think 
 the man will wish he'd never'd said anything about 
 a pony, for he'lt be arrested." 
 
 " No, no, don't ! " cried Ned, " he'd be sure to kill 
 me if you should do that, an' then what 'good would 
 it do me ? " 
 
 " But you hain't goin' to let him carry you off, be 
 you?" 
 
l6 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOV. 
 
 " Oh, I don't know, " said Ned, and he began to 
 cry piteously again, while Joe tried to soothe him 
 by wiping away the big tears with the cuff of his 
 jacket. 
 
 " I think you'd better let me tell the captain," 
 he said. 
 
 " I can't, 'cause he knows another man on the 
 boat, an' one of 'em would be sure to kill me. Why 
 won't you let me just go with you ? " 
 
 " I would if I knew where I was goin' ; but you 
 see I'm most as bad off as you are," and then Joe 
 told him of his misfortune in having become an 
 involuntary passenger, concluding his story by say- 
 ing: "An' I've got a mother that'll feel just as bad 
 as yours will ; it will be worse for her too, 'cause 
 she says now that father's dead I'm all that she's 
 got, an' every cent I make I carry home to her, 
 'cause she has to work hard to get money to pay 
 the rent." 
 
 Joe could understand very readily by Ned's cloth- 
 ing that their homes were widely different. Had 
 it not been for his uniform the messenger boy would 
 have worn a very shabby suit of clothes, while Ned 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 17 
 
 was not only dressed expensively, but he wore what 
 was to Joe the very height of extravagance — a 
 gold ring. 
 
 " Even if you don't know where you're goin", take 
 me with you," said Ned. " If you'd help me, I'd 
 try to get away from that man — there he comes 
 now, don't let him whip me." 
 
 " I'll go ofiE so's he won't know we've been talkin', 
 an' just as soon as he leaves again I'll come back," 
 said he. 
 
 He had just time enough to dart behind a pile of 
 baggage before the man came up, and he needed 
 but one glance to convince him that Ned had 
 good cause for fear. The man's face was so brutal 
 looking that even he began to think perhaps it 
 might not be advisable to appeal to the captain of 
 the steamer lest the story should not be believed, and 
 he be called to an account for interfering. 
 
 The valises were still where he had left them, 
 and marching boldly out, but feeling quite the re- 
 verse of what he tried to assume, he took the bag- 
 gage, not heeding the pleading look Ned gave him, 
 and went to the state-room, where he remained 
 
l8 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOV^. 
 
 some time trying to make up liis miud what he 
 could do to aid the boy wlao had appealed to him. 
 He did not for a moment entertain the idea of 
 . leaving him with that man. Suddenly what seemed 
 to be a very brilliant idea came to him, and he 
 walked down-stairs on to the main-deck again, 
 leaving the door of the state-room unlocked. 
 
 The man was seated by Ned's side smoking, and 
 Joe went from one place to another, keeping the 
 couple in sight all the while, until he saw him walk 
 away with a companion who spoke to him, and who 
 looked quite as detestable as he. 
 
 Joe made sure that the two had gone into the 
 lower cabin, and, running quickly to where Ned 
 sat, he said : " Come up-stairs with me as fast as 
 you can, an' I'll show you what to do." Then, 
 taking the little fellow by the hand, he hurried to 
 the upper deck, not looking around and hardly dar- 
 ing to breathe until they were in the state-room 
 with the door securely fastened and t^je blind of the 
 window closed. 
 
 " There ! " he exclaimed triumphantly in a whis- 
 per, " I guess this fixes Mr. Man, an' when he tries 
 
bN WILLING PASSENGERS. t^ 
 
 to find you he'll think that stealin' boys hain't so 
 easy as he thought it was." 
 
 "But he'll come up here to~^get me," said Ned, 
 hoping that there was an opportunity for him to 
 escape, yet frightened at the step he had taken, 
 
 " He may come up-stairs ; but how can he find 
 you ? See here, Ned, I've got two tickets for the 
 passage in my pocket, an' the room's been paid for 
 by the man I told you about. Now we can keep 
 in here till the boat slops, and then I guess we can 
 give him the slip ; but 1 hain't thought yet how we 
 either of us can get home.'' 
 " But s'posen he comes right up here to the door ? " 
 
 " He won't do that. Can't you see, Ned, that 
 he don't know anything more about this room than 
 he does of any other ? We're all right for a while 
 any how ; but I guess we'll be pretty hungry, 'cause 
 we can't get anything to eat." 
 
 " I don't care 'bout that if he don't get hold of 
 me again," said Ned, growing bright and happy as 
 he realized his temporary safety. 
 
 The boys examined the tickets Joe had, looked 
 curiously at the snug little cabin, wondered what 
 
20 A DISTRICT JdESSENGER BOY. 
 
 the man would say or do when he could not find Ned, 
 and, finally, the first novelty of the situation having 
 passed away, they talked of their homes. 
 
 It was the most unwise thing they could have 
 done, so far as peace of mind was concerned, for at 
 the thoughts of their mothers waiting and watching 
 for them, both broke down. Ned laid down in the 
 berth without a thought of hidinghis grief; but Joe, 
 who considered it his duty in his position of pro- 
 tector to the younger boy, to appear unconcerned, 
 was obliged to stand by the window in order to cry 
 without being seen or heard, and he wiped his eyes 
 with the curtain until his cheeks were'stained blue 
 and green from the dye of the fabrig, in a sorrow- 
 fully ridiculous fashion. 
 
 However, it happened neither of the boys quite 
 understood, but, despite their deep sorrow, they 
 both fell asleep shortly after Joe laid down by the 
 side of Ned to comfort him, and did not awaken 
 until morning. The sun was streaming in through 
 the slats of the blinds, the throbbing of the engine 
 was stilled, and everything betokened the end of 
 ;lic ■.ovaije. 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 21 
 
 Neither of the boys had undressed, for they had 
 anticipated a long, dreary evening during which 
 they would be very hungry, and Joe had fully in- 
 tended to walk around the boat for the purpose of 
 learning what Ned's enemy was doing. They had 
 not laid any plans, and in this Joe felt that they 
 had been culpable, since now that they were at 
 liberty to go on shore, neither had an idea of what 
 course to f)ursue. 
 
 " While you are washing yoUr face I will go out 
 and see if that man is around anywhere," said Joe 
 finally, " an' I'll lock the door and take the key 
 with me so's there won't be any chance of his get- 
 tin' in while I'm gone.'' 
 
 Ned did not much like being left alone, but he 
 made no objection, since he could readily see that 
 it was of the highest importance that they should 
 learn if the men were watching for them. 
 
 Joe went into every portion of the boat in which 
 passengers are allowed ; but without seeing either 
 Ned's captor or his companion. Had he been on 
 deck when the steamer arrived at Newport, he 
 would have seen the two men land there, after 
 
22 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 searching vainly for the boy they had stolen, much 
 as if they feared they might be called to an account 
 for what they had done. Of this, of course, Joe 
 knew nothing; and when he failed to see either of 
 the men, he naturally feared they were waiting on 
 shore in the hope of catching Ned as he landed. 
 
 It was but seven o'clock, and as a number of the 
 passengers were yet on board, the stewards had 
 paid no attention to the state-room the boys occu- 
 pied ; otherwise an explanation might have been 
 made which would have prevented both the young 
 passengers much trouble. 
 
 "It's morning, Ned, an' I s'pose we're in Provi- 
 dence," said Joe as he came back to the state-room 
 where the child was waiting in fear and trembling 
 the result of his trip on deck. " I can't see any- 
 thing of the men, an' perhaps if we go on shore 
 now they won't catch us. We've got to take these 
 »valises, for the man told me to watch 'em, an' that 
 means that I've .got to keep right side of 'em." 
 
 Ned manfully took hold of one side of the heavi- 
 est piece of baggage, and with anxious hearts, the 
 two left the room. 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 23 
 
 At the gangway the children were stopped by 
 the man whose duty it was to collect the tickets. 
 He looked at -the small boys with the large valises 
 curiously ; but as Joe gave him the two pieces of 
 pasteboard that entitled them to first cabin pas- 
 sages, the officer could do no less than allow them 
 to land. 
 
 Even though they were supposed to be in Provi- 
 dence, they were some distance from the city, as 
 they learned when they were off the pier, and Joe 
 said : 
 
 " Now, Ned, I'm sorry to make you do it, but 
 we've got to walk fast if we don't want those men 
 to catch us,'' and that was sufficient to induce the 
 boy to do his best. 
 
 But, no matter how frightened a boy may be he 
 cannot walk very far on a hot morning without 
 breakfast, more especially if he has had no supper 
 the night previous, and some time before they were 
 near the city, both Ned and Joe were obliged to 
 rest. 
 
 As a matter of course, they had seen nothing pi 
 the men, and with the feeling of freedom came th§ 
 
24 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 question which should have been settled the night 
 before — that of where they should go. 
 
 " I declare, I don't know what we will do," said 
 Joe in answer to Ned, and then he chewed a piece 
 of straw vigorously, as if by that means he hoped to 
 be aided in arriving at some satisfactory conclusion. 
 " You see the trouble is that we've got all this bag- 
 gage to lug 'round, when it's about as much as we 
 can do to get along ourselves." 
 
 " Why don't you leave the things somewhere ? 
 You never can find the man that owns 'era, even if 
 you carry them all the way back to New York," 
 said little Ned sensibly. 
 
 "That's so. Bub," said Joe, "but all the same, 
 you see he told me to take care of them, an' I've 
 got to do it, or else they'll blame me at the office." 
 
 Just then an express wagon passed, which sug- 
 gested to Joe a very simple way of disposing of his 
 burden. 
 
 " I'll tell you what we can do," he said as he 
 started to his feet quickly, while his face lighted up 
 with pleasure at the idea. " We'll walk along until 
 we come to an express office, an' then we'll just 
 
UNWILLING PASSENGERS. 25 
 
 send the valises on to where I work. I know we 
 can do that, for last week somebody sent two 
 trunks there, an' the manager had to pay the bill 
 for bringing them." 
 
 Unfortunately it never occurred to Joe that it 
 also would be possible to get money sufficient to 
 pay for the passage home by telegraphing to the 
 manager of the office. 
 
 " We've got a dollar," he said as they trudged 
 along, the valises seemingly growing heavier each 
 moment, " and jest as soon as we get rid of these 
 we'll get something to eat." 
 
 At the express office the clerk took the baggage 
 and gave Joe a receipt for it without unnecessary 
 conversation. If he had not been so busy he might 
 have asked some questions, and thus the boys 
 would have been advised as to the proper course 
 to pursue ; but as it was they walked out little 
 thinking how much they might have learned, and 
 rejoicing that they were freed from a heavy bur- 
 den. 
 
 After they had made a very satisfactory breakfast 
 on a pie which Joe bought for the small sum of ten 
 
26 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 cents, in consideration of the fact that it was not as 
 fresh as a first-class pie should be, they walked in 
 the direction of the wharves as a first step towards 
 learning how they should get home. 
 
 It surely seemed as if they had been singularly 
 fortunate in taking this step, for they had gone 
 hardly more than a block when they met a boy 
 about ten years old, who appeared to know all 
 about it. It was not a difficult matter to make his 
 acquaintance, for he met their advances considera- 
 bly more than half-way, and in a few moments the 
 three were comfortablv seated on some barrels near 
 the pier, discussing the situation. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 A BROTHER MESSENGER. 
 
 YOU see you have to go up that way to get 
 to New York," said the boy, pointing with 
 an air of wisdom, "an' if you fellers want to get 
 home real bad, I'll carry you there to-raorrow my- 
 self in a boat." 
 
 " How long would it take you ? " asked Joe, 
 just a trifle doubtful as to whether this boy could 
 do as much as he said he could. 
 
 " Only two or three hours if we have a fair 
 wind." 
 
 " But we was all night comin' down in the 
 steamer," remarked Joe quickly. 
 
 " That's nothin'," said the boy contemptuously, 
 
 " for this boat I'm goin' to take you ,in can sail 
 
 more'n four times as fast as any steamer you ever 
 
 saw. Why, she sailed right around Tom Stevens' 
 
 27 
 
28 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 boat the other day, an' there wasn't any wind at 
 all. I tell you what it is, just you come up here 
 with me an' see her, then you'll know what she can 
 do." 
 
 There was no reason why the boys should not 
 accept the offer since they had plenty of time at 
 their disposal, and they started at once. 
 
 " What's your name ? " asked Joe, thinking that 
 perhaps it might be as well to call the boy by his 
 right name, as to be obliged to attract his atten- 
 tion by "say," or "look here." 
 
 " Bartholomew West," was the prompt reply, as 
 the boy looked around much as if he expected they 
 had heard of him, and would recognize the name 
 at once. Not seeing the flush of joy he had ex- 
 pected would lighten up the faces of his acquaint- 
 ances when they knew who he was, he walked on 
 ahead, nmch as if he was angry, until they arrived 
 at the end of the street at the water's edge. 
 
 Bartholomew pointed to a beautiful little yacht 
 that was riding at anchor a short distance, from the 
 shore, and said in a tone of triumph : 
 
 " That's the boat ! " 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 20 
 
 Joe and Ned stood looking at her with such 
 undisguised admiration that Bartholomew seemed 
 willing to forgive their ignorance in not knowing 
 him, and at once entered into a detailed account 
 of what the yacht had done in the the way of sail- 
 ing. 
 
 " Do you s'pose you could manage her ? " asked 
 Joe. " You see I don't know anything about boats, 
 an' of course this little shaver here don't." * 
 
 " Manage her ? Why, I could ^ail a whole ship 
 all alone if I wanted to," was the confident reply. 
 " Now you fellers be ready just as soon as it's light 
 to-morrow mornin', an' we'll start.'' 
 
 " Then you'll have to come back alone,'' and Joe 
 began to fear that they were accepting too much 
 from this new acquaintance, who must belong to 
 some important family in the city since he was the 
 owner of such a beautiful craft. 
 
 " Well, I hain't sure hut I shall stay in New York 
 after I get there, an' if I do I'll give you fellows 
 lots of sails in the boat. You see I'm — " 
 
 Bartholomew had assumed a confidential tone, 
 much as if he were about to impart some important 
 
50 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 secret ; but evidently concluded not to, since he 
 stopped suddenly, and looked as if he had already 
 betrayed too much. 
 
 " Why can't we go now ? " asked Ned, who was 
 growing more and more homesick each moment. 
 
 "We can't start until to-morrow morning," said 
 Bartholomew decidedly, " 'cause we couldn't get 
 the boat till then. You see some of the men will 
 be aboard of her pretty soon now." 
 
 " Couldn't get the boat ? " repeated Joe in sur- 
 prise. '' Why can't you have her whenever you 
 want her if she's yours ? " 
 
 " Well — well — you see some other fellers are 
 going to have her to-day," said the boy in confu- 
 sion. 
 
 " If she was my boat I wouldn't lend her to any- 
 body," said Ned, gazing at the beautiful yacht. 
 
 " I have to sometimes," said Bartholomew ; "but 
 we can get her to-morrow mornin' if we're down 
 here early enough." 
 
 It never occurred to Joe that his new acquaint- 
 ance intended to steal the yacht ; he had no idea 
 but that the boy owned her, although it did seem 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 3I 
 
 a little queer that he did not offer to take them on 
 board then. " But what'll we do all da}' an' to- 
 night?" he asked finally. "We hain't got but 
 ninety cents, an' — " 
 
 " Ninety cents ! " exclaimed the yacht-owner. 
 " Have you fellers got ninety cents ? " 
 
 Joe explained how it happened that they had 
 that amount, and Master West was so delighted 
 that he acted very much as if he wanted to embrace 
 them. " You stay right with me," he said as he 
 took each by the arm in an affectionate manner. 
 "I'll show. you where you can sleep, an' nobody 
 won't ever find you. Now come up with me, so's 
 we can get what we want." 
 
 " What we want ? " 
 
 "Why, yes, if we're goin' to sail from here to 
 New York we've got to have some things to eat, so 
 we'll go up an' get some candy, an' some peanuts, 
 an' crackers, an' a lot of things." 
 
 Joe was not just certain whether or no it was 
 wise for him to spend his money, although it did 
 seem as if it was his duty to do so since Bartholo- 
 mew was going to take them home. 
 
32 A ijIStRiCT MESSENGER BoV. 
 
 He did as the owner of the yacht proposed, 
 spending half of his money in the purchase of such 
 dainties as Master West fancied, and then, in order 
 to see if they had been cheated, as Bartholomew 
 said, sat down on a doorstep to test the goods. 
 
 It seemed to Joe as if Master West ate a much 
 larger proportion of the articles he had purchased 
 than was strictly necessary in order to learn 
 whether they were as they had been represented, 
 since more than half the stock had been consumed 
 before the question was decided. Of course Ned 
 and Joe ate some of the dainties ; but they only 
 tagted of them while Bartholomew had a regular 
 feast, and only stopped when, by eating as much 
 as possible, he had lost his appetite for such things. 
 
 After this repast was ended, and the remainder 
 of the eatables packed away in Joe's and Ned's 
 pockets, Bartholomew appeared to have lost his 
 desire to show his new acquaintances around the 
 city; he still said that he would carry them to 
 New York on the following morning, but he seemed 
 to think that they should be able to care for them- 
 selves until then. 
 
A Brother messenger. 33 
 
 " I've got to lay 'round so's to find out whether 
 anybody's goin' to be on the boat this evenin'," he 
 said, "an' you fellers had better wait on the wharf 
 awhile. Perliaps we can all sleep on board the 
 boat to-night, an' if we can, I'll come back for you 
 and take you aboard." 
 
 " Where are you going now ? " asked Joe. 
 
 " Over near where the boat is." 
 ■ " Why can't we go with you ? " 
 
 " It wouldn't do, 'cause somebody might see 
 you, an' then they would know what we was up to." 
 
 " What if they should ? " asked Joe quickly, be- 
 ginning to think that the yacht owner did not appear 
 to have many rights on board of his own vessel. 
 " Can't you take your boat when you want to ? " 
 
 "Oh, I'll tell you all about it to-morrow, after 
 we're on the way to New York," said Master West. 
 " You stay right around the wharf till I come back." 
 
 Before either Joe or Ned could prevent him, he 
 had darted away in the direction of the yacht, leav- 
 ing his two friends at whose expense he had just 
 been feasting, to look out for themselves. 
 
 " Do you know, Ned, I don't believe that feller 
 
34 A OiSTRiCT Messenger boy. 
 
 owns the whole of the boat, 'cause he acts so queer 
 about her, an' I'm ahnost sorry we spent that money 
 for what we did. You see it belojigs to the office, 
 and when I get bacl< an' tell the manager that I 
 had to spend it to get something to eat, he'll take 
 it out of my wages." 
 
 " I wish we was home, an' my papa would give 
 you the money to pay back," said Ned warmly. 
 " Oh, dear, have we got to stay here a whole 
 night?" 
 
 " I'm 'fraid we have, Ned, an' it makes me feel 
 awful bad to think about mother. She must be 
 about crazy 'cause I don't come home, an' as likely 
 as not the manager thinks I run away with the 
 money." 
 
 "My papa had gone away, so he don't know that 
 I didn't come home,'' said Ned with quivering lip ; 
 " but my mamma is feeling as bad as yours is." 
 
 " Yes, Ned, but we won't talk about it now 'cause 
 it don't make me feel very good. We'll wait awhile, 
 an' if that West boy don't come We'll start off som'e 
 where, 'cause I'd rnthev walk than stay 'rounft 
 here." 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 35 
 
 "Don't you s'pose the captain of the steamboat 
 would let us go back if we should tell him what 
 made us come here? I'm sure my mother would 
 pay him when we got home," said Ned. 
 
 " Do you s'pose she'd have money enough ? You 
 know it would cost much as two or three dollars 
 apiece." 
 
 " Course she's got enough. Why, sir, if she 
 wanted as much as twenty dollars she could get it, 
 my mother could." 
 
 " Then let's go right down to the steamboat an' 
 see if they'll take us, you are a sensible little chap,'' 
 and Joe started to his feet; but he stopped sud- 
 denly as a second thought came to him. " It 
 wouldn't do to go, 'cause the man that stole you is 
 waitin' round there prob'ly, an' he'd catch you 
 sure." 
 
 "Oh, dear, I'd forgot all about him," said the 
 child. 
 
 Joe made no reply ; seated on a pile of boards, 
 with his chin in his hands, he gave himself up to 
 the most gloomy reflections, so hopeless did the 
 case seem. He had remained in this sorrowful 
 
36 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOV. 
 
 attitude some moments, with Ned silent by his 
 side, when both were startled by a shout : 
 
 " Hello, there ! why hain't you up to the office ? " 
 
 Joe sprang to his feet. He saw just behind him 
 a boy about his own age, in the uniform of a Dis- 
 trict Messenger. " Why, you hain't one of our 
 boys, are you ? Where did you come from ? " con- 
 tinued the new comer. 
 
 Joe looked first at the uniform and then at the 
 boy that wore it as if uncertain whether lie could 
 trust the evidences of his own senses. 
 
 " Well," said the messenger, " what's the matter 
 with you now ? Does it overcome you very much 
 to see me.'"' 
 
 " Where did you come from ? " asked Joe. 
 
 " Come from ? Why, I belong here. What are 
 you doin' ? Where do you work ? " 
 
 " In New York." 
 
 " New York ! " exclaimed the boy, and he uttered 
 aproloriged whistle. " You don't mean to say that 
 you was sent way down here with a message, do 
 you?" 
 
 " See here," Joe made up his mind in an instant. 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 37 
 
 "I'm in an awful bad scrape,, an' so is this little 
 feller; sit down here an' I'll tell you all about it." 
 
 "All right; but I guess we'd better get behind 
 those barrels, 'cause if anybody should see me 
 they'd think I ought to go back to the office, even 
 if I have got half an hour off." 
 
 A convenient place for conversation was found 
 behind some barrels, where the two were almost 
 completely screened from view, and then Joe told 
 the story ; but not without many interruptions in 
 the way of exclamations of surprise, almost incre- 
 dulity, from his brother messenger. He concluded 
 by telling the story of their meeting with Master 
 West, and his offer to take them to New York in 
 his yacht. 
 
 "Was it Bart West that you met?" asked the 
 boy. 
 
 " His name was Bartholemew.'' 
 
 " An' where is the boat ? " 
 
 Joe explained as well as he was able the locality 
 in which they had seen the yacht, and the messen- 
 ger said quickly ; 
 
 "Well, you don't want to have anything to do 
 
38 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 with that feller, 'caOse he's a reg'lar duffer. He's 
 too lazy to work, an' he hangs round tlie city like 
 ^loafer. That boat hain't his at all. I know who 
 owns her. Bart West hain'f got money enough to 
 buy one end of a punt. He was goin' to steal the 
 yacht, that's what he was going to do, if he was go- 
 in' to do anything, an' if you had gone off with him 
 you'd got into a pile of trouble.'' 
 
 Quite naturally, both Joe and Ned were alarmed 
 at the narrow escape-they had had, for they would 
 have gone with Bart West without a question. 
 
 " Well, how are you goin' to get home?" asked 
 the Providence boy. 
 
 "That's just what we don't know. We don't 
 dare to go to the steamer, 'cause that man might 
 catch Ned again. I'm afraid we'll have to walk 
 if that West boy don't own the boat." 
 
 " Walk ! "echoed the messenger, " why, it would 
 take you a year to do it, an' then I hain't sure that 
 you could get there." 
 
 " Well, what can we do ? Can't you help us some- 
 how if you know all the folks here ? " 
 
 "I s'pose I could," said the new acquaintance 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 39 
 
 as he rubbed his chin reflectively. " If I should 
 tell our manager about it, I guess he could tele- 
 graph to New York to find out if it was all right, 
 an' then he could fix it so's you could go back on 
 the boat ; but he couldn't send the other feller, 'cause 
 you see he hain't one of the crowd." 
 
 " Oh, don't go away an' leave me here, will you, 
 Joe.'"' asked Ned imploringly, a sense of 'utter 
 loneliness coming over him as he thought of what 
 might happen to him if he were left alone. 
 
 "Indeed I won't, Ned. If we can't get home 
 together I'll stay and go with you if we have to 
 walk every step of the way." 
 
 Ned stole his hand shyly into Joe's, to thank 
 him for the promise, and the messenger said in a 
 tone of superior wisdom : 
 
 " You see if lie was a messenger like we are, it 
 would be all right ; but I'm most sure our manager 
 wouldn't have anything to do with him. But you 
 stay here, an' I'll tell him what you've said, an' 
 then I'll come back to let you know what he's go- 
 mg to do about it." 
 The boy leaped out of the hiding-place, running 
 
40 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 swiftly towards the office as if he would scorn to 
 walk while he had his uniform on, and Ned and 
 Joe were left alone, two very forsaken feeling lit- 
 tle fellows, even though there was a faint prospect 
 that they might escape from their present difficulty. 
 
 Joe was obliged to repeat again and again to his 
 weary little charge that he would remain with him, 
 and they were talking of what they would do in 
 case they were obliged to walk home, when sud- 
 denly they heard Master West calling to them. 
 
 " Well, what is it ? " asked Joe coojly, feeling 
 that he had good cause for complaint against this 
 boy who would have allowed them to get into trou- 
 ble by going away in a stolen boat. 
 
 "Come up town an' get some more things; we 
 hain't got half enough to last us to New York." 
 
 " I guess not," said Joe. " I hain't goin' to spend 
 any more money for such things, and too, we won't 
 go with you in the boat if we never get home." 
 
 "Why not?" and Bartholomew stood before 
 them a perfect picture of painful surprise. 
 
 " Well, you see we hahi't sure that you own the 
 boat, an' we concluded not to run any risks," 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 43 
 
 "S'posen I don't own the boat, so long as I can 
 get her. I'll fix all that, an' you've only got to 
 come along." 
 
 " I guess we can walk, thank'ee. We'd rather do 
 that than steal a boat." 
 
 " Oh, you're too much of a girl to suit me, if you 
 don't dare to do a little thing like that," said Mas- 
 ter West loftily, and then he walked slowly away, 
 much as if he expected the boys would call him 
 back wheif they found that he was really intending 
 to leave them to their fate. 
 
 " We want to get home pretty bad," said Joe ; 
 " but not so much that we're willing to steal a boat 
 to go in." 
 
 " All right, you can stay here an' starve to death 
 for all I care. You'll be sorry, though." 
 
 " I^«'1I be sorry, Bart West," cried a voice from 
 up the street; "but you can't get any messenger 
 boy to go in with you when you're goin' to steal 
 Mr. Longley's yacht." 
 
 "Then it was you, George Browning, who told 
 these fellers that the boat wasn't mine ? ' sqid 
 Bart angrily. 
 
44 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 "Yes, it was," replied the messenger who ap- 
 peared excited, " an' these fellers can get home 
 without you, for our manager says he'll pay their 
 fare. He telegraphed to New York, an' if the lit- 
 tle feller's name is Edward Hawley, he's goin' to 
 give 'em all they want to eat, an' buy a state-room, 
 an' they are to go like reg'lar swells." 
 
 " 'Tis Edward Hawley," piped Ned, jumping up 
 on his tired little' feet. 
 
 It was not many seconds before Joe and Ned 
 were out from' behind the barrels, questioning 
 George in breathless excitement. 
 
 "The manager of your ofifice had telegraphed 
 down here to know if you come on the boat," said 
 George as soon as the boys gave him an opportu- 
 nity to speak, "an' to pay your fare back if you 
 was here. So when I told our manager, he knew 
 all about it. Then when I told him about the other 
 feller, he said folks in New York had been tele- 
 graphing all around the country for a boy by the 
 name of Edward Hawley. Now you'd better come 
 up to the office, an' everything '11 be all right." 
 
 As may be imagined, it was not many moments 
 
A BROTHER MESSENGER. 4S 
 
 before Joe and Ned were telling their stories to 
 the manager of the office in which George was em- 
 ployed, and then their troubles were over. The 
 fact that they were in Providence and safe was tel- 
 egraphed to New York at once, and George was de- 
 tailed to show the boys around the city until time 
 for the boat to leave, for Mr. Hawley had sent word 
 that Ned should be supplied with what he needed 
 to make him comfortable and happy. 
 
 Nothing more was seen of Master West, and the 
 two boys returned to New York on the same 
 steamer on which they had been involuntary pas- 
 sengers the night previous. 
 
 " Hello, there's the man come to look for his 
 valises," said Joe next morning, as he and Ned 
 stood by the rail while the steamer was being warped 
 into the dock. " I s'pose he'll be mad now 'cause 
 I sent them on by express." 
 
 " Why, that's my father /" exclaimed Ned, when 
 Joe had pointed his employer out from among the 
 crowd on the pier. 
 
 It was indeed the case ; and the reason why Mr. 
 Hawley had not come to relieve Joe was that word 
 
46 A DISTRICT MESSENGER BOY. 
 
 of Ned's non-appearance at home had been sent to 
 him nearly an hour before the steamer sailed. 
 
 Joe went back to the office, after he had been 
 home to see his mother, but he did not remain 
 there very long, for Mr., Hawley gave him a posi- 
 tion in his store, in return for his kindness to Ned, 
 and to-day the District Messenger boy is in a fair 
 way to become a successful merchant. 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 AN old guide and trapper in the mountains 
 and the plains, an ex-soldier with a grizzled 
 beard, shaggy eyebrows, and kindly eyes — two 
 boys of ten and twelve found John-Cendrill more 
 irresistible than a volume of fairy tales or any book 
 of travels they had ever encountered. They knew 
 by instinct that he had all sorts of adventures to 
 relate, and treated him as if he were a fascinating 
 volume and it 'was their privilege to turn over a 
 new leaf of him every day. 
 
 They were camping in the Adirondacks, and the 
 very first night they got off as soon as their own 
 supper was finished to look up the old guide. 
 They came upon him lying on some hemlock boughs 
 with his head braced up against a log, his feet to- 
 ward the fire, and they rushed upon him from the 
 shadow of a pine-tree like two small keen wolves 
 47 
 
48' WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 " Oh ! I knew you were tharabouts — you hain't 
 surprised me," he said as they settled down on either 
 side of him. 
 
 " Yet we came as still as mice," said Harry. 
 
 "You rustled a little, and your buttons were 
 shiny, " said John, showing the trained keenness 
 of ears and eyes which a long residence among 
 wild things gives one. " I commenced looking out 
 for Indians and deer and rabbits before I was half 
 as old as you are," he added, turning to Will, the 
 younger boy, " I hain't never got over the habit." 
 
 This was exactly what Will and Harry hoped for. 
 It sounded like a beginning, a sort of fly-leaf or 
 preface to their volume. 
 
 " Where were you when you saw deer and In- 
 dians and rabbits ? " said Harry. 
 
 " I was a boy five years old," said the guide," and 
 it was in 1832. That isn't quite as far back as the 
 Revolution, you know, so I wasn't in Braddock's 
 army if you're looking round to see if I knew any 
 regular heroes. I didn't know any but a common 
 lot of men — though I'm not sure but they was 
 heroes, the whole crowd of 'em, men, women, and 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 49 
 
 all. We was a large party — nigh on to a hundred 
 and fifty of us, I should think, all told, with wagons, 
 them regular wagons with white canvas tops — we 
 used to look when we was stretched out in a string 
 on some of those big plains, as if we was a whole 
 regiment of tents walking off on wheels. We were 
 emigratin' to Oregon. My father and mother 
 wanted to go so is to be better off, and they took 
 me because they could not leave me. , To me it was 
 all fun. I hadn't any of the thoughts that made all 
 the grown people look ahead of 'em kind o' fearful 
 — Injuns and sickness and that long trip, taking 
 months on the road and then a wild new country 
 when we got to it — I hadn't any knowledge and 
 so no apprehensions. What lots of things folk 
 have to learn ! It took me years to get that fore- 
 lookin' cast to my eyes that I used to see in the eyes 
 of the men on that trip — the women had the look 
 too — I'd see it in my mother's face sometimes 
 when we was restin' toward night and had eat our 
 supper she'd stoop to pick me up, and she always 
 looked out over the plain to the hills beyond when 
 she straightened up with me in her arms. But I 
 
WAGON-TiRE CAMP. 
 
 liked that riding all day over the grass and seeing 
 the long-eared rabbits jump away and scoot off. 
 " At night we always camped together and they'd 
 
 i.jgntejLi.u i J 
 
 " MY MOTHER HAD THAT FORECASTING LOOK IN HER EYES." 
 
 turn the horses loose to eat the grass, hitching their 
 heads, with a short rope to their legs so's they could 
 eat but not makin' it long enough for 'em to rare 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. C t 
 
 up and run off. Then we'd all kindle fires and 
 fry bacon and bake bread for the next day in a 
 skillet, and eat our suppers and then climb into the 
 wagons again to sleep. The men that was to be on 
 guard all night would look after their guns — mus- 
 kets they was with flint locks ; I used to go to sleep 
 hearing the coyotes bark and sometimes the howl 
 of the big gray wolves — they are dangerous, but I 
 did not know it then. I left all my responsibilities 
 to my father and mother. I did not expect they'd 
 let me get eat, and I wasn't disappointed. 
 
 " Sometimes we'd see troops of deer and we'd 
 always hope they would come near enough for us to 
 shoot and the young men wanted to get on to the 
 horses and ride after them. But the older men 
 would shake their heads, point way off, and say 
 ' these horses have got to get us a good many hun- 
 dred miles along before we've done with them and 
 we'd better not be using them to run after any 
 small fry.' It was words of wisdom and we were 
 glad afterwards that they'd listened. When we 
 come into the buffalo region it was different; we'd 
 get a shot at some of them without much trouble. 
 
52 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 " One night I remember I vvas awaked by a great 
 shouting and confusion and men rushing round, and 
 then there was a sound like thunder ; it roared up 
 and grew and the earth shook, and then it died 
 away again. I sat up on my little bed, and they 
 told me it was buffalo going by. We'd seen a good 
 many buffalo the day before — parts I suppose of 
 a great herd and probably there was Injuns after 
 them with their arrows, and they'd frightened them 
 in the night so that the whole herd had started off 
 on a dead run going they did not know where, nor 
 care. When a herd gets started in that way, noth- 
 ing .on the face of the earth can stop therft. They'll 
 roll off high ledges, or run into a river and get 
 drowned. The hind ones crowd the forrad ones, 
 and away they go blind-mad, tearing along, making 
 the earth rock, and running down everything that 
 comes in their way. Our guard heard this mob 
 coming, and they knew there wasn't any chance 
 for us if we was in their road, and they tried to get 
 in the horses so as not to have them frightened 
 and then they all got in behind the wagons and 
 that was all they could do. But lucky for us they 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 53 
 
 did not happen to turn our way. But I never shall 
 forget the sound of that tramp and roar and the 
 shouts of our men. 
 
 " I must say there was a kind of rough sameness 
 about it — a thousand miles or so of picnicking. 
 Different you know from coming up here in the 
 Adirondacks for two months and then going back 
 into civilization again. Well, we had a variety 
 after a while — though that was rough too. We 
 began to see signs of Indians when we got near 
 Snake River." 
 
 " What are signs of Indians ? " asked Will sud- 
 denly. 
 
 " Well, sometimes it's one thing, and sometimes 
 it's another. We'd find what there was left of a 
 dead buffalo that had been killed with an arrow, 
 and we'd see where there had been a camp fire, 
 and once or twice we'd catch sight of them — they 
 would be disappearing, somewhere — going into the 
 ground it seemed as if they did sometimes ; I sup- 
 pose they would hide somehow, dive into the gully 
 of a creek, or lie down fiat till we stopped looking 
 for them. Some of the old scouts and hunters 
 
54 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 with US began to look uneasy and said they was 
 feelin' us and by and by they'd be down on us. 
 Sure enough, in a day or two more they was. It 
 was towards night. The horses were tired and the 
 men too, but everybody got a rousin' up when 
 we saw a whole party of 'em canterin' toward us, 
 yellin' like mad, but not wastin' any arrows till they 
 got near enough to hit. There wasn't nobody hurt 
 that time. Indians are kind o' cowardly — they 
 won't fight in a real stand-up and knock-down way 
 until they can out-number you. Then sometimes 
 they'll pile in and you can have a little fun with 
 them at close range. They went off yellin' after 
 about three rounds with their arrows and we looked 
 round and found there wasn't anything more hurt 
 than one of the mules had got an arrow stuck through 
 one of his big ears. He had brayed and kicked, 
 but nobody paid any attention till after 'twas over, 
 and then they found the reason, and we all laughed, 
 and his master took it out and scratched his head 
 and told him he was a beauty and gave him a little 
 extra feed, and he was all right the next morning. 
 .\s for me, I wasn't allowed to s^? mugh of it. 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 S 
 
 My mother bundled me up quicker than lightning, 
 wrapped blankets around me and put me into the 
 bottom of our wagon. I think there was so many 
 blankets round me, an arrow head couldn't have got 
 through unless it had been on a bean pole, but she 
 was afraid still, and she held me tight in her arms 
 all the time. She never said anything, only held 
 me tight and put her head close down to where she 
 knew mine was in the blankets. 
 
 " In two or three days more we had another just 
 such a fight, and then we got to the banks of the 
 Snake River. Some of the scauts took a kind of a 
 squint up and down the bank and hesitated a little 
 and then said we'd start across. The river looked 
 pretty full though it had not rained ; those rivers fill 
 up with snow-water from mountains sometimes, and 
 it's dreadful deceiving. Then we had the Indians 
 behind us as we thought, and we felt obliged to go 
 on. That first team was two pairs of mules and 
 they acted queer — wouldn't go into the water, and 
 the men had to get on to their backs and whack 
 them very — very earnestly indeed, to start 'em in. 
 3ure enough — they hadn't more'n got well in, be- 
 
56 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 fore the leaders began to swim and another minute 
 the second paii; had to do likewise and then the 
 wagon floated and they began to go down stream 
 which made matters worse, because they might get 
 carried too far to land. But the men kept whack- 
 ing — and — exhorting, so to speak, and they got 
 out into the middle and then, whoo-o-o-p ! there 
 was a yell from the other bank and the Injuns 
 bobbed up like water-rats all along, and whistle — 
 phitt, their arrows began to fly like hail round 'em. 
 The men kept cool. They unhooked or else cut the 
 traces, and I tell you when they headed them mules 
 round there wasn't much hesitation about coming 
 back. This time one of the men got an arrow into 
 his ribs, and another one got hurt, and the mules 
 looked like pincushions — Arrows stickin' in 'em. 
 " They said 'twas mere luck we had not all been 
 killed. If the Indians had had a little more strength 
 of mind and waited till more of us got flustered by 
 the deep water, they'd 've just had us easy. But 
 they was so tickled to see us coming right over to 
 them that they lost their balances and hurrahed too 
 §oon — that saved us. 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 57 
 
 " We was glad we hadn't started in more than 
 one team. The others had hung back a Uttle to 
 see how the first one got on. But it was aggravat- 
 ing to see that wagon float down the stream and the 
 current take it over to the other side and then In- 
 dians haul it in and go caperin' round with the 
 things that was in it — shakin' 'em in our faces. 
 We couldn't help firing at them once or twice 
 though we knew we was so far off we could not hit 
 'em. 
 
 " Well, we camped on the bank where we were, 
 and what was more, we staid there all winter. 
 Them Indians never let up on us till snow came — 
 there couldn't a man on a horse straggle a half 
 mile from the camp, but that he got an arrow in him, 
 or singin' past his ear, so that he had to come 
 tearing back again, thankful if he had saved his 
 scalp. I suppose some of those people slept 
 soundly till the snow came. After that we were a 
 little more comfortable. 
 
 " Well, spring came finally, and one day we all 
 forded the river, horses and mules and cattle, 
 women and babies, and wagons and all — we got 
 
58 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 safely across. We thought 'twas ahnost a miracle 
 and like the Jews crossing the Red Sea. But the 
 Indians were on the other side of the river most as 
 quick as we were, and began pesterin' us again. 
 'Twas like the Philistines that was always pitching 
 against the Israelites and leading 'em a life. It 
 got so finally if you had said ' Indians ' ! to one 
 of our men when he was asleep he'd have his gun 
 in his hand before his eyes was open and be out, 
 firing at something before he was awake. 
 
 " It warn't a bit funny, though one night some- 
 thing funny happened. We was camped near a 
 little river, and a buffalo swam across, and came 
 bumping up the bank. The sentry on that side 
 heard him blowin' and snortin' and knew what 
 'twas and so hadn't given any alarm, but the beast 
 got scared, seeing pur fires, lost his wits, and came 
 thundering into camp head and tail up and bellow- 
 ing like the bull he was. Some of our men were 
 asleep on the ground and he ran along close by 
 their heads — 'twas a wonder he did not step on 
 their noses. Everybody thought it was Indians that 
 had got in at last and every man reaphed put fpr 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 59 
 
 his gun ; but it was only one old lonesome buffalo 
 who was scared 'most to death. A dog barked at 
 him and he ran in another direction and finally 
 bolted under our wagon, giving us a shaking up like 
 an earthquake, and then away he rattled off into 
 the dark again. It was all over 'most as soon as it 
 begun and father came back laughing and the noise 
 settled down as quick as it begun. 
 
 " I ain't a-going to tell you boys how serious 
 matters was a-gettin' any more than that they just 
 was serious, and we called a council one day and 
 decided to turn from the trail we had been follow- 
 ing and get in among the hills and so be out of the 
 Indians' way. They'd killed some of our men, you 
 know, and was — unpleasant generally. So we did 
 that ; and instead of wide plains all around and deer 
 and buffalo and elk feeding round the hills was close 
 on to us and birds and berries and trees, differ- 
 ent from any we'd seen before. We had a new 
 trouble though, if we didn't have Indians. On the 
 plains we didn't need a road. You could always 
 
 a- 
 
 go somewhere — if it was marshy in one place it 
 wasn't in ai^other and you could always go round it. 
 
6o WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 But in the hills there were rocks and trees and 
 swamps and no getting away from them, and instead 
 of turning out to fight Indians we had to turn out 
 and make roads. It was pretty hard on the horses 
 too, and some of them died, or got so poor we 
 couldn't work 'em and had to leave them behind. 
 
 " So things was getting serious again. We slept 
 better nights, but had to work harder days and 
 there wasn't anything in the way of game to shoot 
 as there had been, and we had to eat pretty much 
 the same things all the time. 
 
 "Well, the council settled that. we had lost so 
 many horses and wagons, that we was in great dan- 
 ger of losing all the rest and starving to death there 
 in the wilderness, and the best thing was for a 
 number of the men to take some of the best horses 
 and go on to Fort Walla-Walla and send back a 
 strong party to us ; and the rest of us meanwhile 
 to stay where we was. It really was the best way, 
 but when the morning came and my father was 
 among the men to go and mother saw him get on 
 to his horse and face into them woods, she just 
 broke down and cried and sat th^e huggin' me on 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 6t 
 
 I 
 
 the steps of the wagon for hours after they was out 
 of sight. I suppose I was like other boys and it 
 made me feel pretty bad to see my mother cry ; but 
 after a while I got hungry and I began to fret. 
 Then she felt as if she hadn't been kind to me and 
 she stirred round and got the best dinner she could. 
 But the best she could get was only fried pork and 
 saleratus bread and^e'd had that nigh on to forty 
 years, as it sedmed to me, and I couldn't eat much 
 and she noticed that and was afraid I was pinin'. 
 
 " We'd been left with the wagons drawn around 
 in a circle and inside we had our fires, and we slept 
 every night in the wagons. But instead of hearing 
 the buffalo bellow and the little coyotes bark, there 
 would be the rustle of the wind in the trees and 
 then sometimes a loud sound like firing a cannon 
 a mile or so away from us. I used to hear that sound 
 and it gave me a sensation down my back and I'd ; 
 cuddle closer up to my mother, because I always 
 knew she would keep everything off. One day I 
 asked an old guide who had been in Lewis & Clarke's 
 Company when/ they crossed the Rockies in 1805 
 what those noises was. I expected he'd laugh at 
 
62 WAGON-tiRE CAMP. 
 
 me and think I was a 'fraid-cat ; but he didn't. He 
 said Lewis & Clarke had heard them but did not 
 know what they was. They asked the Indians and 
 they said there was rich ores in the bosom of the 
 mountains, guarded by spirits of evil. And some- 
 times the mountains would rend and groan with the 
 hot veins in them. It was queer that them Indians 
 had this tradition, for they never tried to find gold 
 or silver themselves and nobody thought at that 
 time there could be any truth at the bottom of the 
 story. Gold wasn't discovered so's to be known 
 until -1849, in California. But I guess there was a 
 kind of an idea about it in the air as far back as 
 1832. Perhaps it was handed down from Columbus. 
 Them Spaniards, you know, was crazy after gold. 
 
 " Well, as I said, my mother thought I was kind 
 o' pinin' for a change in my victuals and she made 
 the old guide show her the kind of roots the Indi- 
 ans dig up and eat when there ain't no more buffalo 
 meat in their pantries. He'd et all kinds of things 
 when he was with Lewis & Clarke — choke-cheriy 
 soup, boiled dog and raw horse, and he said they 
 wasn't bad if you was pretty hungry. There's a kind 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMf. (■ j 
 
 of thistle, and a wild liquorice and a wild fennel ar»d 
 an artichoke-like root that was ali good ; but the 
 thistle root was the best — sweet as sugar, power- 
 ful good to a boy that hadn't seen candy for a year 
 and never seen but mighty little anyway. So wc 
 used to go out and get thistles often, and some- 
 times two or three of the other women would go 
 too — never very far, because we still had a fear of 
 Indians. Them thistle roots was as long as any on 
 'em East here, where the farmers hate 'em and say 
 their roots run down to China, and we'd have to 
 pull and dig tremendous. My mother noticed how 
 often there was little yellow grains mixed in with 
 the sand and sometimes whole pieces ; not like 
 pebbles — they was different feelin'. She looked 
 kind o' queer at 'em one day, and began to save 
 them — the pebble-like bits, and the dust too. The 
 other women noticed what she was doing and then 
 they all looked at each other as if the same idea had 
 knocked 'em, and after that they always saved the 
 yellow-looking stuff and I was allowed to dig up all 
 the thistles I liked. 
 
 " It seemed a dreadful long time we waited for 
 
64 WAGON-TIRE CAMf. 
 
 that party to get back that had gone off into the 
 wilderness, and one morning a woman said to my 
 mother, ' Seems to me my ears'll crack off listenin'' 
 to hear the three guns.' That was to be the signal 
 of the party's return so't we might know they 
 wasn't Indians. She hadn't more'n said the words 
 when we heard first one gun and then another and 
 another, fired close along to each other. They wasn't 
 any mistake about them sounds. Mountains full of 
 gold and silver never had the heart in 'em or behind 
 'em that those guns had, and we all danced about and 
 was crazier for joy than that buffalo 'd been with 
 the camp fires and pretty soon they hove in sight 
 threadin' along through the trees on their horses. 
 How glad we all was to see them, and they to see 
 us alive and well, I can't never tell. The bears 
 hadn't got 'em, nor the Indians, and they hadn't 
 been sick, and nothing had got us either. We had 
 a day of rejoicin', and the next day we was to pack up 
 and go off. Everything had to go on the backs of 
 the horses or else not go at all — the wagons was 
 to be left. They'd brought some spare horses with 
 them and some of the horses that was left behind 
 
WAOON-TIRE CAMP. 65 
 
 had eat grass and grown fat and rested so they was 
 as good as ever. 
 
 " My mother showed the dust she had found to 
 my father and asked him if he thought it looked like 
 anything. He got her idea but he hadn't none of 
 the queer feelin's about the sounds, or the Indian 
 stories, and he laughed and said he guessed there 
 was a good deal o' clay in that soil and he didn't 
 believe 'twas anything more'n some kind of dirt. 
 My mother didn't say nothing. Women is wise 
 about that. "But I noticed she did the dirt up in a 
 little bag and put it among the blankets, and that 
 bag went with us all the way to Fort Walla-Walla. 
 
 " We got through somehow, to the fort. It's like 
 a long bad dream to me now. Of course I was so lit- 
 tle they gave me the easiest side of everything, but 
 I knew in a dumb sort of a way how hard it all was, 
 arid I don't think I laughed much till we got in 
 sight of the fort. . We must have been a hard- 
 lookin' crowd when we got in. We'd been a'most 
 two years away from (yvilization — our clothes was 
 ragged and our blankets, and some of us hadn't any 
 blankets at all but buffalo skins. Mother said she 
 
66 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 was glad there wasn't any white women besides our 
 party in the fort because she looked so. 
 
 " There was a store at the fort where they kept 
 all kinds of things for tradin' with the Indians, and 
 my mother went there as soon as she could. She 
 had that little bag o' dust in her hand, and she 
 showed it to the man. He glanced at it kind o' 
 easy at first, and was going to laugh just as father 
 had but she shook a little round in her hand and he 
 took another look and stopped laughing. 
 
 " ' Let me take some of it, and you "step in here,' 
 said he. It was a great barn of a room built out 
 of logs bigger than your waist, and there was 
 skins of bears and wolves and otter and beaver all 
 piled up on one side, and on the other was shelves 
 with calico and beads and coarse woolen cloth and 
 knives and little looking-glasses. 
 
 " The man beckoned her into a little ofRce-like- 
 room, built into the big room, and there he poured 
 something on to the yellow stuff, aqua fortis or 
 vitriol perhaps, or something — at any rate the 
 dirt did not go away but shone up brighter than 
 ever, and then the . man turned to mother with a 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 67 
 
 wondering look in his eyes, and said, 'that is worth 
 twenty dollars an ounce. Where did you get it ? 
 You can buy blankets or anything you want. Or 
 shall I give you the money for it ? ' 
 
 " Mother was so tickled, she didn't know whether 
 she most wanted to tell father, or get the calico 
 stuff. She laughed right out loud, the first time 
 I'd heard her in many a long day. She got some 
 blankets, and some cloth for me a suit, and then 
 she ran off and showed them to father. 
 
 "'That's what I got for the yellow clay,' said 
 she. 
 
 " You may believe he stared ; and she told the 
 other women and there was great excitement 
 through the camp. 
 
 " Well, that was really the first discovery of gold 
 in the great West. It set everybody a-fire just as 
 it did when they found bits of gold in the flume of 
 Sutter's mill sixteen or seventeen years later. 
 
 " A party was made up right off to go back to 
 Wagon-Tire Camp as we'd called it, and see what 
 more there was to be found. My father would have 
 gone with the rest, though mother urged him not 
 
68 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 to go, and I hung on to him, I remember, as hard 
 as I could. He was took sick the day before they 
 started and so he stayed behind. It was a great 
 disappointment; and more than ever, when he 
 got well, he had that forecastin' look in his eyes 
 and he'd turn and look ever so many times a day 
 toward where that party had been lost sight of in 
 the woods going joyfully to find their fortunes at 
 Wagon-Tire Camp." 
 
 John paused here and remained silent. 
 
 " Well ? " said Harry after he had waited what 
 he thought was a respectful interval, "what hap- 
 pened then ? " 
 
 " Well, my father made a decent living for a good 
 many years as a farmer, gave me as fair an educa- 
 tion as he'd had himself and I lived with him until 
 I enlisted in 1862. I had the war fever more than 
 I ever had the gold fever." 
 
 " But the party that went off to find the yellow 
 dust?" said Will. 
 
 "Oh, them," said John, "they never come 
 back again, not a man of 'em. The Indians 
 wiped 'em out, we suppose, every soul of 'em ; and 
 
WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 69 
 
 what's more, it happened to any party that went 
 after them — the same thing, or else they never 
 found the place. One of those two things it al- 
 ways was. Either they never come back at all, or 
 else they come back and hadn't found the place. 
 I used to wonder sometimes if the Indians' evil 
 spirits did guard the spot." 
 
 John made another long pause as if he had fin- 
 ished ; it was getting late, but the boys still had a 
 feeling that there was another leaf in this chapter 
 and did not move. 
 
 They had their reward. Presently John went 
 on. 
 
 "I 'listed, as I said, in '62, and went into the 
 regular army. I liked it pretty well and stayed in 
 after the war was over. My father and mother 
 was both dead and I didn't want to go back to the 
 farm. It was lonesome without my mother. I 
 always liked her. 
 
 "We was ordered in 1873 over into the Modoc 
 countrv, and we fit the Indians there and whipped 
 them some and they whipped us some — when we 
 left off fightin' it was about an even thing as it 
 
70 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 generally is. When we marched away from there, 
 we went up north towards Oregon. Me and an- 
 other man were scoutin' ahead of the regiment 
 one day and we come to a pleasant little valley 
 among the hills. It looked comfortable on the 
 grass in the middle, and there hadn't been any 
 Indians round for near a week. So we got off our 
 horses and eat some luncheon we had, and then 
 lay off on the grass smokin'. We both noticed a 
 good many queer hummocks in the grass. But we 
 did not think much of it till we saw they were in a 
 circle. Then we poked about and began to find 
 pieces of wheel-hubs and bits of old iron all rusty 
 and rotten. 
 
 " The other fellow said he should think there 
 had been a lot o' wagons round there sometime. 
 Then it all come back to me like a flash and made 
 me kind o' dizzy. This was Wagon-Tire Camp. I 
 looked around again and remembered the lay of 
 the hills and the looks of things generally — it 
 hadn't altered much except that the trees was big- 
 ger. We'd been wanting some water and I said 
 sudden, 'you'll find a spring over here.' Sure 
 
Wagon-tire camp. 71 
 
 enough 'twas there — the very basin they had dug 
 out and stoned up years before. It seemed kind 
 o' queer to the other fellow my knowin' where the 
 spring was, but he knew I hailed from Oregon and 
 so he didn't say nothing. 
 
 " Well there I stood on the edge of making my 
 fortune and I had to get on to my horse when 
 we'd rested as long as we ought to and ride away 
 from it. 
 
 " The other fellow said something about it, when 
 we got to Fort Walla-Walla — how funny it was — 
 that circle of old wheel-hubs, and some that heard 
 him knew what it must be he'd found. They tried 
 to get up a party to find it again and the other 
 soldier said he could take them to the spot. But 
 I went and told him about it and then he thought 
 he wouldn't." 
 
 " But you could have gone too," said Harry, " and 
 dug lots of gold and got rich. Oh, John, I should 
 think you'd go." 
 
 " I should if it was made worth my while," said 
 John. 
 
 " How could that be done ? " said Harry. 
 
'J 2 WAGON-TIRE CAMP. 
 
 " Make me believe that the place wasn't watched 
 by evil spirits," said John, as he folded his arms 
 in an obstinate sort of way and unfolded them 
 again to relight his pipe. 
 
 Harry thought that eventually this would be an 
 easy thing — he did not believe in them himself 
 and at that moment their father was heard calling 
 ,them and they went to bed on hemlock boughs 
 under the white tent cover and dreamed out their 
 fortunes, which is much the easiest way of piling 
 up gold. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 
 
 IT was nearly sunset when I drove into the 
 Gypsy camp near Dayton, Ohio. The camp 
 consisted of squatty tents, wagons with horses feed- 
 ing behind them, horses tethered ready for trades, 
 dogs, children, men and women. The tent is 
 scarcely a Gypsy's house — he requires all out- 
 doors for that ; it is only a sort of coverlet which 
 he will draw over his head at night, if he cares for 
 such a coyer, so it makes no difference how small 
 it is. 
 
 A fat, curly-haired woman sat on the ground, 
 with her supper spread on a tablecloth before her. 
 The fire which cooked it burned near, and the chil- 
 dren, dogs and flies came up and all seemed about 
 to settle on the beefsteak. She brushed the dogs' 
 noses to keep them back, and prevented her baby 
 from walking in the gravy. I wanted to talk to 
 75 
 
'j6 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 her about her people and she wanted to tell my 
 fortune. So, though I begged her not to let me 
 interrupt her, the children and flies had the ground 
 table pretty much to themselves while we sat on a 
 wagon tongue and exchanged remarks. 
 
 The Gypsy king's tents were near by ; not gor- 
 geous pavilions guarded by brown-skinned senti- 
 nels — but the same old weather-worn canvas 
 stretched on poles, with a corner or two hitched 
 up for air, that you see every summer in creek- 
 bottoms or the edge of the woods, when the other 
 boys guide your steps thither by the magic words, 
 " There's Gypsies camped over there." The king 
 was in town trading horses or buying supplies. 
 He is said to be an old man with a striking hoary 
 head. 
 
 His daughter came from one of the tents. She 
 had the features of her race, but a gentleness in 
 her manner which bordered on refinement. She 
 was a handsome girl. A yellow handkerchief was 
 tied over her hair, and her shape was trim, like 
 Fanchon's, after the poor Cricket tried to make 
 something of herself. She even resembled the old 
 
THE GYPSIES. 77 
 
 German woodcuts of Fanchon. This Gypsy prin- 
 cess was the daughter of that Matilda Stanley to 
 whose burial in the Dayton cemetery the Gypsy 
 tribes and families flocked in such numbers a few 
 years ago. 
 
 It is said that whenever a gorgio, or stranger, 
 approaches a tent, the Gypsies try him by certain 
 test-words of Romany, to see if he has any knowl- 
 edge of this ancient language of theirs. The prin- 
 cess, as she approached, said something to the 
 curly woman which sounded like " Sov mem ; chivvy 
 de lay." 
 
 " It's the Romany," I said, though unable to 
 quite catch the words or understand them. One 
 who does not "rdiier," or speak the tongue, is 
 easily puzzled by these mysterious words which 
 they mix up with their English. 
 
 They looked suspicious an instant, but laughed, 
 and one replied, "Yes, it's the Romany." And 
 the other added with a learned air, " The Egyptian 
 language." 
 
 If you can rdkker Romany, you have a pass- 
 sign to the hearts of these travellers. The prin- 
 
78 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 cess translated several common words ; her voice 
 was very pleasant. 
 
 " What do you call child ? " I asked. 
 
 " ChavL" 
 
 " Or say, How do you do ? " 
 
 " How de kur." 
 
 Perhaps the princess was fooling a Gentile, or 
 giving a localism for the ancient Romany greeting, 
 " Sarishaw." 
 
 A horse was a " gry" and the teakettle " ktkavi. " 
 "J^/Aavi," or kettle, is one of the test-words which 
 a dye or Gypsy woman is sure to utter before 
 strangers. 
 
 Very few of them know a great number of Rom- 
 any words. But they use what they have to throw 
 a veil over their speech. It is the language in 
 which their folk-tales are preserved, and in which 
 a guii/o (story) is told while they are squatted by 
 the camp-fire. These old stories record their days 
 of persecution, their sharpness at bargaining, their 
 love of the wagon and the road and contempt for 
 standard modes of life, their thievings, and their 
 lax notions of dealing with the gorgio. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 79 
 
 Besides telling fortunes the Gypsy women make 
 lace and sell baskets. In England they are a beg- 
 ging people, but those in America, even the English 
 families, are said to improve, to accumulate prop- 
 erty, and to hold themselves above any lower means 
 of getting a living than cheating in a horse trade, 
 or getting silver for fortunes out of credulous 
 people. I can remember when the dark-skinned 
 woman, with a leghorn poke just begged out of 
 some old closet atid turned wrong-side foremost on 
 her head, used to come into the house, halE-fright- 
 ening and half-delighting us with her wheedling 
 plea for any discarded garment. Now, many of the 
 clans own valuable real estate, and some are even 
 dwelling in their houses, at least part of the year, 
 though summer and the leafing-out of the green- 
 wood tree draws them again and again to the road 
 and the wagon. The impulse which seizes us all 
 in May or June to go a-Gypsying, which empties 
 dusty streets and fills farmhouses and seaside hotels, 
 must be very strong on certain of these wealthy 
 wanderers, living in cities, whose intimate friends 
 do not know that the dark blood is in their veins. 
 
8o 
 
 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 Every once in awhile it is told that they disappear 
 from civilized ways and are absent. But the 
 Romany rye ( or gentleman Gypsy ) is not away en 
 business ; nor is the beautiful lady visiting the 
 great people of the earth. They are both under 
 
 the tent, or in the wagon, delighting themselves 
 once more with Romany talk and the sight of a 
 ke'kavi hung on its iron support over a camp-fire. 
 They are perhaps helping to eat a pig which died 
 a natural death ( for the wanderers like such meat ), 
 or chickens taken without leave oS. somebody's 
 
THE GYPSIES. 8 1 
 
 roost. This is to them such a forbidden and deli- 
 cious feast as crackers and sardines are to a bad 
 boy or girl at boarding-school, eaten sitting up in 
 bed after the lights are out and the teacher has 
 gone clown the hall. 
 
 This Stanley family at Dayton, and the other 
 families intermarried with them and clustering 
 around them to form a tribe, own considerable 
 property there. 
 
 "We've just bought another farm," said the 
 older woman pointing out on a ridge east of 
 camp, a sweep of fertile-looking land and a home- 
 stead under shady trees. 
 
 The camp was on an open common, with scarcely 
 a shrub to keep off the late summer heat. Yet 
 all of these children of the road preferred their 
 wagons on the common to the embowered house. 
 From her manner of speaking I inferred that this 
 clan owned property in common, no piece of land 
 belonging to any individual uncontrolled by the 
 others. Their farms were rented to tenants. 
 
 " You love to live outdoors," I said. 
 
 "Of course," replied the elder woman, as if she 
 
82 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 wondered how anybody could endure a differem 
 life. " We stay South all winter." 
 
 Her children tumbled over the ground and raced 
 with the dogs, uttering bits of Romany talk. They 
 live in the joy of perpetual moving. Looking at 
 them, I remembered how often I had built a play- 
 house under the carpet on the line in housecleaning 
 days, and how I loved to see the kitchen table in- 
 verted with-legs in the air and to sit in it, rowing 
 with a broom, fancying it a boat. The dark little 
 Romanys do not mind sun or wind or rain ; they 
 need not keep themselves tidy, and the world is a 
 changing panorama to them. 
 
 The men, lounging beside or under another 
 wagon, rolled their laughing eyes at us, sure that I 
 would leave silver in the fortune-teller's palm be- 
 fore going away. Such sparkling eyes and teeth 
 are in no other countenance than a Rom's. While 
 the Gypsy is in one sense as sociable and innocent 
 as a child, in another he is as crafty as a fox. He 
 likes to make game of the gorgio, and especially 
 of that alien who despises his wandering life, his 
 dirt, and his basking and "inviting his soul." But 
 
THE GYPSIES. 
 
 h 
 
 you cannot talk with such a clan as this one, with- 
 out warming to them somewhat, in spite of difiEering 
 habits. They are very hospitable and kindly when 
 their interest is aroused. It is true that Gypsy 
 traders have taken miserable horses, painted them 
 attractive colors, touched them up in various cun- 
 ning ways, and cheated many a Gentile buyer with 
 them ; it is true they used to have a reputation for 
 kidnapping children, though they always seem to 
 have plenty of their own ; and that their appearance 
 in a neighborhood made the residents careful not 
 to leave any valued thing lying around in easy 
 reach after night ; it is true, according to the best 
 authority, that old Gypsy women love to play the 
 mystery of mysteries, or great trick — hokkani boro 
 — on any trusting gorgio — that is, cheating him 
 out of all he has. Only a few years since a West- 
 ern farmer had a Gypsy queen arrested for getting 
 thousands of dollars from him fraudulently. But 
 it is also true that many a gifted man and woman 
 have looked on these runaway playmates of nature 
 with lenient and kindly interest. 
 They are of the woods,woodsy, and of ^bes^p?nd, 
 
84 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 loamy. Their wandering is as much an instinct as 
 the yearly migrations of the birds. Hunters have 
 had the same restless feeling ; and I have known 
 families, not Gypsies, possessed with a like mania 
 for change and indulging it in very civilized ways. 
 
 Occasionally an outsider marries among the Gyp- 
 sies, and is at once adopted by them, wandering 
 and living their life. An Irishman buried in the 
 Dayton Cemetery was such a recruit. And many 
 an Englishman has taken to the road with his brown 
 wife. 
 
 At Elmwood, New Jersey, the gathering point 
 of an Eastern clan, not long ago there died a man 
 named Wharton, who was a native of Shropshire, 
 England. He had married a Gypsy woman and 
 became king of the tribe. Recently his daughter 
 was married to a descendant of Oak Lee, who was 
 king of all the English Gypsies sixty years ago. It 
 appears that each clan, or bunch of families under 
 the patriarchal rule of a small king or chief, has 
 its gathering-point, where it owns property and 
 brings its dead for burial. 
 
 The Dayton princess, sitting on the wagon-tongue, 
 
tHE GYPSIES. 85 
 
 asked me if I had seen her mother's monument in 
 Woodland cemetery. I had seen it, with other 
 monuments of the Joels, Jeffreys, Harrisons, etc., 
 who make up the cl^n. They seem very fond of 
 the resting-places of their dead, and ornament 
 them lavishly with flowers and the most childishly- 
 floral epitaphs. These epitaphs are prepared by 
 themselves, and are crude and tender, like a boy's 
 first letter to his mother, with all the curlycues 
 thrown in. 
 
 Though the ceremonies at Queen Matilda Stan- 
 ley's burial differed in no way from the ceremonies 
 of any Christian burial, the newspapers had taken 
 so much notice of the event that thousands of 
 slrangers flocked there to witness them. Her 
 monument is of native granite, or what the ceme- 
 tery-keeper irreverently calls "nigger-head stone," 
 bearing a marble angel on the capital. The in- 
 scription reads : — 
 
 MATILDA 
 
 wife of 
 
 LEVI STANLEY, 
 
 Died February 15, 1879, 
 
 Age 53 years. 
 
S6 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 Farewell, dear Tilda, farewell, your earthly days 
 are past, like a blooming and lovely 
 
 flower you 
 
 were too sweet to last. Your pain 
 
 on earth was 
 
 very great, my lovely beauty dear, now 
 
 Jesus has 
 
 called on you, I trust you in his care, 
 
 now you be 
 
 quick and follow me and tell my 
 
 children dear to 
 
 do their work, for Jesus. I hope to 
 
 meet them there. 
 
 On the base is the name " Stanley," and on a re- 
 verse side another epitaph : 
 
 MARTHA LOUISE 
 
 Daughter of Levi and Matilda 
 
 STANLEY 
 
 Died December, 1866 : 
 
 Aged 10 years. 
 
 Our daughter has gone to a mansion 
 
 of rest, along 
 
 with her Jesus that's who she loves 
 
 best. Along with 
 
 her Jesus who died for us all, 
 
 come on here in heaven 
 
 there is room for us all. 
 
 As a race the Gypsies have no religion. But in 
 
A RUSSIAN GYPSY CHILD. 
 
tHE GYPSIES. §9 
 
 monumental piety they appear quite equal to the 
 gorgios. Scarlet geraniums, blooming oleander 
 and foliage plants are as well kept about their 
 plots as if the kin of these resting travellers had 
 never eaten wild meat along the hedges. Masonic 
 and Odd Fellow emblems are curved upon the 
 monument base ; I do not know for what reason. 
 Near by are the Harrison and Jeffrey stones, 
 the first indicating one grave which has a foot- 
 stone marked " Mother and Babe : '' 
 
 REFIANCE, 
 
 wife of 
 
 RICHARD HARRISON, 
 
 Died 
 
 May 3, 1873, 
 
 Aged 43 years. 
 
 JOSHUA 
 
 their son died 
 
 May I, 1873, 
 
 Age 10 months. 
 
 A husband and six children 
 
 left to mourn their loss. 
 
 Our Mother here lies underground, 
 The dearest friend we ever found ; 
 But through the Lord's unbounded love 
 We'll meet again in realms above. 
 
i)a THE GYPSIES. 
 
 We loved this tender little one 
 And would have wished him stay. 
 
 But let our Father's will be done. 
 He shines in endless day. 
 
 The quaintest stone is in a shrubby enclosure 
 where the " old king and queen " have long lain 
 buried. These were Owen Stanley, a native of • 
 Reading, Berkshire, England, who died February 
 21,1860 ; and " Harriet, consort of Owen Stanley, 
 who died August 30, 1852." After the usual 
 affectionate doggerel this information is recorded : 
 
 Owen Stanley was his name, 
 
 England was his nation, 
 Any wood his dwelling place. 
 
 And Christ his salvation. 
 
 He died at Andover, Indiana, in his wagon. He left 
 twelve children, forty grandchildren and two great-grandchil- 
 dren to mourn his death. 
 
 Among the Gypsies the old man or old woman 
 is a revered and powerful being. 
 
 Here also is inscribed the name of • David Stan- 
 ley's daughter, born in England, and in her second 
 year burned to death in the wagon. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 91 
 
 Gypsies used to swarm along the old National 
 'Pike, and even yet they make it a thoroughfare, 
 though all roads and by-ways are theirs also. 
 Among the small dilapidated villages along the 
 'Pike in Ohio, is one where the warehouses are 
 about sinking into the canal through natural decaj^, 
 and all summer long dog-fennel stands deep and 
 rank up the very sides of the 'Pike embankments. 
 Near this place the Gypsies " watch the tan," or set 
 up the tent, and very appropriate to such surround- 
 ings are their quaint figures. There was a milli- 
 ner who had a stock of headgear left upon her 
 hands when the season was past, so she invited the 
 Gypsy women to come in and " deal " with her ; for 
 the dark-skinned women of the road, who used to 
 pick up any kind of finery, were supposed to be 
 indifferent to the shapes of their bonnets. They 
 came and filled the little shop. That evening they 
 struck camp and proceeded on their way, and the 
 milliner discovered that rolls of precious ribbon 
 and scraps of lace had gone with them. A consta- 
 ble pursued and brought the party back to trial. 
 They claimed that they had bought their goods. 
 
9 2 fHE GYPSIES. 
 
 but the milliner showed she had none of their sil- 
 ver in exchange. The voluble dark women who 
 pen dukkerin{XsX\ fortunes)-so glibly, know how to 
 throw contempt upon, and raise the neighborhood 
 laugh at the expense of gorgios. The anxious 
 milliner received her goods again, but she and her 
 shop are now known by the name the Gypsy wo- 
 man gave them, " the bony old bird in her nest of 
 ribbons." 
 
 " An old Gypsy " used to be the bugaboo of all 
 children. We have crouched in the elderberry 
 bushes at the mention of such a crone. It was a 
 great piece of courage to climb upon the fence in 
 the woods and defy such an imaginary child-stealer. 
 But I have never known one instance of such kid- 
 napping by the Gypsies. In this country children 
 are carried away by other races than the Roms, 
 and with other motives than these loitering, bask- 
 ing people could feel. Yet in old times abroad, 
 and particularly in Scotland, they suffered perse- 
 cution because ignorant people suspected them not 
 only of child-stealing, but of cannibalism,- of being 
 agents of the Turks, etc. In the year 1636 they 
 
SPANISH GYPSY GIRL DANCING. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 95 
 
 were warned out of Scotland, or the "men would 
 be hangit and the woemen drowned ; such of the 
 woemen as has chil'dren to be scorgit through the 
 burg and brent in the cheeke." At the same time 
 that country was so unsettled, and outrages were 
 so common among all classes, that the people were 
 a long tivne in coming to the conclusion of laying 
 the blame on the Gypsies. 
 
 Though ,this woman in the Dayton camp spoke 
 of Romany as "the Egyptian language," Mr. 
 Charles G. Leland, who has made the race and 
 the tongue his studies for many years, tells us of a 
 Gypsy woman he saw in Egypt who could not talk 
 Romany. None of the Gypsies there speak it. She 
 said they had lost the gift; for she knew there 
 was such a language spoken by the wandering 
 races. The Gypsies in Egypt call themselves Ta- 
 taren. 
 
 The Gypsies are of Aryan stock, and Asiatic 
 in their origin. They are always a distinct and 
 separate element, like running water, though they 
 take peculiarities from the countries through which 
 they move. We can trace them back to the four- 
 
g6 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 teenth century ; they existed then in the Balkan pen- 
 insula. Some authorities have considered that the 
 name signified Egyptians, but too many proofs point 
 out India as their native land. , Their Spanish ap- 
 pellation is Gitano ; Albanian, Jeok ; Magyar 
 Pharao niphek — or Pharaoh's people ; French, 
 Bohemians ; Scotch, Tinkler, which is probably a 
 corruption of Zingaro or Zingano. 
 
 They have penetrated to nearly all known coun- 
 tries, taking characteristics from each. But it is 
 impossible to iix a date to their first appearance in 
 Europe. They may have been wandering there 
 centuries before historical mention is made of 
 them. They have been called " chaltsmide," or 
 Ishmaelites — descendants of Hagar, the smith's 
 trade being always one of their leading handicrafts. 
 Among the English Gypsies is indeed one large 
 family branch called Petolungro, or Smith. 
 
 Mr. Leland tells us of Welsh Gypsies, Russian, 
 Austrian, Egyptian, Hindoo, American Gypsies. 
 The Russians are delicately made and not so 
 brusque and stolid as the wanderers in English 
 lanes. Nearly all of them have some musical skill. 
 
THE Gypsies. 97 
 
 Their Romany songs have a power and melody 
 that cannpt be withstood. Mr. Lathrop in his 
 Spanish Vistas describes the dancing of a Gypsy 
 girl in a figure belonging exclusively to her race. 
 It is not, as one would suppose from the abandon 
 and excitability of the Romany, a flinging and vio- 
 lent dance, but a series of smooth, sinuous motions, 
 very graceful, requiring great skill, and gaining in- 
 tensity of expression, until undulations seem to flow 
 wave after wave, downward through the dancer's 
 body, while her arms weave about. He says : 
 
 The crowning achievement is when the hips begin to 
 sway too, and, while she is going back and forward, execute 
 a rotary movement like that of the bent part of an auger. 
 In fact, you expect her to bore herself into the floor, and dis- 
 appear. Then, all at once, the stamping and clapping and 
 the twanging strings are stopped, as shf ceases her formal 
 gyrations ; she walks back to her seat like one liberated 
 from a spell ; and the whole thing is over. 
 
 In 1417 a band of three hundred Gypsies came 
 to Liinneburg. The account says : 
 
 They were as black as Tartars, with a duke and count at 
 their head splendidly dressed and leading, like nobles, dogs 
 
98 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 of chase ; then a motley crew afoot, and women and chil- 
 dren in wagons. They pretended to be on a seven years' 
 pilgrimage to expiate apostacy. 
 
 As to their religion, they generally absorb it 
 from the country they are in, though they have 
 the relics of one old faith, about which they do not 
 trouble themselves. Mr. Leland tells an amusing 
 story of a very poor, pious-looking old woman 
 whom he and some friends saw tramping along the 
 highway. ,She made no appeal for charity, but 
 was so aggressively sad-looking and worthy, that 
 one of the party spoke to her and drew forth her 
 moving story. She said she was a washerwoman, 
 going to another town to see her dying daughter. 
 She had never begged ; she could get through 
 somehow. But through this artlessness Mr. Le- 
 land's practiced eye detected the Gypsy tramp 
 who loves to fleece any gorgio. So he spoke to 
 her : " Can tide rakker Romanes, nuridye ? " " Can 
 you talk Romany, my mother ? " 
 
 The old woman taken unawares at hearing the 
 dialect of the tents in the mouth of a gentleman 
 tourist, replied in confusion, " The Lord forbid, sir, 
 
THE GYPSIES. lOI 
 
 that I should talk any of them wicked languages." 
 She was a noted tramper and a deep actor of ap- 
 propriately-dressed parts. She pretended to have 
 a letter of recommendation from her clergyman. 
 But the sound of Romany took her off her guard 
 and at once brought the mischievous Gypsy glitter 
 into her eyes. 
 
 Family affection is strong in the race, as their 
 care of their dead testifies. Mr. Leland tells us a 
 survivor will forever deprive himself of any pleas- 
 ure he enjoyed with a- lost relative. " My brother 
 was so fond of cigars," said one ; " I never have 
 smoked since he died." "Mother liked fish so 
 well. O, no, I never can touch it again, now she 
 is gone." And they are quickly sympathetic 
 towards people poorer than themselves, Gypsy or 
 alien. Being wanderers, they are of course adapt- 
 able to any place or circumstances. They love 
 all dumb- creatures, and their love of nature must 
 be their most conspicuous trait. When you talk to 
 them they do not attempt to explain their wander- 
 ing instinct. I have thought they feel a superiority 
 to the world of people settled in houses, 
 
I02 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 In Europe and America, the titles of duke, king 
 etc. are given to the heads of small bands of Gyp- 
 sies, until, says authority, " one is bewildered by 
 the hosts of kings from John Buelle beside Athels- 
 tan in Malmesbury Abbey in 1657, to Matilda 
 Stanley who was buried at Dayton, Ohio, in 1879." 
 
 The Gypsies are ignorant of books, and have no 
 literature of their own, except the unwritten bal- 
 lads and stories handed down from generation to 
 generation, which careful compilers and nomad- 
 lovers, like Mr. Leland, have gathered up and put 
 into print. Mr. George Borrow, an English author, 
 wrote books about the Romany people, though 
 Mr. Leland's several volumes are the best. Bul- 
 wer Lytton put them into some of his novels ; and 
 even George Eliot delighted herself with their 
 picturesque figures, though touched-up with dirt 
 and seen against a background of vapor from the 
 pot where hedgehog or dead pig was boiling. One 
 of the men at the Dayton camp observed doubt- 
 ingly to me that he thought some man had made 
 a book about them, but he was not sure. Intelli- 
 gence circulates among them in primitive ways. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 
 
 I OS 
 
 He had probably heard from some other travelling 
 family or clan — New Jersey or Pennsylvania Gyp- 
 sies — about Mr. Leland", the great Romany Rye, 
 and his works. But not having met this gentle- 
 man Gypsy himself, the impression left on his 
 mind was vague. 
 
 The entire stock of Romany words is said to ex- 
 ceed five thousand, though the number known to 
 any one Rom is small. He mixes them generously 
 with English, or whatever tongue he is born to 
 speak; and the little brown babies around the 
 camp-fire are taught to treasure them as most pre- 
 cious secrets. 
 
 No record is left of the first arrival of Gypsies in 
 America. They came over with means, however. 
 As to personal appearance, they are a dark, finely- 
 formed race. They pride themselves on their small 
 hands and feet, their lightness of Step and easy 
 motion. Their hair is black, or very dark, and 
 does not readily turn gray ; their skins are tawny 
 olive ; their teeth are strong and white ; their 
 cheek-bones are high and their noses aquiline like 
 ^lie Indians. But of course there are differences 
 
Io6 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 in families, some being shorter, or ligliter, or less 
 muscular, or less generally well-favored than oth- 
 ers. The Stanleys and Lees have been conspicu- 
 ously handsome, both in England and this country. 
 Mr. Leland gives a list of many different families 
 named to him by an old Gypsy woman, each hav- 
 ing some physical trait distinct from the others. 
 
 Every Romany ^«<(//(? (story) is short and pointed. 
 One of the gudli told generation after generation, 
 is about the Gypsy bribing the policeman : 
 
 Once apre a chairus a Romany chal chored a rani chillico 
 (or chiriclo), and then jailed atut a prastramengo 'pre the 
 drum. " Where did tute chore adovo rani ? " putchered the 
 prastramengo. 
 
 "It's kik rani ; it's a pauno rani that I kinned'dree the 
 gav to del tute." 
 
 " Tacho," penned the prastramengo, " it's the kushtrest 
 rani mandy ever dick dus. Ki did tute kin it .' " 
 
 Avail, many's the chairus mandy's tippered a trin-mushti 
 to a prastramengo to mukk mandy hatch my tan with the 
 chavis. 
 
 Once on a time a Gypsy stole a turkey, and then met a 
 policeman on the road. 
 " Where did you steal that turkey ? " asked the policeman. 
 
THE GYPSIES. 
 
 107 
 
 " It's no turkey ; it's a goose that I bought in the town to 
 give you.'' 
 
 " Fact ! " said the policeman ; " it is the finest goose I ever 
 saw. Where did you buy it .' " 
 
 Yes, mahy's the time I have given a shilling (three four- 
 pence ) to a policeman to let me pitch my tent with the chil- 
 dren. 
 
 They always hang their cooking utensils high in 
 the wagon, because if a thing falls upon the ground, 
 or is trodden on, they consider it consecrated to 
 the earth and no longer fit for their use. Mr. Le- 
 land tells us a curious point of affinity between the 
 Gypsies and Hindoos may be found in a custom 
 which a Rom thus describes : 
 
 When a mush muUers an' the juvas adree his ker can't 
 kair habben because they feel so naflo 'bout the Rom being 
 gone, or the chavi or juvalo mush, or whoever it may be, 
 then their friends for trin divvuses kairs their habben an' 
 bitchers it a lende. An 'that's tacho Rommanies, an' they 
 wouldn't be dessen Romany chuls that wouldn't kair dovo 
 for mushos in sig an' tukli. 
 
 When a man dies and the women in his house cannot 
 prepare food (literally, make food) as they feel so badly be- 
 cause the man is gone, or the girl or young man, or whoever 
 
lo8 THE GYPSIES. 
 
 it may be, then their friends for three days prepare their food 
 and send it to them. And that is real Romany (custom) 
 and they would not be decent Romany fellows who would 
 not do that for people in sorrow and distress. 
 
 Precisely the same custom prevails in India 
 where they use an indentical term for it. 
 
 Here is another of their stories, about the gorgio 
 and the Romany chal: 
 
 Once upon a time a gorgio said to a Gypsyj " Why do you 
 always go about the country ? There is no food in what does 
 not rest (or stay here)." Said the Gypsy, " Show me your 
 money ! " 
 
 And he showed him a guinea, a sovereign, a half-sovereign, 
 a half-guinea, a five-shilling piece, a half-crown, a two-shill- 
 ing piece, a shilling, a sixpence, a four-penny piece, a three- 
 pence, a two-pence, a penny, a half-penny, a farthing, a half- 
 farthing. Said the Gypsy, " This is all bad money." 
 
 " No," said the other man, " it is all good and sound. Toss 
 it in your hand and hear it ring ? " 
 
 " Yes," replied the Gypsy, " you told me that only bad 
 things keep going, and this money has gone all over the 
 country many a time." 
 
 All men are not like trees. Some must travel and can- 
 not keep still. 
 
tHE- GYPSIES. i6^ 
 
 This precisely expresses the Romany nature. 
 They must travel and cannot keep still. Their 
 strain of blood prefers the open sun for a parasol 
 and any woods for a dwelling-place, to palace roofs 
 and established kingdoms. Of course they have 
 no record as statesmen, soldiers, agriculturists, 
 builders or scholars. They are always playing 
 truant along the roads ; they never have been, and 
 never intend to go, into the world's busy school. 
 
 A Gypsy fortune-teller always takes her subject 
 to one side, so that spectators may neither over- 
 hear the revelation nor cast contempt upon it. She 
 seems to believe what she tells, but behind the 
 gorgio's back she always has her laugh at his credu- 
 lity. The prediction is short but bristling with 
 points ; and when the Gypsy predicts backward, or 
 tells what has actually happened, her penetration 
 does her marvelous credit ; she often hits the ex- - 
 act truth. The fortune usually runs m this wise, 
 if she sees in the face before her and in the hand 
 she holds, energy and the generous piece of silver : 
 
 " And it's a good fortune that's coming to you, 
 my lady, or my gentleman. You've been far and 
 
no THE GYPSIES. 
 
 you've seen much, but you'll go farther and see 
 more. There's going to be a great change, and 
 it's a change for the better. You'll be rich, and 
 give away by the handfull, and what you've had is 
 but a drop to what you will have. Tell me the 
 exact truth : do you begrudge me this money that 
 you lay in my hand ? No. I tell you a true fortune, 
 and them that's your enemies can never make 
 headway against you. You will succeed in what- 
 ever you turn your hand to. " Then to these 
 bright generalities she adds a few predictions 
 suited only to the person addressed, which gives 
 him faith in the whole, though he laughingly denies 
 it to his friends ; and sends him away with the im- 
 pression that in his case the oracle has spoken 
 fact. 
 
 It is a queer little discovery that the good old 
 gibberish with which boys and girls have long 
 counted out for Hide-and-Seek, 
 
 One-ry, 0-ry, ick-ry Ann, 
 
 Filison, foloson, Nicholas, Jan, etc. 
 
 is a corruption of Romany rhymed words. 
 
THE GYPSIES. i 1 i 
 
 The neighbors of the Gypsies, that is, people who 
 live around their gathering-points, know less about 
 them, their traditions and common happenings, 
 than do strangers far off who love to gather up in- 
 formation about them. This is partly because they 
 despise the gorgio, and partly because the gorgio 
 despises them. It is not every white-face that 
 cares to sit down in a Gypsy's tent and have the 
 dogs nosing near — the wolfish-looking curs that 
 always range with them ; that loves the ground 
 we tread, enough to snuff its sweetness along with 
 Romany noses ; or that can at all comprehend the 
 brown brother's love of free air and his hatred of 
 walls. 
 
 It was sunset when I left the Dayton camp ; the 
 west was all a water-melon color over that pretty 
 little city. Soon the men who had been in town 
 trading, would come home ; or do they say " come 
 tent ? " Come ker, perhaps. The camp-fires would 
 start up fresh, and perhaps the guitar or fiddle be 
 heard between dog-barks and children's night 
 twitterings. I could have stayed longer, if steam 
 cars only took the road in such a leisurely fashion 
 
112 TllE GYPStES. 
 
 as do Gypsies. They were not like any of the peo- 
 ple who live in houses. Outdoors furnishes their 
 bric-k-brac — in golden-rod, quaint toad-stools, all 
 kinds of leaves, mosses and curious pebbles. The 
 sky, raining or shining, is a ceiling renewed every 
 day. 
 
 Boys are sometimes possessed with a fury for 
 going off to unknown places and achieving im- 
 mense deeds in the killing of buffaloes, Indians and 
 alligators. I know one dear little fellow .who 
 broke up a lot of pickle-bottles with a hatchet, and 
 played he was killing giants. But if men and wo- 
 men confessed to their chief mania, I think it 
 would be a general desire to sit along the hedges 
 or in the dim sweet woods, without a care in the 
 world, letting the hours soak them in content and 
 playing they were Gypsies. 
 
HUNTED BY A WILD 
 STALLION. 
 
 TOWARDS the last of August my cousin and 
 myself, both of us lads of sixteen, had been 
 plover-shooting on the airy plains near Island 
 Head on the Newfoundland coast. Having occa- 
 sion to go from the Cape to a miners' camp near 
 the Head we decided to proceed around the cliffs 
 where the air was fresh and bracing in preference 
 to the sodden, tiresome marshes further inland. 
 About three o'clock we set out having a tramp of 
 eight miles before us. Our course lay close to 
 the edge of those sheer, iron-bound cliffs that rise 
 haughtily out of the sea to a height of from two 
 hundred to five hundred feet. Not a bush was in 
 sight, upland and hollow being covered with a 
 short, thick growth of grass and succulent weeds. 
 It was tiresome, and sometimes perilous, work to 
 113 
 
1I4 HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. 
 
 descend a couple of hundred feet into one of these 
 gorges and scale the other side again. I have of- 
 ten, when a lad, inquired whence came the suc- 
 cession of these mighty hollows along this and 
 other parts of my native coast. At first sight you 
 would not attribute the tremendous gouging out to 
 the action of flood, for only a tiny brook a couple 
 of feet wide and incapable of rounding its pebbles 
 hurries along to fling its little, thi^n, silvery body 
 over the precipice into the sea. But reflection has 
 since taught me that they must be due to mighty 
 torrents caused by the melting glacier that spared 
 Newfoimdland, then a part of the mainland, no 
 more than any other portion of the continent. 
 
 On the mountain-tops we shot plover and cur- 
 lew till our ammunition was exhausted and the 
 sun was only half an hour high. Then we quick- 
 ened our pace, for the camp of the miners was 
 still six miles distant. 
 
 As we reached the top of the highest plateau, 
 jaded from the exhausting climb, we heard the far- 
 off but keen, vicious whinny of a horse. We spoke 
 not but looked at each other; for we were now 
 
tlUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. 
 
 1^5 
 
 aware of what we had forgotten before, that the 
 wild stallion, Black Glossy, was grazing about 
 those airy meadows. Further down the coast 
 were other stallions let loose during the summer 
 while the fishermen were away in their boats ; but 
 none was so much to be dreaded as this fierce 
 brute whose name sent terror into the heart of 
 every timid traveller. 
 
 We had no means of defense, having fired away 
 our ammunition ; but we were cool, and promptly 
 decided to get off level ground and trust to escape 
 in some cliff-side or slope where the beast could 
 not get a footing. Se we were off with the speed 
 of the wind. 
 
 About a third of a mile beyond us lay the edge 
 of a slope that ran down to a small cave, and, from 
 a dim recollection which I had retained of the 
 spot, I was in hopes, if we could reach there be- 
 fore the stallion, to make our escape. Again 
 came the same wild neigh, and in the distance we 
 could hear the dull thud of hoofs upon the .hard, 
 dry top of the upland. I glanced hastily around, 
 and at a distance of about a third of a mile saw 
 
U6 HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. 
 
 our pursuer. He was as black as a raven, and 
 the shining of his coat I could see even at that 
 distance. His head curved downward, his body 
 seemed to be gathered up and shortened, and his 
 tail streamed out behind him. Our terror almost 
 lent wings to our feet. Nearer and wilder grew 
 the whinny ; but we scarce trusted ourselves to 
 look back. We were nearing the slope, but I was 
 not certain that the portion we were approaching 
 was gradual enough to afford a foothold. I had 
 breath enough to say to my cousin Ned : 
 
 " If he overtakes us, our only chance is to stop 
 short, swerve aside, and then dart straight ahead 
 again, which will cause him to curve round and lose 
 time. It is his heels that we have most to guard 
 against." 
 
 We were at the slope and found that it was not 
 so steep as we could have desired it. Below a 
 small brook brawled over the stones down the 
 incline to be lulled and lost in the sand between 
 hightide-mark and the stretch of wild-meadows at 
 the foot of the hill. Nimbly we ran down ; but 
 fifteen paces above us, at the spot where we had 
 
HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. II7 
 
 begun the descent, was the stallion. He did not, 
 as I supposed he would, rush headlong down but 
 snorted, and pawed the sand with his fore-hoofs. 
 Then, wheeling, he galloped in the direction of a 
 faint path that led through a more level passage. 
 
 We knew that he must reach the botton of the 
 valley almost as soon as we could, so we sprang, 
 ran — and sometimes found ourselves rolling — 
 down the steep grassy slope. The neighing of the 
 infuriated brute was now more constant and more 
 appallingly shrill ; and the three walls of the hol- 
 low gave echoes of the vicious cry till it seemed to 
 our terrified imagination as if we were being pur- 
 sued by twenty demon horses. The sun, too, had 
 just gone down, and in this lonely place, walled by 
 great mountains, with a weird marsh and a com- 
 plaining surf before us, superstitious fear was ad- 
 ded to the terror of pursuit. 
 
 We reached the botton safely, and observed run- 
 ning out into the cave, a narrow ledge of rock. 
 
 " Upon that " was all I had breath to say, hastily 
 indicating the rock with my hand. 
 
 Then we struck out across the niarsh — arid tlie 
 
Il8 HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. 
 
 terrible brute was close by us, his tail in the air, 
 nostrils distended, his eyes blood-shot. We 
 stopped short and swerved to the left, when he 
 was so close that we might have felt his hot breath 
 upon us ; and as he curved round, almost losing 
 his legs, we darted on. I shall never forget the 
 thrill of that moment in watching the result of our 
 manoeuvre. As he swept round his tongue was 
 out and he flung foam from his open jaws. His 
 thin " slippers," bright from running over the 
 grass, gleamed almost in .our faces as he wheeled 
 around. 
 
 Our ruse had saved us. Ere it was necessary to 
 repeat the trick we had both mounted the rock and 
 were nimbly running out to its furthest point where 
 the spray broke slightly over us. From this point 
 we could leap upon a larger rock whence we might 
 take a long range of strand to our right, after the 
 tide had ebbed another half-hour. 
 
 Now, the danger and the terror over, we could 
 not but enjoy the discomfiture of our baffled pur- 
 suer. A dozen times did he rush out to the surf, 
 plash the water with his hoofs, and plough up the 
 
HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. II9 
 
 sand ; then he would go careering along the 
 marsh's marge with mane erect, uttering his shrill, 
 fierce whinny and filling every nook about the 
 cliffs with terrifying echoes. We jumped upon the 
 larger rock and stood there awaiting the fall of the 
 tide. The gloaming deepened, and still the mad- 
 dened brute raved up and down the strand, 
 plashed into the marsh, tearing up the lilies and 
 the violet flag-blooms with his infuriate feet, crying 
 all the while like a balked fiend. And when it be- 
 came totally dark, before the rising of the moon, 
 we could see gleaming out of the deep dusk by the 
 verge of the marsh two eyes that resembled kin- 
 dled emeralds. 
 
 Beyond the rock on which we stood every now 
 and again a fin or a tail would break the surface 
 of the water and scatter myriad little phosphores- 
 cent beads about like showers of silver spray. 
 The splashing was probably made by sharks, for 
 before the darkness came we cauld see them lurk- 
 ing around the rocks in the clear, green waters, 
 and at intervals pushing a black fin above the sur- 
 face, We ha4 at the first thought of leaving our 
 
120 HUNTED BY A WILD STALLION. 
 
 guns behind us on the rock and wading and swim- 
 ming around the point to the strand ; but the terror 
 of a shark's crunching jaws was not more welcome 
 than the shining heels or the vicious teeth of the 
 Stallion. 
 
 When the moon rose above the sea the tide was 
 out, and left a dark belt around the base of the 
 rock. Once more our eyes searched for the foiled 
 horse. He was beyond the marsh standing in 
 deep gloom under the shoulder of the precipice. 
 The last thing I remembered noting as I slid 
 from the rock upon the clammy shingle were two 
 globes of smouldering fire looking toward our 
 point of departure. And as we passed around the 
 point that terrible neigh — it was the last time we 
 heard it — again started a hundred echoes. About 
 nine o'clock we reached the miners' camp, eating 
 the more heartily, and sleeping the more soundly 
 for our afternoon of strain and terror. 
 
\ \ 
 
WILD HORSES. 
 
 NOT to go back of the present order of things, 
 I suppose we may say that the home of the 
 horse is the great Assyrian plains which stretch 
 from Egypt to Persia, and have their centre in the 
 valley of the Euphrates and Tigris. That is a re- 
 gion in which horses would delight. They can fol- 
 low the summer southward beyond the reach of 
 the too severe gales of winter, and can migrate 
 northward again when midsummer heat dries up 
 the pools and water-courses in the South. They 
 can range from Morocco and the Upper Nile to the 
 wide tablelands of Thibet, and around the Black 
 Sea into the steppes of Russia. All this vast area 
 is a succession of open grassy plains where pastu- 
 rage is perpetual ; or, if it fails for a time in one 
 part the horses can easily gallop away to where 
 
 ^he grass is plentiful and water always fresh. 
 123 
 
124 WILD HORSES. 
 
 And a wild horse is the. very image of proud 
 freedom ; there is swiftness and nobility and 
 grace in his every movement ; the head is high, the 
 neck arched, the long mane and tail float like 
 plumes, the eyes flash with bright curiosity, the 
 neigh is shrill and defiant as a trumpet ; in an in- 
 stant, upon thundering hoofs, he has vanished like 
 a wind from your sight, leaving only a cloud of 
 dust behind ; he is wholly untamed, and seems 
 utterly untamable ! Yet I doubt whether there 
 exists anywhere to-day — unless possibly in some 
 of the remote highlands of Central Asia — a single 
 band of wild horses none of whose ancestors ever 
 felt the saddle upon their strong backs, or igno- 
 miniously dragged some burden for the slow-footed 
 master of all animals — man. 
 
 Think how long ago it was when the horse was 
 first made use of. The Bedouins of the Euphrates 
 valley have a tradition that their favorite breed 
 descends straight from the pair which Noah took 
 with him into the ark ; and the Bible account 
 leads us to believe that this was among the first of 
 the animals which the early men subjugated, thov;- 
 
^^^iMl-,.,,^ 
 
 tSe fiery war charger. 
 
WILD HORSfiS. 
 
 127 
 
 sands of years before the beginning of the six thou- 
 sand years which we are told the Bible history 
 covers. In many caves in Europe, where it is 
 evident men made their homes long before they 
 had learned enough to build houses, there is a 
 floor of accumulated soil — very compact, and 
 sometimes three or four feet deep — in which are 
 found traces of fireplaces, broken bones of a vari- 
 ety of animals, stone spear-heads, arrow-points, 
 knives, bones with rude drawings carved upon 
 them, and other incontestible evidences of man's 
 possession, together with some rare portions of the 
 human skeleton itself. In the dry, hard soil of 
 these dark and quiet caves — the old open en- 
 trances to which have frequently been choked up 
 by drifted dust and the falling away of the cliffs 
 above, so that new "*rock-shelters " are constantly 
 being discovered — such fragments of bones would 
 be preserved for an enormous length of time ; and 
 there is reason to believe that the time when men 
 made homes of them is very much longer ago than 
 any historian writes about. Well, in these caves 
 are found the bones of the horse, and found in con- 
 
128 WILD HORSES. 
 
 siderable numbers ; so that we are convinced that 
 they had begun to catch and tame this prince of 
 quadrupeds even then. It is certain that they ate 
 his flesh — a custom which has survived till this 
 day. 
 
 I have no doubt that the day when the first wild 
 horse was captured was the beginning of a marked 
 progress in the growth of savage men toward civili- 
 zation. There is something in the very compan- 
 ionship with a horse which is inspiriting and en- 
 nobling. It draws out a man's best skill and 
 strength to catch and bring under his rule an ani- 
 mal so fleet and headstrong and wilful. It gives 
 him work to do and exercises all his wits and 
 energies, while at the same time on horseback he 
 is better able to cope with other " beasts of the 
 field," to escape from danger, to travel and see 
 what there is in the world outside his home-valley, 
 and to maintain his superiority or at least equality, 
 among his fellowmen. This is a great and bene- 
 ficial education. It has always been noticed at 
 the present day, on both sides of the ocean, that 
 those races of savage men who possess horses and 
 
Wild horses. ^29 
 
 are accustomed to ride constantly, are far superior 
 in all manly virtues to those tribes that are not 
 mounted. This is particularly noticeable in the 
 case of our Indians on the plains. Tribes like 
 the Blackfeet, Sioux, Pawnees, Comanches and 
 Apaches, whose horses are many and always at 
 hand, do now, and always will, rule the Shoshonees, 
 Pah-Utes, Diggers and other races who possess 
 few or no horses and are unskilful in the saddle. 
 I imagine, then, that the first family, in those pre- 
 historic days, who tamed the horse, became at 
 once chief of the tribe, and that the tribe soon 
 found itself the strongest in the world. 
 
 Nearly all the wild horses — probably all, in- 
 deed—are claimed as included in the property of 
 some man, or tribe^ or to have been once their 
 property. As one travels through Arabia he sees 
 such bands of horses dashing about in the dis- 
 tance, but never coming near him, and it seems 
 the greatest assumption possible for some little 
 shaykh, or ragged Bedouin, to say, "Those are 
 mine." But the traveller does not know that once 
 a year the Bedouins make a great circle about the 
 
13° Wild HorseS-. 
 
 plain and gradually drive in all the horses they 
 care to, when the colts are marked, and a large 
 number picked out and half tamed to be sold to 
 the townspeople of Aleppo, Bagdad, Damascus 
 and other cities on the border of tl)e desert. The 
 Bedouins have distinct names for many of the 
 varieties of these desert horses, and claim to know 
 their separate "pedigrees;" that is, the lines of 
 ancestors from which they are descended — the 
 horse-families to which they belong. It is from 
 this stock, known in general as the ' " Arabian " 
 horse, that the English thoroughbreds and the best 
 hunting and race-horses have been derived ; while 
 the great, impetuous, fiery war-chargers came orig- 
 inally mainly from the Barb horses whose home is 
 along the south shore of the Mediterranean. But 
 both of these native Eastern horses are of much 
 less size than the thoroughbred and charger. It 
 is by mixture of other blood, and by cultivation, 
 that the size has been increased ; and with this has 
 followed a loss of a part of the beauty and value 
 of the original wild stock. 
 
 It is not easy to realize when we think of the 
 
WILD HORSES. 
 
 133 
 
 vast number of horses which are now owned and 
 employed in North and South America, and the 
 equally vast herds that roam in unfettered liberty 
 over the broad plains from the Saskatchewan to 
 the Rio Gila, and from Brazil to Patagonia, that 
 the horse is not native to our pampas and prairies, 
 but was introduced by the Spaniards only three 
 centuries ago. Yet this is the fact, and all our wild 
 horses, as well as all our tamed ones, have de- 
 scended from these first chargers of Cortez's and 
 other early expeditions of exploration and con- 
 quest, or have since been brought from Europe. 
 
 More than two centuries elapsed after the Span- 
 ish conquests in Mexico and South- America before 
 white men pushing westward from the Atlantic slope, 
 crossed the prairies and plains west of the Missis- 
 sippi and penetrated the Rocky Mountains. It 
 was almost an equal time before the pampas of 
 Southern Brazil, Paraguay and Patagonia were ex- 
 plored. On both these great areas of grassy plains, 
 travellers found multitudes of horses as free as the 
 baffaloes and antelopes which were their compan- 
 ions upon the wide wastes ; and to these small. 
 
134 WILD HORSES. 
 
 active wild horses was given the name mustang. 
 The methods in use by the Mexicans and Indians 
 for capturing wild horses to recruit their steeds, 
 are interesting. Armed with that effective instru- 
 ment, the lasso (a rope of rawhide about fifty feet 
 long, and having a running noose in one end), a 
 party of men mount their best horses and go in search 
 of the wild steeds. The horses of the plains and 
 pampas rove about in companies of twelve to twenty, 
 mares and colts, under the leadership of some old 
 fighting horse. When the proximity of such a band is 
 discovered, an attempt is made to get as near to 
 them as possible, which has to be done with great 
 caution since the wild horses are exceedingly wary. 
 Then if the ground favors, by the presence of deep 
 precipitous valleys, or otherwise, the men try to 
 corner the herd by driving them into some canon. 
 This accomplished, it only remains to single out the 
 ones which are desired, if all the herd cannot be 
 captured, and by that skilful riding and throwing 
 of the lasso in which Mexicans excel, to entangle 
 the noble animal and bring him to the ground. 
 This done, his safety is soon made certain. This 
 
> ^-, 
 
WILD HORSES. 1,^7 
 
 casting of the lasso is sometbing concerning which 
 a great deal might be written, but would not come 
 into the scope of the present article. The lasso is 
 the one weapon and instrument which every one 
 who expects to have anything to do with wild 
 horses or cattle must be provided with ; it requires 
 long training, strong muscles and a steady eye to 
 throw it, and a very stout pair of legs and dexter- 
 ous pair of arms to hold what you have attached 
 your lasso to. 
 
 On the open level plains such a method as I have 
 described above would not avail in an attempt to 
 capture wild horses. If it is thought worth while to 
 follow them (where tame horses can be bought so 
 cheaply), the plan is for several men, with extra 
 horses, to single out the one horse in a band which 
 they want (usually some magnificent stallion), sep- 
 arate him from the rest and follow his tracks night 
 and day, as fast as possible, thus giving him no 
 time to feed or sleep, until they have tired him out. 
 By the time this is accomplished you may be sure 
 they are well tired out themselves. I have heard 
 of men on foot, even, doing this with success, by 
 
138 WILD HORSES. 
 
 several of them uniting and managing it so that the 
 horse was frightened into moving always in a great 
 circle, where he could be followed incessantly by 
 the men relieving one another. 
 
 The hunters and trappers who used to wander 
 alone over the West sometimes lost their own horses 
 and were in sore need. To meet this extremity 
 they discovered a way of shooting a horse at a par- 
 ticular point in the neck where, by touching a cer- 
 tain nerve, they stunned the animal, and had time 
 to bind his legs and head before he recovered. But 
 if their bullet went half an inch out of its way the 
 horse was ruined if not killed outright. This prac- 
 tice was called creaseing. Only the most accurate 
 marksmen were able to do it, and I think it has 
 wholly gone out of vogue on the plains. 
 
 In the United States, indeed, the picturesque 
 figure which the haughty, timorous, beautiful wild 
 horses make upon the limitless expanse of yellow 
 plain is overweighed by the annoyance they cause. 
 Let a band of them come near a ranche, and they 
 will attract away from the home-pastures many of 
 the ranchman's tame horses and mules which, once 
 
WILD HORSES. 139 
 
 they have joined their nomadic brethren, and 
 caught the infection of freedom, can never be re- 
 claimed. Tlie plainsmen, therefore, dread the ap- 
 pearance of wild horses and frequently make a 
 special effort to kill all of them they can. Chances 
 are few, however, unless the herders make a regu- 
 lar business of it, for nothing in the world is so shy 
 of human approach as an American wild horse. I 
 am not aware that any use is made of their car- 
 casses ; but in Paraguay many thousands of horses 
 are killed yearly for the sake of their hides, their 
 tallow, and their hoofs and long hair, all being ex- 
 ported from the Rio la Plata country in large quanti- 
 ties. Those Paraguayan horses, however, like thou- 
 sands on our own plains, are not truly wild, for once 
 ayear — sometimes oftener — they are surrounded 
 by a cordon of mounted men, called ganchos, and 
 driven into corrals, or stockade-pens, where the colts 
 are branded by a hot iron with the owner's mark, 
 those picked out that are intended for sale or to be 
 trained to the saddle, and the rest let go to range 
 in' freedom for another year. 
 There is a vast deal of interest attaching to the 
 
14° WILD HORSES. 
 
 history, habits, breeding and ancestry of the differ- 
 ent wild horses of the world ; but it is impossible 
 here to do more than indicate something about 
 them which may profitably be followed up by you 
 in your reading. 
 
HOW WALTER FOUND 
 HIS FATHER. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 SO you stick to your story ? " 
 " If I told anything else it would be a lie," said 
 the boy, doggedly. 
 
 " Now look'ee here, "said Officer Mahoney of the 
 San Francisco police force, shaking a finger men- 
 acingly at the ten-year-old boy, who cowered as if 
 in consciousness of guilt, " don't ye think ye'll 
 gain anything by misleadin' of these gentlemen. 
 Three days ago, when I set eyes on ye a-hangin' 
 round the ferry slip, says I to meself, ' That's a boy 
 as has no business here.' I asked you then where 
 ye come from and were a-goin', and this was what 
 ye said : The night before ye had come in from 
 New York on the overland train, and yer father, 
 141 
 
142 HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 who's a lawyer and come out here three years ago, 
 was to meet ye at the wharf, but the gentleman 
 niver put in an appearance. Is that correct? " 
 
 The boy sullenly nodded assent, and the officer 
 went on, fixing the boy with his eye, in a manner 
 calculated to terrify the worst criminal into a con- 
 fession, but this time addressing the gentlemen 
 present : 
 
 " Says I then, to Officer Field here, ' That boy's 
 a runaway, and no mistake. He's too well-dressed 
 to be raised among the gang he's with, and his 
 story about coming in on the overland train and 
 losing his valise is all gammon. This fellow lives 
 on some farm not more'n a hundred mile from 
 here. He's been readin' blood-and-thunder stories 
 and some fine night has slipped a little money into 
 his pocket and stole away from home. These 
 country people are slow, but they'll be heard from 
 afore long. If he came down on the overland 
 train at all, he stole a ride.' " 
 
 The boy listened to this suppositious account of 
 himself in a silence which might have been obsti- 
 nacy or passive endurance. 
 
HOW Walter found his father. 143 
 
 " Have you seen the conductor of the overland 
 train that reached here Monday night ? " inquired 
 Secretary Hunter, of the Society for the Protection 
 of Children, in whose rooms this colloquy was, being 
 
 held. 
 
 "If you please, sir," said the other officer in 
 blue, speaking for the first time, " I went down to 
 the C. P. R. R. office yesterday to inquire about 
 him, and found he had just started off up Rus- 
 sian River the day before on a month's vacation. 
 By the time he comes back the matter will have 
 slipped his memory." 
 
 " Then there's the lad's name," broke in Officer 
 Mahoney. " Walter Linneville, indade ! There 
 isn't such a name in the whole directory of the city. 
 Faith ! it's from a chape novel." 
 
 " It is a curious case," said Secretary Hunter, 
 addressing Judge Windsor, president of the Society, 
 who had sat all the time a silent spectator. " What 
 do you think we had better do ? Write the New 
 York Chief of Police, and see if the lad- can be 
 traced there ? Or would that be proceeding with- 
 out sufficient grounds ? " 
 
144 HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 " Do whatever you please," said the judge, who 
 was a firm believer in physiognomy, and had been 
 keenly studying the boy's face during the progress 
 of the discussion. " / believe the boy's story. 
 Walter, would you like to go home with me and 
 stay until we find your father ? " 
 
 The boy was out of his chair in a moment. The 
 restoration of confidence in him, implied in the 
 judge's words, acted like some magical stimulus. 
 The sullen look vanished from his face and his 
 eyes sparkled with intelligence and gratitude. 
 
 " I know we shall find my father," he cried. 
 
 " Fields," said Officer Mahoney in an undertone, 
 " if he is a hippycrite he's a bad 'un," and Officer 
 Fields nodded assent. 
 
 This was early in the month of February, 1880. 
 Two months later, not a clue had been discovered 
 bearing upon the history of the boy. The State of 
 California had been scoured in vain for a lawyer, 
 or man of any other profession, bearing the name 
 of Charles Linneville. When other resources 
 failed, an appeal was made to the New York Chief 
 of Police, who reported that the address given by 
 
HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER, 1 45 
 
 the boy as his boarding-place in that city was a 
 vacant house. The boy was generally believed to 
 be a runaway, and every effort was made to obtain 
 some clue to his antecedents. 
 
 Judge Windsor alone adhered to his faith in the 
 lad, whose story was always straightforward and 
 consistent. He had latterly taken up the matter 
 himself, writing to several addresses which Walter 
 recalled among his friends at the East. But even 
 if the tale were confirmed, the judge reflected, 
 there still remained the perplexing question of the 
 father's whereabouts, for solution. 
 
 Before the public the boy figured as a delightful 
 mystery, and was fast passing into the history of 
 the city as a parallel case to that of Willie Bald- 
 win, the bright, neatly clad, freckled little five- 
 year-old, found wandering alone on the streets of 
 San Francisco early one morning some five years 
 ago, and of whose previous history not a trace has 
 ever been revealed. 
 
CHAPilER II. 
 
 AT the foot of the hills to the southwest of the 
 city, embowered in green, where birds sing 
 and flowers blossom all the year long, is the city 
 and county hospital, a rambling structure, built in 
 the form of a star, with long wings radiating from 
 a common centre. One day during the middle of 
 March, a couple of ladies drove up to the door, 
 heavy-laden with fruits, bouquets and magazines ; 
 they were representatives of the Fruit and Flower 
 Mission, on their regular weekly visit, and their ad- 
 vent was hailed with rejoicing by the patients. 
 
 Passing through Ward J in the north wing, they 
 were accompanied by Dr. Douglass, one of the vis- 
 iting physicians, who entertained them with odd 
 bits of information respecting some of the most 
 interesting cases. 
 
 At the end of the ward lay a strong man pros- 
 146 
 
HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 147 
 
 trate. His face was that of a man between thirty 
 and forty, two great dark eyes gazing gravely at his 
 visitors, his nose clear cut and shapely, his mouth 
 hidden by a heavy dark moustache, while his brown 
 hair was slightly tinged with gray. 
 
 "Here," said the doctor, "is a case brought up 
 from the City Receiving Hospital two or three weeks 
 ago. The fellow had a blow on his head, when 
 coming ashore from one of the coast steamers some 
 time before, and has continued ever since in the 
 state in which you see him. It is really a most in- 
 teresting case from a scientific standpoint, and of 
 a type very rarely presented to the profession. 
 Physically, he is in the most perfect health, a slight 
 paralysis of the lower muscles, which was percep- 
 tible at first, having wholly disappeared. His 
 power of articulation is measurably restored. But 
 the co-ordination between the brain and the body 
 — to make myself clear, I will say the mysterious 
 telegraphic communication which makes the body 
 obey the bidding of the brain — is wholly gone. 
 He hears us speak, his eyes are full of intelligence, 
 his mind is unusually clear and active, his utterance 
 
148 HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 is distinct, yet he can exercise no more control 
 over his speech than if it were the property of an- 
 other person. With the other functions it is the 
 same. Observe him when I give him this pen- 
 cil." 
 
 The doctor placed a pencil in the right hand of 
 the patient, at the same time laying before him a 
 sheet of paper, and saying, 
 
 " Be so kind as to write your name." 
 
 The man's forehead was knit as with a mighty 
 concentration of effort, but his hand, with a violent 
 jirk, flung the pencil to the floor. 
 
 " Put your hand to your head ! " commanded 
 the physician. ^ 
 
 Another silent inner struggle took place ; the 
 hand trembled, swayed, and moved a few inches 
 downward upon the bed. A gleam of fun sparkled 
 for a moment in the patient's eyes, at his own fu- 
 tile efforts. 
 
 " Question him, if you like," said the doctor to 
 his lady companions. " He has lain here for days, 
 but all efforts to learn his name or identity have 
 failed." 
 
Mow WALTER FOUND HIS FATHEP. 1 49 
 
 One of the ladies eagerly availed herself of the 
 permission. 
 
 " Are you an American ? " 
 
 "No," quick and distinct. 
 
 '• Are you an Englishman ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Irishman ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 "A German?" 
 
 "Well, I think— yes." 
 
 " Sprechm Sie Deutsch 1 " 
 
 "Oh, yes." 
 
 "But he does not, or he would szy ja, doctor. 
 Besides, he speaks English with purest accent." 
 
 " My dear madam, I told you he has not the 
 slightest control of his vocal organs. He says yes 
 when he means a negative. See ! He is laughing 
 now at his absurd admission." 
 
 " Let me try again. Now listen to me and an- 
 swer — me — care-fully. Are — ^you — a — German ? " 
 
 "No, American." The reply came with sharp 
 decision. 
 
 " Would you know your name if you heard it ? " 
 
150 HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Is it Smith ? Brown ? Jones ? Black " 
 
 " Lim — Lim-Limburger ! " suddenly burst from 
 the sick man's lips. 
 
 " Limburger ! What an odd name ! Are you 
 sure ? " 
 
 " Yes, yes. Oh — confound ! " 
 
 The lady who had not hitherto spoken, a small 
 woman clad in nut-brown, with bright black eyes, 
 stooped over the patient and whispered something 
 in his ear. As he heard it, a sudden light came 
 into his face, his hand clutched the coverlet im- 
 pulsively, but not a sound came from his lips. His 
 powers of utterance had failed again, and speech 
 was impossible, as it had been the greater portion 
 of the time since he was brought there. 
 
 As they moved away from his bedside one of 
 the ladies addressed the physician : 
 
 " Now, Doctor, tell us frankly what will be the 
 result of this case." 
 
 "The man," said the doctor, fastening his 
 thumbs in the buttonholes which ornamented the 
 lapels of his coat, " is to all intents and purposes, 
 
tlOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 151; 
 
 dead, save that his soul remains imprisoned within 
 the body over which it has ceased to reign. He 
 may continue in this state for years and be appar- 
 ently as infirm in intellect as any other inmate of 
 Napa Asylum — where he'll have to be sent be- 
 fore long. There is slight hope of recovery ;■ some 
 sudden shock might restore him — even the sight 
 of some familiar object — any trifling thing may 
 prove the touchstone by which will vibrate the 
 subtle chord linking together body and brain." 
 
 " Doctor Douglass, have you a telephone here, 
 and may I use it a moment ? " said the little 
 woman in nut-brown. She had been lost in thought 
 for some moments, and now spoke in a tone of 
 grave resolve. 
 
 " Why, certainly, my dear madam, but — may I 
 ask—" 
 
 " Yes, Doctor, you may. I am going to send for 
 the ' shock.' That is all." 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 AT three o'clock that afternoon, Judge Wind- 
 sor sat in his Hbrary at home, deep in the 
 study of some knotty legal question. Beside him 
 on the floor, turning over the pages of a dog-eared 
 volume, was his young protdgd. 
 
 A sudden exclamation from the boy arrested the 
 judge's attention. Holding the ponderous volume 
 open in his hands he rushed over to his protector. 
 
 " See here ! I have found his name ! " he cried. 
 
 The book he held was a directory, published a 
 year previous. It was open at the L's, and half- 
 way down the page, where the boy's finger was 
 firmly held, the judge read : 
 
 "Charles Linneville, Attorney-at-law, 412 Pine 
 St." 
 
 The judge was scarcely less excited than the 
 boy. 
 
 152 
 
HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 153 
 
 " Hurrah, Walter, we'll find him now ! If he was 
 here a year ago, it will be easy enough to trace 
 him. But what stupidity it was, not to have looked 
 in the old directories." 
 
 There came a sudden imperious ring at the tel- 
 ephone. He rose impatiently and responded. 
 
 " Is that you. Judge Windsor ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir." 
 
 " Not sir. Mrs. Carrington is speaking. I am 
 at the county hospital." A confused muttering 
 followed. 
 
 " Cannot understand you, madam. Will you 
 please speak slower ? " 
 
 " I said, please take Walter and come out here 
 at once. Don't delay.'' 
 
 The judge felt that something of importance 
 was behind this imperious demand. To don hats 
 and overcoats and spring into the light buggy that 
 stood before the door, was only the work of a few 
 minutes. The gray mare fairly flew over the pave- 
 ments and across the city. Buildings dwindled 
 in size, yards grew larger, streets broader. They 
 left the travelled road at last, flashed past vacant 
 
T ' ' HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 lots, over uneven grades, and finally drew up at 
 an arched gateway. 
 
 Arrived at the main entrance to the hospital, a 
 little woman in nut-brown encountered them, her 
 eyes dancing with excitementi but her voice cool 
 and controlled, as she said : 
 
 " Judge Windsor, I have to-day chanced upon 
 several curious cases here, which I fancy you and 
 Walter may like to see. Doctor Douglass is going 
 to take us through the north ward. Doctor Doug- 
 lass, you are acquainted with the judge, and know 
 the interest he takes in curious metaphysical 
 developments." 
 
 Judge Windsor would have liked very much to 
 make some inquiries of this exacting lady, but 
 a sharp glance of her eye admonished him to 
 silence. He accompanied the party through the 
 long, dreary room, now stopping at the bedside of 
 a dying consumptive, now looking pityingly upon 
 a man emaciated with blood starvation, and anon 
 chatting gayly with a victim of melancholia. An 
 incorrigible opium-eater entertained the visitors 
 with an account of his experiences, and related 
 
ilOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 155 
 
 dramatically his sensations at a time when his crav- 
 ings for the drug became so violent that he had to 
 be strapped to his bed to prevent his doing some 
 mischief to his attendants. 
 
 The judge listened with a weary and indifferent 
 air. They had nearly reached the extremity of the 
 ward, and he could not help thinking somewhat 
 regretfully of his cosey library and easy chair at 
 home. He felt fretted at the thoughtless demand 
 which had called him here on an obviously ainjless 
 quest. He knew Mrs. Carrington well ; and while 
 he metitally credited her with some very worthy 
 qualities and pleasant possibilities, he realized 
 that she was a very Quixotic little body and not at 
 all incapable of conceiving absurd and impractica- 
 ble schemes — 
 
 He never completed these reflections. There 
 was a sudden commotion close by. Upon a cot 
 just before him, where a moment before a helpless, 
 inanimate form had lain, a fine-looking, dark-eyed 
 man suddenly raised himself to a sitting posture, 
 and holding out his arms to the judge's timid 
 companion, cried out in resonant tones, 
 
1S6 HOW WALTER FOUND HIS FATHER. 
 
 " Walter, my boy ! 'come here." 
 
 Love, the all-powerful, had effected what neither 
 the physician's skill, nor all the resources of science, 
 could accomplish. 
 
 There may have been a dry eye somewhere in 
 that end of the ward, but if there was, no one else 
 was there with clear enough vision to -see it. 
 
 When Officer Mahoney heard the whole story — 
 how Mr. Linneville had gone up to Port Town- 
 send to settle a few months before, and, coming 
 down on the Astoria to meet his boy iji San Fran- 
 cisco, had received an almost fatal injury in step- 
 ping ashore — that blue-coated guardian of the 
 peace was quite crestfallen for a moment. Then he 
 turned to Officer Fields. 
 
 " Sure, that was the occasion we made a triflin' 
 mistake, me friend ! " And Officer Fields, the re- 
 ticent, nodded. 
 
AFTER THE BUFFALO. 
 
 BOTH Indians and bison, or American buffalo, 
 are so rapidly passing away that it may be of 
 interest to describe the way in which the inhabitants 
 of our great upland plains provision themselves for 
 the year. The Red River Half Breeds and the 
 white hunters hunt the buffalo chiefly for the hides, 
 and the cargoes of pelts that each year float down 
 the Missouri are only a partial measurement of the 
 destruction. The Government, too, as a means of 
 warfare frequently orders its cavalry to destroy 
 all the buffalo in the district occupied by a hostile 
 tribe ; and in a single day seven hundred animals 
 have been left on the ground, the service not per- 
 mitting even a pelt or a tongue to 'be taken. 
 
 Very different in its intention and aspect is the 
 hunt by an Indian tribe, when the approach of 
 winter is driving the bison toward the south, and 
 IS7 
 
15^ AFTER THE BUFFALO. 
 
 the hardships of the coming season make every 
 pound of meat valuable to the hunters. 
 
 At the time of the hunt I am about to describe, 
 I was with " Pretty Blackbird's " band oilpsarraqua 
 — or "Crow" — Indians (who live in the region 
 of the Upper Missouri) and we were encamped 
 along the creek, tributary to the Musselsjiell. The 
 banks were fringed with willow and alders and the 
 meadow was green with the fresh springing buffalo 
 grass. Teepees'' and wikinps* dotted both sides of 
 the stream ; grouped in picturesque clusters or 
 standing in solitary independence. The herd of 
 ponies grazed in the bottom land and on the hill- 
 sides. Here and there was one picketed ready 
 for use. The children were playing, the women 
 were working ; some making moccasons, some weav- 
 ing, some plaiting lariats, some sewing beaded 
 robes. The tall brown cones of the teepees with 
 the blue column of smoke rising from the nest of 
 poles sticking out of the top, and the little beehive- 
 shaped wikinps- made from boughs covered with 
 skins composed a savage village, beautiful in its 
 
 * Lodges. 
 
AFTKR THE BUFFALO. 1 59 
 
 straggling picturesqueness, its thronging life, and 
 so airy in its effect that you could not but feel that 
 on the slightest whim it would vanish like a mirage. 
 Those most dejected and wretched of all Indian 
 villagers, the wolfish dogs, were snapping and 
 snarling or skulking or sleeping or, in their queer 
 harness, were dragging kettles of water from the 
 creek. And yet with all this varied life and the 
 daily occupations there was a certain air of rest 
 that pervaded the little valley. It was in contrast 
 to the sudden bustle and hurrying to and fro, when 
 a picket came riding leisurely in to announce a 
 large herd of buffalo in sight. 
 
 The boys and men caught up their horses. The 
 women made ready the knives and lariats, and got 
 the pack animals. The men were soon ready, 
 most of them armed with rifles, some with bows 
 backed with sinew and capable of driving an arrow 
 clear through a horse. 
 
 The Indian horses are rated as " five-cow," " ten- 
 cow " ; the greatest prize being a " twenty-cow 
 horse." This means that the horse has speed and 
 bottom to overtake a herd under ordinary circum- 
 
l6o AFTER THE BUFFALO. 
 
 Stances and place his master alongside of twenty 
 cows, to be despatched in succession. A twenty- 
 cow horse is beyond price with the Crows and Sioux. 
 Like the Arab mares, they are as a rule not to be 
 bought. 
 
 The band of hunters stripped of everything 
 almost save aminunition pouch, or quiver, set off 
 at once to gain the windward of the herd ; and 
 later on the women and boys leading spare horses 
 and pack animals under guidance of a few men, 
 took a diagonal that would bring them near ithe 
 probable line of chase. 
 
 I was mounted on a very good " American horse " 
 about twice the size of " Pretty Blackbird's " sin- 
 ewy " twenty-cow " steed. 
 
 It had been raining the day before and the 
 prairie, only sparsely covered with the tufts of grass, 
 was very slippery. The old picket-guard bulls of 
 the herd sighted or scented us when we were about 
 half a mile away. Of course we were not grouped, 
 but had 'spread out to endeavor to enfold them. 
 Instantly away they went, tails up, their greatj lum- 
 bermg, clumsy gallop covering ground very rapidly, 
 
AJfTER THfi BUFFALO. ^^3 
 
 and their huge cloven hoofs taking good hold of 
 the slippery surface. And away went we, the ' 
 horses with ears and eyes set, running like an- 
 telope. It was a beautiful sight to see the naked 
 Indians and naked ponies, flying across "country in 
 a long, straggling line converging toward the black, 
 billowy mass of objects far ahead. Up hill and ' 
 down, over one rolling land wave after another, * 
 slipping, once or twice a horse falling, but usually 
 keeping their feet with wonderful agility and 
 steadily gaining on the bison. Pretty Blackbird 
 was in the lead, his horse cleaving the air like 
 a swallow ; his hair streamed in the wincl, his mus- 
 cular, bronze body poised gracefully as a part of 
 his steed, his right hand held his Winchester rifle, 
 thrown easily into the hollow of the left arm. My 
 horse managed to keep reasonabl)- near Blackbird's, 
 and about five of us struck the herd first, Blackbird 
 splitting it as a wedge and charging almost to its 
 head before firing. His object was to separate it 
 into portions. Aided by the foremost pursuers, 
 the herd was scattered and disorganized. We, 
 Blackbird and I, were at the front among the swift 
 
164 AFtER TMK Bli^FlLd. 
 
 footed cows, and he was selecting his animals and 
 banging right and left, holding his Winchester as 
 one would hold a revolver. He hit with almost 
 unerring accuracy, just behind the fore shoulder or 
 through the back (a forward and downward ranging 
 shot). I found great difficulty in keeping my horse 
 near the animals and fired shot after shot without 
 much effect, while Blackbird and the others were 
 laying out the huge beasts for the winter provision- 
 ing in rapid succession. 
 
 So we went ; away, away, the herd scattered 
 into groups, some calves being lassoed or shot 
 with arrows, by the hunters behind us. My horse 
 was flagging. His wind was gone, but with whip 
 and spur I endeavored to keep pace with Black- 
 bird. 
 
 It was no jise, his little beauty was running as 
 fresh almost as at the start, and a clump of buffalo 
 were almost within his reach. They and Blackbird 
 drew steadily away from me, when suddenly they 
 swerved, charged headlong down a long slope. I 
 took the shortest line toward them, but was far be- 
 hind when crack, crack began Blackbird's rifle. He 
 
AFTER THE BUFFALO. 165 
 
 was again up with them and in a few rapid shots had 
 marked his trail with his trophies when suddenly 
 the leaders went out of sight, and like the pouring 
 of a cataract the herd disappeared from view over 
 the edge of a coulee or deep gully. Blackbird 
 apparently made no attempt to check his horse ; 
 probably in the slippery mud it would have been 
 worse than useless. At any rate he simply gathered 
 his horsehair bridle, straightened himself — it was 
 the work of an instant — and over he went after 
 the buffalo. We heard his rifle, so knew he must 
 be safe; and hurrying forward saw the bison 
 scrambling up the opposite side of the ravine, 
 which was about twenty feet deep, and Blackbird's 
 horse was plunging to dry land, while knee-deep in 
 the mud the chief himself was blazing away at the 
 buffalo laboriously climbing the opposite bank. 
 
 My part of the hunt was over for that day, the 
 whole pleasure and excitement lay in the terrific 
 and dangerous ride. I had not the feeling of want 
 which prompted Blackbird to shoot the last flee- 
 ing creature, after he had strewn three or four 
 miles of trail with trophies. 
 
1 66 AFTER THE BUFFALO. 
 
 With a careless laugh and good-natured nod, 
 Blackbird signed to me that this was the end and 
 we rode back, meeting the crowd of women and 
 children. He told some where his trophies lay. 
 Others had been as successful as he ; and soon the 
 whole prairie was alive with little parties rapidly- 
 securing and caring for the abundant relay of win- 
 ter meats. Plenty reigned in the camp of Pretty 
 Blackbird. 
 
OSITO. 
 
 ON the lofty mountain that faced the cap- 
 tain's cabin, the frost had already made 
 an insidious approach, and the slender thickets of 
 quaking ash that marked the course of each tiny 
 torrent, now stood out in resplendent hues and 
 shone afar off like gay ribbons running through 
 the dark-green pines. Gorgeously, too, with scar- 
 let, crimson and gold, gleamed the lower spurs, 
 where the oak-brush grew in dense masses and 
 , bore beneath a blaze of color, a goodly harvest of 
 acorns, now ripe and loosened in their cups. 
 
 It was where one of these spurs joined the pa- 
 rent mountain, where the oak -brush grew thickest 
 and, as a consequence, the acorns were most abun- 
 dant, that the captain, well-versed in woodcraft 
 mysteries, had built his bear trap. For two days 
 he had been engaged upon it and now, as the even- 
 167 
 
i68 
 
 OSITO. 
 
 ing drew on, he sat contemplating it with satisfac- 
 tion, as a work finished and perfected. 
 
 From his station there, on the breast of the lofty 
 mountain, the captain could scan many an acre of 
 sombre pine forest with pleasant little parks inter- 
 spersed, and here and there long slopes brown 
 with bunch grass. He was the lord of this wild 
 domain. And yet his sway there was not undis- 
 puted. Behind an intervening spur to the west- 
 ward ran an old Indian trail long travelled by the 
 Southern Utes in their migrations north for trad- 
 ing and hunting purposes. And even now, a light 
 smoke wafted upward on the evening air, told of a 
 band encamped on the trail on their homeward 
 journey to the Southwest. 
 
 The captain needed not this visual token of 
 their proximity. He had been aware of it for sev- 
 eral days. Their .calls at his cabin in the lonely 
 little park below, had been frequent, and fhey had 
 been specially solicitous of his coffee, his sugar, his 
 biscuit and other delicacies, insomuch that once or 
 twice during his absence these ingenuous children 
 of Nature had, with primitive simplicity, entered his 
 
osixo. ■ 169 
 
 cabin and helped themselves without leave or stint. 
 
 However, as he knew their stay would be short, 
 the captain bore these neighborly attentions with 
 mild forbearance. It was guests more graceless 
 than these who had roused his wrath. 
 
 From their secret haunts far back towards the 
 Snowy Range, the bears had come down to feast 
 upon the ripened acorns, and so doing, had scented 
 the captain's bacon and sugar afar off and had 
 prowled by night about the cabin. Nay, more, 
 three days before, the captain, having gone hur- 
 riedly away and left the door loosely fastened, upon 
 his return had found all in -confusion. Many of his 
 eatables had vanished, his flour sack was ripped 
 open and, unkindest cut of all, his beloved books 
 lay scattered about. At the first indignant glance, 
 the captain had cried out, " Utes again ! " But on 
 looking around he saw a tell-tale trail left by floury 
 bear paws. 
 
 Hence this bear trap. 
 
 It was but a strong log pen floored with rough- 
 hewn slabs and fitted with a ponderous niovable 
 lid made of other slabs pinned on stout ^crofs 
 
1 70 OSITO. 
 
 pieces. But satisfied with his handiwork the cap- 
 tain now arose and prying up one end of the lid 
 with a lever, set the trigger and baited it with a 
 huge piece of bacon. He then piled a great quan- 
 tity of rock upon the already heavy lid to further 
 guard against the escape of any bear so unfor- 
 tunate as to enter, and shouldering his axe and rifle 
 walked homewards. 
 
 Whatever vengeful visions of captive bears he was 
 indulging in, were, however, wholly dispelled as he 
 drew near the cabin. Before the door stood the 
 Ute chief accompanied by two squaws. " How 1 " 
 said the chieftain, with a conciliating smile, laying 
 one hand on his breast of bronze and extending the 
 other as the captain approached. 
 
 " How ! " returned the captain bluffly, disdaining 
 the hand with a recollection of sundry petty thefts. 
 
 " Has the great captain seen a pappoose about 
 his wigwam ? " asked the chief, nowise abashed, in 
 Spanish — a language which many of the Southern 
 Utes speak as fluently as their own. 
 
 The great captain hald expected a request for a 
 biscuit; he,'therefo1-e; was naturally surprised at be- 
 
OSITO. 171 
 
 ing asked for a baby. With an effort he mustered 
 together his Spanish phrases and managed to reply 
 that he had seen no pappoose. 
 
 "Me pappoose lost," said one of the squaws 
 brokenly. And there was so much distress in her 
 voice that the captain, forgetting instantly all about 
 the slight depredations of his dusky neighbors, vol- 
 unteered to aid them in their search for the miss- 
 ing child. 
 
 All that night, for it was by this time nearly'dark, 
 the hills flared with pine torches and resounded 
 with the shrill cries of the squaws, the whoops of 
 the warriors, the shouts of the captain ; but the 
 search was fruitless. 
 
 This adventure drove the bear-trap from its build- 
 er's mind, and it was two days before it occurred 
 to him to go there in quest of captive bears. 
 
 Coming in view of it he immediately saw the lid 
 was down. Hastily he approached, bent over, and 
 peeped in. And certainly in the whole of his ad- 
 venturous life the captain was never more taken by 
 surpirise ; for there, crouched in one corner, was that 
 precious Indian infant. 
 
172 OSITO. 
 
 Yes, true it was, that all those massive timbers, 
 all that ponderous mass of rock, had only availed 
 to capture one very small Ute pappoose. At the 
 thought of it, the builder of the trap was astounded. 
 He laughed aloud at the absurdity. In silence he 
 threw off rbck and lid and seated himself on the 
 edge of the open trap. Captor and captive then 
 gazed at each other with gravity. The errant in- 
 fant's attire consisted of a calico shirt of gaudy 
 hues, a pair of little moccasons, much frayed, and a 
 red flannel string. This last was tied about his 
 straggling hair, which fell over his forehead like the 
 shaggy mane of a bronco colt and veiled, but could 
 not obscure, the brightness of his black eyes. 
 
 He did not cry ; in fact, this small stoic never 
 even whimpered, but he held the bacon, or what re- 
 mained of it, clasped tightly to his breast and gazed 
 at his captor in silence. Glancing at the bacon, 
 the captain saw it all. Hunger had induced this 
 wee wanderer to enter the trap, and in detaching 
 the bait, he had sprung the trigger and was caught. 
 
 " What are you called, littje one ? " asked the 
 captain in Spanish, very slowly and distinctly. 
 
OSITO. 175 
 
 " Osito," replied the wanderer in a small piping 
 voice, but with the dignity of a warrior. 
 
 " Little Bear ! " the captain repeated, and burst 
 into a hearty laugh, immediately checked, how- 
 ever, by the thought that now he had caught him, 
 what was he to do with him ? The first thing, evi- 
 dently, was to feed him. 
 
 So he conducted him to the cabin and there, ob- 
 serving the celerity with which the lumps of sugar 
 vanished, he saw at once that Little Bear was most 
 aptly named. Then, sometimes leading, and some- 
 times carrying him, for Osito was very small, he set 
 out for the Ute encampment. 
 
 Their approach was the signal for a mighty shout. 
 Warriors,squaws and the younger confreres of Osito, 
 crowded about them. A few words from the cap- 
 tain explained all, and Osito himself, clinging to his 
 mother was borne away in triumph — the hero of 
 the hour. Yet, no — the captain was that I be- 
 lieve. For as he stood in their midst with a very 
 pleased look on his sunburnt face, the chief quiet- 
 ing the hubbub with a wave of his hand, advanced 
 and stood before him. " The great captain has a 
 
176 OSITO. 
 
 good heartj" he said in tones of conviction. " What 
 can his Ute friends do to show their gratitude ? " 
 
 " Nothing," said the captain looking more pleased 
 than ever. 
 
 " The captain has been troubled by the bears. 
 Would it please him if they were all driven back to 
 their dens in the great mountains towards the set- 
 ting sun ? " 
 
 " It would," said the captain ; " can it be done ? " 
 
 " It can. It shall," said the chief with emphasis. 
 "To-morrow" let the captainVtf^ his eyes open, and 
 as the sun sinks behind the mountain tops he shall 
 see the bears follow also." 
 
 The chief kept his word. The next day the up- 
 roar on the hills was terrific. Frightened out of their 
 wits, the bears forsook the acorn fields and fled 
 ingloriously to their secret haunts in the mountains 
 to the westward. 
 
 In joy thereof the captain gave a great farewell 
 feast to his red allies. It was spread under the 
 pines in front of his cabin and every delicacy of the - 
 season was there, from bear steaks to beaver tails. 
 The banquet was drawing to a close, and compli- 
 
OSITO. 177 
 
 mentary speeches 'twixt host and guests were in 
 order, when a procession of the squaws was seen 
 approaching from the encampment. They drew 
 near and headed for the captain in solemn silence. 
 As they passed, each laid some gift at his feet — 
 fringed leggings, beaded moccasons, bear-skins, coy- 
 ote skins, beaver pelts and soft robes of the moun- 
 tain lion's hide — until the pile reached to the cap- 
 tain's shoulders. Last of all came Osito's mother 
 and crowned the heap with a beautiful little brown 
 bear-skin. It was fancifully adorned with blue rib- 
 bons, and in the centre of the tanned side, there 
 were drawn, in red pigment, the outlines of a very 
 stolid and stoical-looking pappoose. 
 
JAP. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 IT was a very saucy-looking little dog, with black, 
 bead-like eyes and a pug nose so high in air 
 that it gave him a look of ineffable conceit, al- 
 though he was, at this moment in an attitude of 
 supplication, sitting on his hind legs, begging pit- 
 eously. 
 
 But then Jap was always begging ; when he was 
 hungry, when he wanted to go to walk ; when he 
 desired to have a game of ball ; when he thought 
 anything was expected of him ; whenever, in fact, 
 he felt conversational and tried to say something. 
 
 Just at present he put up his paws and begged 
 
 because he was embarrassed by the long sermon 
 
 his young master, Gabriel Roberts, »had been 
 
 preaching at him. It was a full account of Jap's 
 178 
 
JAP. 179 
 
 faults and shortcomings, and although Jap experi- 
 enced no sense of remorse for his sins, nor meant 
 to promise amendment for the future, he still 
 found it convenient to wiggle his slender black and 
 white paws and entreat Gabriel to stop. Gabriel, 
 however, went on : " There, you rascal, you barked 
 three times in the night and woke poor old 
 grandma ! You worried grandma's cat the first 
 thing this morning ! You drove grandma's rooster 
 out of the yard ! You would not eat the breakfast 
 grandma offered you ! I see, Jap, you and I 
 must go." 
 
 Jap continued to beg, but not in a manner to 
 show that he tried to take in the seriousness of 
 the situation. Gabriel felt, with a heavy heart, 
 that Jap's prospects looked very grave. For Jap — 
 although of all little dogs in the world the most 
 bewitching — had enemies of whom Gabriel's 
 grandmother was the chief. The others were her 
 cat and a gigantic rooster who was so afraid of the 
 little dog that he took his hens far away from 
 home on long excursions, where they got into sad 
 mischief scratching up the neighbor's gardens and 
 
l8o JAf. 
 
 were angrily complained of. The old grandmother 
 had had little but trouble all her life, and had 
 grown cross-grained with all the world, and found 
 these little vexations unendurable. She had told 
 Gabriel pointedly this morning that she would not 
 allow herself to be tormented tc^ death by a miser- 
 able little animal which was not even a Christian 
 dog, but a wretched heathen Japanese Pug. His 
 ways were not her ways ; her ideas were far from 
 governing him, and to see that conceited little nose 
 sniffing scorn at her was more, than she could en- 
 dure ! If Gabriel did not at once get rid of that 
 dog, she would. This intimation was something to 
 shudder at, for it meant- all the terrors of sudden 
 death for the poor little beast. 
 
 Gabriel had always been a dreamy boy with his 
 mind set on things far-off, but he had grown to 
 love Jap with all his heart. Those of my readers 
 who know how expensive this rare breed of dogs 
 is, may wonder how a barefooted boy of twelve, out 
 at elbows and with a torn straw hat, should come 
 to have one in his possession. But Jap had been 
 given to Gabriel the year before by a little girl 
 
JAP. I 8 k, 
 
 whom he pulled out of the river into which she 
 had tumbled by chance. It had not been a diffi- 
 cult feat to achieve, and he could see no reason 
 for accepting any reward and indignantly declined 
 the money her parents offered him. A few months 
 later, however, the family went to Europe for a 
 long stay, and the little girl sent Gabriel her pet 
 dog. Ever since he and the Pug had been insep- 
 arable, and a warm friendship had grown up be- 
 tween them. Jap was, in truth, a dog of quick 
 intelligence and understood most things at once. 
 There was only one subject regarding which he 
 was stupid, and that was where Gabriel's grand- 
 mother was concerned. The powers that be, must 
 be propitiated, and he ought to have tried to please 
 this somewh-at grim and melancholy-minded old 
 woman. But Jap was excessively fastidious, and 
 she was always bustling about and getting in his 
 way. He liked peace and quietness, and she shut 
 doors with a bang. He had a preference, too, 
 for rather delicate food, and she had a way of 
 insisting that he should eat messes which she de- 
 clared quite good enough for a dog, but which he 
 
l82 JAP. 
 
 despised and would have starved before he con- 
 descended to touch. She had, besides, given him 
 two or three contemptuous little kicks. Ja,p found 
 such treatment hard to put up with, and he quite 
 disliked her and showed his feelings. Not being 
 a little Christian dog, you see, he did not know 
 that he should have borne even her blows with 
 patience and fortitude. 
 
 Gabriel knew his grandmother and although he 
 believed in her actual kindness, he realized the 
 strength of her prejudices and that she would in- 
 flictingly carry out any course of action she once 
 decided on. So he said to himself that Jap should 
 never go back into her sight again. He thought 
 a little of setting out in quest of adventures with 
 Jap for a Puss-in-Boots ; he remembered Dick 
 Whittington's cat which laid the foundations of his 
 fortunes. It then occurred to him that Jap knew 
 so many tricks he might well set up for a Learned 
 Dog, and earn his own living, besides drawing 
 crowds to admire him. This idea quite pleased 
 Gabriel; and had he known of a circus within 
 walking distance he might have set out that very 
 
JAP. 183 
 
 hour to solicit an engagement for the Japanese 
 Pug. 
 
 As it was while turning the fancy over in his 
 mind, Gabriel thought he might as well take stock 
 of the dog's performances, and sitting down again 
 was putting him through his paces, when all at 
 once his attention was diverted by the heavy tramp 
 of hoofs along the road and the dull lowing of 
 cattle. In a few moments a drove came in sight, 
 driven by a boy a-foot and followed by a large, 
 red-faced, good-natured looking man in a gig. 
 Gabriel and his dog were on the bank just above 
 the sandy road whence rose a cloud of dust and 
 enveloped them. Jap was sitting on his hind legs, 
 holding a stick on his fore paws, but did not alter 
 his position except to raise his ears and turn his 
 head from right to left. The man in the gig hap- 
 pened to observe the droll little figure and stop- 
 ping his horse he burst into a loud laugh, and 
 called out : 
 
 " What'll you take for your dog, my lad ? I call 
 that a knowing animal." 
 
 "One hundred dollars,"- said-Gabriel, just-as ii$ 
 
184 JAP. 
 
 might have said " a thousand " ; for he had no idea 
 that Jap commanded any special market value. 
 He was a bright little dog, that he knew, and so 
 odd-looking that strangers always turned to look 
 at him ; but in the village of Marshfield dogs were 
 not considered as salable commodities. So his 
 reply was merely a pleasantry, and it surprised 
 him when the man got out of his gig, came up the 
 bank, and after looking Jap over critically, said : 
 
 "That's a han'some price, even for a Japanese 
 Pug. Where'd you get him ? " 
 
 "A young lady in the Red Stone House gave 
 him to me." 
 
 "Where'd she get him ? Imported him, likely 
 enough." 
 
 " I don't know," said Gabriel. " I know she 
 made everything of him, but all she told me was 
 that he was ten months old." 
 
 " He's a fine animal an' no mistake," said the 
 man sitting down beside Gabriel. " He seems a 
 bright 'un too." 
 
 " Oh ! what he don't know ain't worth knowing," 
 said Gabriel, " See him now ! " 
 
JAP. i8s 
 
 Gabriel took a ball out of his pocket and flung 
 it at Jap who caught it in his mouth ; then with a 
 stroke of his paw sent it rolling back along the 
 ground. Next Gabriel blindfolded him, while he 
 hid his hat, and then let him look for it with all 
 his eyes.. In fact, there was no end to the games 
 they played together to the high enjoyment of the 
 red-faced ruan. 
 
 " I'd like to have that dog," said he presently, 
 " ef we could come to terms." 
 
 " You'd have to offer something considerable to 
 make me part with him," declared Gabriel. " He's 
 the only thing I've got in the world." 
 
 " I'll give you five dollars in cash for him." 
 
 " Five dollars," repeated Gabriel with an accent 
 of scorn ; yet in all his life he had never had five 
 dollars of his own. 
 
 The man meditated a while. " I should like to 
 make it an object to you," he said then. " I don't 
 mind sayin' as much as this ; I've got a brother in 
 the fancy-dog line an' at this moment he's in want 
 of a Japanese dog for a customer. He had six 
 come out by steamer, but four on 'em died in the 
 
i86 JAP. 
 
 passage, an' the other two have dwindled a'most to 
 nothin' an' lost their hair. I'd like to take him 
 that dog. Now, I wonder what you say to a 
 swap." 
 
 "A swap?" exclaimed Gabriel, to whom the 
 process of swapping meant marbles and jack- 
 knives. 
 
 " Folks got a cow ? " the man went on to inquire 
 with a forced smile. 
 
 " No,'' said Gabriel incredulously. 
 
 " What would you say now to a good cow for 
 that ere dog ? " 
 
 Gabriel felt as if he were dreaming ; but he was 
 not a boy to give himself away easily, so he asked 
 quietly : " What sort of a cow ? " 
 
 " Jes' come down an' look at my red heifer," 
 said the man, pointing to his drove which had 
 stopped a little way off and were grazing content- 
 edly along the green banks. 
 
 Gabriel took Jap in his arms and followed the 
 red-faced man down, and the dog sniffed at the 
 cattle and looked at them as if they were insects. 
 Some were old cows and some were fine young 
 
JAP. 187 
 
 Steers, and here and there was a mischievous-look- 
 ing calf. But the gem of the whole herd was a 
 small red heifer who was cropping the sweet herb- 
 age with long, deep breath. 
 
 " Lead her up," the man said to the cowboy. 
 " Now look at her," he went on to Gabriel, " an' 
 see if you don't think she's a beauty. I bought 
 her yesterday, twenty miles back, an' she's worth 
 a pile o' money ; but I'll trade her off to you for 
 that ere dog I've set my heart on havin', an' will 
 call the transaction square.'' 
 
 Gabriel's head was swimming, but he said 
 soberly, " Grandmother always thought if she only 
 had a cow, she could get along." 
 
 " Wa'al, here's such a chance as you'll never 
 have ag'in ! Look at her horns ! She's part 
 Jersey, an' a young Jersey cow's worth her weight 
 in gold. She only had her first calf las' February. 
 Her milk's as rich an' sweet as butter. Jes' taste 
 it!" 
 
 He pulled a cup out of his gig and milked the 
 heifer, calling upon Gabriel to taste, and Gabriel 
 tasted much to his own satisfaction. He did not 
 
1 88 JAP. 
 
 tell the drover he thought the world bewitched 
 that anybody would give a cow away for a little 
 dog. But after half an hour's talk he kissed Jap 
 and resigned him to the man, who tied him se- 
 curely to his dash-board and drove away. Gabriel 
 walked home with some elation, leading his prize. 
 But his heart was pulled two ways, and when Jap 
 sitting up on the seat of the gig looked back at 
 him and begged, uttering a piteous, little, soft 
 whine, it was torn almost in two. 
 
 Strange to say, as the two separated it was the 
 drover who felt sure he drove a profitable morn- 
 ing's work and made the best of the bargain. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 WE are obliged to pass over the details of 
 old Mrs. Roberts' reception of her grand- 
 son and his cow. At first she was indignant, then 
 alarmed, and finally declared herself incredulous. 
 That a little dog who could do nothing save to sit 
 on his hind legs and beg could be exchanged for 
 a beautiful sleek heifer, was a thing undreamed 
 of in her philosophy. Gabriel showed her a paper 
 in which the drover had recorded the transaction, 
 and which both he and the cowherd had signed ; 
 but even this did little towards satisfying the old 
 woman that the bargain was legitimate and lawful. 
 Nothing could have convinced her except the logic 
 of the situation : there was the cow grazing con- 
 tentedly in the back yard and nobody to hinder ! 
 Mrs. Roberts could do no work that day. It was 
 enough to stand about and watch the heifer, first 
 189 
 
19° JAP. 
 
 from one side and then from the other. The 
 creature had such a beautiful shiny coat — such 
 meek loving eyes, such great, velvety dewlaps ! 
 The very whisk of her tail was a poetic curve to 
 the old woman, who in all her long life had had 
 few possessions to take comfort in. After a while 
 she grew bold enough to put her hand on the 
 arched neck, and then she laughed ; an odd sort of 
 a laugh with a half-sob in it. Many and many a 
 day had passed since the poor old woman had 
 known just that throb of pride and joy. 
 
 But when the day declined, and milking-time 
 came, there was a slight reverse. Gabriel had 
 asked the farmer over at the Red Stone House to 
 come and teach him how to milk, and it was then 
 that the flaw in their good luck came out. The 
 heifer kicked the milk-pail, and this was the secret 
 of the whole transaction. The drover had bought 
 her for a song from her owner who had found her 
 unmanageable. Hardly a drop of milk had the 
 milkmaid saved in a whole month, and there is an 
 end to all things. However, Farmer White had 
 not lived all his life for nothing. 
 
JAP. 191 
 
 " Jes' go," said he to Gabriel, " an' get a basket 
 of red clover blossoms an' feed them to her one 
 at a time while I milk her. No female critter can 
 think o' two things at once, an' she'll forget her 
 heels in having her tongue pleased." 
 
 Now this worked like a charm ; or perhaps it 
 was that a change of scene had improved the 
 heifer's manners. But henceforth whenever she 
 was milked, there was always some delicacy pro- 
 vided for her to chew on while she stood. Then 
 from being kindly treated, and having no rival in 
 the yard to make her jealous, she soon forgot all 
 her tricks and settled down into an unbroken 
 course of the prettiest behavior. 
 
 In fact, both Mrs. Roberts and Gabriel declared 
 that such a cow had never been seen before ; so 
 beautiful, so good-natured, so sensible. The old 
 woman would waken out of a nightmare at night 
 in which she had dreamed of losing the cow, and 
 again and again stole out "and put her arms about 
 the creature's neck and fairly wept with joy at her 
 reassurance in the possession. Every morning 
 she said to the red heifer, " There you are, my 
 
1^2 JAP. 
 
 beauty ! " Gabriel milked her at sunrise, a great 
 pail of foaming milk, and then went about taking 
 the milk to their customers. " Customers " — the 
 old woman used to repeat the word to herself again 
 and again and look at the three sets of chalk- 
 marks on the pantry-door. " Customers " — the 
 word had such a rich, thrifty sound to it. 
 
 Then at night the milkman called to take their 
 milk, and put it into a great can which he sent off 
 by the eight o'clock train to town. Here was 
 wealth indeed ! 
 
 And besides Gabriel had milk to drink ; milk 
 on his potatoes, bread and milk — puddings too, 
 on a Sunday at least ! Why it was an era of actual 
 luxury in that household which had formerly known 
 nothing except scanty rations and privation. 
 
 Then driving the cow to pasture (Squire Lowry, 
 a distant relation of Gabriel's had given them a 
 bit of pasture land in his river-meadow) was to the 
 boy an experience of almost unmixed delight. 
 The sky was over him, and the beautiful thousand- 
 faced and thousand-voiced nature was all about 
 him. Hitherto, when he had lounged about the 
 
jAi>. 193 
 
 fields, he had had a hopeless vagabondish feeling 
 of being of no use in the world. Now he seemed 
 to be a part of the days and the seasons ; of the 
 bright magical world of life and color all about 
 him. He learned to know every bird which 
 whirred and soared and called and sang; he knew 
 the favorite flowers of the bees and the secret of 
 the gray rabbit's nest. He was, in fact, learning 
 everything nowadays ; he was going to school at 
 the academy, and could hold his own with any boy 
 there. 
 
 There was nevertheless one regret which fol- 
 lowed him.everywhere ; and that was for dear little 
 Jap. He missed the dog with his pretty ways, his 
 loving companionship, and it cut Gabriel to the 
 heart to think that it was he, he himself, who had 
 sold the little creature for a " mess of pottage " 
 and had sent him away into the black world of 
 silence and distance. Was the little dog happy ? 
 Was he loved, tended, guarded from the cold and 
 rain ? Who could answer these questions which 
 made Gabriel's heart swell almost to bursting 
 when they came up to him in the lonely night.' 
 
194 JAP. 
 
 It would have been strange indeed if Gabriel 
 had not had the Uveliest sense of gratitude for 
 what little Jap had done for him. The dog may 
 have been an unconscious instrument, but Hfe was 
 all the same the real instrument of this amazing 
 good luck. Even the old grandmother by this 
 time regarded Jap as a sort of fairy-gift which had 
 changed all their fortunes. Her heart had grown 
 softer, and she found herself wishing now and then 
 that she had never ill-treated the little dog. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE exchange had been made in May, and the 
 summer and autumn passed all too quickly, 
 and winter came. But with the winter came Christ- 
 mas with its warmth and glow of good cheer and 
 kind feeling, which brought back the beauty of the 
 summer and the richness of the autumn. For 
 Gabriel and his grandmother were to have a Christ- 
 mas this year. Hitherto in Gabriel's life this holi- 
 day season had been something to shudder at. 
 But now even Mrs. Roberts had said, " Let us keep 
 Christmas, Gabriel ! " and he had dressed the little 
 house with evergreens and done all he could to 
 make things look festival-like. His grandmother, 
 too, had performed her part, and what a dinner 
 she set forth, after they had been to church that 
 day ! Gabriel had brought a dinnerless boy home 
 to dine with him, and how the two laughed as they 
 195 
 
196 JAP. 
 
 saw the array of good things on the table, which 
 were only a promise ; for was not the happy old 
 grandmother still busy at the fire over good things 
 to come ? This was a Christmas indeed ! Out in 
 her stall in the shed, the red heifer was eating a 
 warm sweet mush of her own, for it was a bitter cold 
 day and she needed comfort. So when Gabriel 
 sat down to dinner he felt that everybody was 
 having a good time, but he did say with a full 
 heart, " I wish little Jap was here ! " 
 
 And at this moment something unexpected hap- 
 pened which almost sent his heart into his mouth. 
 It was an impatient, short little bark. 
 
 " What's that ? " he exclaimed, and was out of 
 doors in an instant, tearing down the yard to the 
 gate. And what do you suppose he saw ? Why, 
 there sat little Jap on his hind legs begging to be 
 let in. 
 
 Gabriel pounced on him with the swiftness of a 
 hawk upon its prey, but with a diiference, for he 
 strained the little creature to his breast, kissing 
 his little soft head over and over, while Jap, on 
 his side, showed the liveliest joy at seeing Gabriel. 
 
JAP. 197 
 
 He licked his face, he licked his hands, he uttered 
 little soft whines ; he even wagged his tail at the 
 sight of old Mrs. Roberts who had followed her 
 grandson out and now stood in utter consterna- 
 tion raising her hands and exclaiming, in fear and 
 trembling, " Has the cow got to go ? " 
 
 For now that the little dog had come back, she 
 could not see what would happen except that 
 there should be a first transformation scene, and 
 the beautiful red heifer and the bright new milk 
 pans and the chalk-marks on the pantry door — 
 in short all signs of richness and plenty which the 
 had given her new youth — all, all vanish away and 
 leave nothing behind but this conceited little pug. 
 
 Gabriel, however, after quaking for a moment 
 over the thought of the red-faced drover coming 
 down the lane and demanding his heifer back, 
 thought the matter out sensibly, and said, " Jap 
 must have run away from his owner and come 
 back to me. Jap, tell me this minute where you 
 came from ! " 
 
 Jap, however, said not a word concerning his 
 adventures, but entering the familiar kitchen and 
 
ig8 JAP. 
 
 smelling the steaming dinner, at once jumped up 
 in a chair and began to beg for some. Not even 
 the old grandmother had the heart to refuse him 
 his share of the best, and when he licked her hand 
 she patted him quite kindly and everything was 
 made up between them. In fact, Jap's arrival 
 seemed just what was needed to put the whole 
 party in the highest spirits for the feast. It was 
 Christmas day and their duty was to eat, drink 
 and be merry. 
 
 But when Gabriel awoke next morning with 
 Jap's head against his shoulder, and when he went 
 out to the shed to milk the cow followed by Jap, 
 jaunty and important as ever at his heels, he began 
 to wonder how he could possibly be the owner of 
 both the cow and the dog at once. It seemed 
 quite a delicate question, and he knew not how to 
 answer it. A fair exchange is no robbei^y, but the 
 gain from this operation seemed to be wholly on 
 one side. He could not exactly quarrel with this 
 singular result, but although he would have been 
 perfectly satisfied if he could have owned both 
 (jow and dog, he could not reconcile it to his <^0T\- 
 
Ay THAT INSfAffT 9ABRIEL SATy A JfOTICE f ASTENED TO A Tfiigj 
 
JAP. 201 
 
 science that at present they both seemed to be his. 
 
 If Jap could only speak — only tell where he 
 had been ! But the only answer he made to the 
 most persistent question was to put up his paws 
 to beg. 
 
 " Oh ! Jap, Jap," Gabriel said many times that 
 day, "don't you understand that you did very 
 wrong to steal yourself ? " 
 
 Jap, however, remained entirely undisturbed by 
 
 remorse. He seemed frankly pleased to get back 
 
 to his old quarters. He wore a silver chain about 
 
 his neck, but in spite of such splendors he seemed 
 
 t 
 to have grown more humble and thankful-minded 
 
 in the interval that he had been away. And after 
 
 the grandmother had once made up her mind that 
 
 nobody was likely to appear and carry off her 
 
 precious cow in place of Jap, she was very good 
 
 to the little dog, giving him a corner by the fire 
 
 and selecting tid-bits for his meals. 
 
 " It seems to be all right," said Gabriel on the 
 
 third day while walking along the village street. 
 
 At that instant, however, he saw a notice fastened 
 
 tp a tree which sent the blood to his fag^. 
 
202 JAP. 
 
 It ran thus : 
 
 Strayed or Stolen on Christmas day, a Japanese 
 pug dog with a silver link collar, marked J. S. 
 Any on€ returning the animal within three days will re- 
 ceive a suitable reward. John Blackwell. 
 
 Gabriel's duty was simple enough. There was 
 Jap trotting before him, and there was Judge 
 Blackwell's great house up on the hill. All Gabriel 
 had to do was to take the dog in his arms and go 
 and knock at that wide front door. 
 
 " Let the boy come in," said Judge Blackwell, 
 when he heard of his errand. Gabriel was shown 
 into a. large crimson-furnished and fire-lighted 
 room, where the Judge was sitting with his married 
 daughter who was visiting him. Now this was the 
 real mistress of Jap who had paid a great price 
 for him ; but Jap only looked at her, wagged his 
 tail once and stayed with Gabriel. 
 
 "You see," Gabriel explained rather shocked at 
 the pug's want of feeling, " he used to be my dog." 
 
 " Your dog ? " said the Judge. " How is that ? " 
 
 Then the whole story came out, and it amused 
 the Judge and hjs daughter so much that they 
 
JAP. 203 
 
 asked Gabriel a thousand questions ; about himself, 
 his grandmother, and the heifer, and their prospects 
 generally. 
 
 " I think, my dear, I should like to have the lad 
 keep his pet,'' said the old gentleman to his 
 daughter. " If your husband does not mind, the 
 dog shall stay with his former master, and I will 
 buy you another. I like the little fellow's fidelity 
 in going back to his old home on a Christmas 
 day." 
 
 Gabriel, modest, tried to be proud. But it was 
 of no use. His face shone so brightly at the idea 
 of having his dog back that it told all the story 
 and his words went for nothing. So he carried 
 Jap home and the two live together to this day. 
 Old Mrs. Roberts divides her affections between 
 her grandson, the red cow, and Jap nowadays, and 
 has made a red cushion for the latter. 
 
THE RICH MAN OF THE 
 MOUNTAINS. 
 
 IT was in the summer of 18 — that mining busi- 
 ness took me into Colorado and well over it. 
 Almost the first acquaintance I made there was 
 Abe Carter, a genuine "old-timer.'' Having many 
 business transactions with him, I learned to resisect 
 his keen insight, his quaint straightforwardness, his 
 manly nature. A large, full-bearded, great-hearted 
 fellow was he, though gruff and blunt in manners to 
 strangers ; especially to " tender feet," for whom 
 " old-timers " generally have a profound contempt. 
 Notwithstanding the fact that I was undeniably one 
 of this unfortunate class, we were friendly from the 
 first ; and much that I learned of mining lore was 
 due to his intelligent companionship. Eventually 
 we became stanch friends, and for a friend to be 
 relied upon in weal or woe, give me one of his kind. 
 204 
 
THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 205 
 
 The next summer while we were travelling to- 
 wards camp in the Gunnison Country, we passed 
 the ravine now well known as " Dead Man's Gulch," 
 and I asked him about the' origin of the name. He 
 told me the story of the massacre there years ago, 
 but confessed he had forgotten many of the facts. 
 
 " Tell you what," added he, " Ouray is camped 
 near here and we'll get him to tell us about it." 
 So after selecting a camping-spot for the night we 
 rode off in the direction of Ouray's camp. 
 
 Ouray was then the Chief of the Indians, and to 
 the day of his death, a good friend to the white men. 
 His house was carpeted and comfortably furnished, 
 even to silverware for the table, and he subscribed 
 to and read many of the leading newspapers. This 
 superior intelligence did not extend to the mem- 
 bers of his family, however, and after his death 
 his wife went back to her tapee, and Ouray's house 
 and its refined belongings were scattered to the 
 four winds. 
 
 We found Ouray sociable and communicative. 
 He gave us an intelligent account of the massacre. 
 
 " In 1859," he said, " five white men left their 
 
2o6 THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 Eastern homes to seek for gold in the secret safes 
 and vaults of the Rocky Mountains. While cross- 
 ing the Plains they met a Cheyenne Indian who 
 declared he could direct them to a rich mineral 
 vein, and would do it for a small consideration in 
 blankets, etc. ; but guide them personally he would 
 not. It would be death to him to go. Did they 
 not know that a feud existed between the Moun- 
 tain and the Plains Indians ? If either were caught 
 on the other's ground, there was but one way off of 
 it for the offender, and that was straight into the 
 Happy Hunting Grounds. But the men argued, 
 persuaded and bribed until they finally prevailed 
 upon the Cheyenne to go with them, promising to 
 protect him through all dangers. Continuing their 
 journey, they met with no adventure until they 
 reached the gulch, which had then, of course, no 
 name, as their party was the very first to cross the 
 main range. 
 
 " Here they camped for the night without disturb- 
 ance, intending an early start in the morning. 
 They cosily cooked their breakfast in their little 
 black frying-pan and ate it with a keen relish. 
 
tHE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 2o'j 
 
 Strapping the pan and their blankets on a pony's 
 back, they were just ready to resume the journey, 
 when they suddenly descried a party of Indians. 
 They were the dread Mountain redskins. They at 
 once demanded that the white men should give up 
 to them their Indian guide. The whites refused. 
 The chief of the band declared that though they 
 would not disturb the white men, the Indian they 
 must and would have ; he must be given up or he 
 would be taken by force. Of course the white men 
 could see, he argued, that resistance was use- 
 less as his band numbered three hundred braves. 
 
 " But the men were true to their pledged word. 
 They resolved to protect the Indian as best they, 
 could. There certainly was not the shadow of a 
 chance for him ; and how they themselves would 
 fare was doubtful. 
 
 " At that moment the fate of all Of them was 
 suddenly settled. 
 
 " This was the situation : the white men were in 
 the bed of the ravine. High bluffs rose on either 
 side.. The Indians swarmed on the ledges and 
 levels of one of the lower bluffs. There was but 
 
208 THE RICH MA^f OF TliE MOUNT AllSfg. 
 
 one mile more to make before the broad open 
 mesa would offer the little party its chances of 
 escape ; and to reach this open country was their 
 only hope, and they knew the whole distance would 
 be lined with the moving enemy. 
 
 " And this was the crisis : while the parley had 
 been going on, an Indian on the opposite bluff had 
 been continually dancing, gesticulating and shout- 
 ing. He would occasionally drop on one knee, 
 draw his bow straight for his victim's head, and 
 then leap into the air in triumph, as if he had 
 really laid him in the dust. As these pantomimes 
 had become more frequent, one of the whites had 
 watched his movements with increasing dread. 
 And now as he observed him aiming with greater 
 care than at any time before, the man fired at him 
 just in time, as he hoped, to save the life of the terri- 
 fied guide. The savage with a wild leap and plunge 
 tumbled into a small gorge. 
 
 " The arrow had not been discharged, and the 
 fatal shot so enraged the other braves that shower 
 after shower of arrows at once came flying into the 
 camp of the unfortunate white men. All parleying. 
 
THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 209 
 
 all possibility of compromise was at an end. Being 
 at every natural disadvantage, they were also en- 
 tirely at the mercy of the Indians. Notwithstand- 
 ing this, they fought like heroes. Driving their 
 horses up the ravine they took refuge behind them, 
 firing over their backs. When these barricades 
 fell before them, they flew from bush to tree, still 
 firing continually. When the last brave fellow 
 dropped, the opening of the ravine was not a quarter 
 of a mile ahead. Three quarters of a mile had 
 they travelled, with three hundred Indians firing 
 upon them from above. 
 
 " The Plains Indian was carried off in triumph, 
 but the bodies of the whites were left where they 
 fell. Their own fallen braves, twenty-five in num- 
 ber, were thrown into the gorge, where the first 
 savage had tumbled — hence the disitial name by 
 which the spot is known." 
 
 Ouray, who had been an eye-witness to the scene, 
 could not sufficiently express his admiration of the 
 courage and good marksmanship with which the 
 white men fought, nor his regret that he had not been 
 able to control the Utes. 
 
210 THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 I inquired whether there was in existence any 
 clue to the men all of whom, he said, were less 
 than thirty-five years of age. He produced part of 
 a diary that had been found on the ground ; but 
 the penciled words were indistinct and no names 
 could be traced. I determined to visit the spot 
 and accordingly Carter and I rode over to it the 
 next morning. There we saw the bleached bones of 
 the brave fellows and walked the straight and nar- 
 row path that they had desperately taken to their 
 fate. 
 
 Carter aroused me from a melancholy reverie. 
 I followed him across the ravine and up to the 
 ground where the Indians had fought. The gorge 
 in which the braves had been thrown was an open 
 spot, and jumping down I tossed out whatever I 
 could find in the shape of a trophy. As I was 
 about to ascend, with a handful of arrows, a small, 
 curious-looking parcel attracted my attention. After 
 unrolling piece after piece of buckskin and string 
 after string of rawhide, I concluded there was noth- 
 ing to find, when some small object dropped at my 
 feet. Picking it up, I found it to be a beautiful 
 
THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 2II 
 
 Stone of about the size of a small walnut, evidently 
 the property of a "medicine-man. 
 
 Much pleased to secure such a relic, we left the 
 spot and started for camp, thirty miles away. There 
 I showed the stone to Jack Armstrong, a man who 
 had the reputation of being a good mineralogist. 
 He examined it closely. Presently he asked what 
 I would take for it. I did not care to part with it, 
 but I gave him permission to carry it to his cabin 
 that night for farther examination. In the morn- 
 ing he offered me ten dollars for it ; but it was worth 
 more to me than that as a curiosity ; and valuable or 
 not, I preferred to keep it. When he found that I 
 would not part with it, he drew me aside and low- 
 ering his voice said, " Do you know what that is ? 
 It's an opal, and there's no telling how much it is 
 worth ! " 
 
 This information I kept to myself until the fol- 
 lowing morning, when I revealed it to Carter to- 
 gether with the plan that I had formed. 
 
 " Now," said I, " if that's an opal, I know where 
 it came from, and there's probably a bed of them." 
 
 Carter gave a long whistle. He heartily approved 
 
213 THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 of my plan, which was to seek for the bed of opals 
 again, and bring as many as practicable back with 
 us. We were to share the work amd the proceeds. 
 We at once set about making preparations. 
 
 Although I had avoided mentioning the worth or 
 nature of the stone to any one, Armstrong had elec- 
 trified the boys, not so much with the fact that I 
 had found an opal, as with stories of the fabulous 
 wealth I was about to secure, and there was great 
 interest felt in our expedition, and the camp gave 
 us a hearty " Godspeed. " 
 
 After a week's steady travelling, we found the 
 locality where I had noticed the strange stones, and 
 we went to work with a will. Before leaving camp, I 
 had sent my specimen to New York, for. Tiffany's 
 inspection, in order to learn its. exact worth. I ex- 
 pected to find a letter in reply to mine awaiting me 
 on my return to camp. 
 
 For two months we worked constantly, hoping to 
 return to camp before the first snow should fall. 
 At the end of that time, our ponies laden with the 
 milky stones, we started for our winter quarters 
 with the lightest hearts that ever men carried. The 
 
THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 213 
 
 first part of the trip was made quickly and pleasantly 
 but as the way grew more rugged, our heavily 
 burdened horses showed signs of exhaustion. 
 Our provisions, too, were nearly consumed. We had 
 taken supplies for a ten-weeks trip, and at the end of 
 that time we found there was a four or five days' 
 journey before us yet. Living on short rations did 
 not improve our strength or aid our progress. We 
 decided that Carter should ride on ahead without 
 load, as he could make the trip alone in less than 
 half the time we could with our loaded beasts, and 
 come out to meet me with food and a fresh horse. 
 The rest of the way was tiresome and lonesome 
 enough for me, and storms , threatened to burst 
 almost hourly; but I looked at my treasure bags and 
 jogged cheerfully along. This trip safely over, there 
 was that in those bags which would render me in- 
 dependent of labor or care. I made the distance 
 in much less time than I expected. I well remem- 
 ber the day I reached the brow of the last hill. 
 The camp fires glimmered through the trees. I 
 could hear the voices of the boys as they sang 
 around it, Fine voices they were too arjd their 
 
2^.;. THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 rich notes floated to me, set to the music of the 
 soughing pines. The delicious cahn that pervaded 
 the spot and controlled my senses seemed to me a 
 beautiful prophecy of the future of the rest and 
 comfort I had planned for myself. 
 
 As I entered the main road, I was greeted by 
 the sight of Carter's stalwart figure, while his 
 honest gray eyes looked a gladness that needed 
 no words to interpret. He was just setting out to 
 meet me. 
 
 " Haven't heard from New York .? " was my first 
 question as we walked along. 
 
 " Yes, here's the letter,'' and he handed it to me. 
 
 I put it in my pocket, feeling that nothing now 
 was needed to complete my happiness that night ; 
 anxious as I had been to receive it, possession was 
 sufficient for the present. 
 
 " I told the boys of our success," said Abe, " and 
 of our plan to turn the claim over to them in the 
 spring. They're half wild over the luck of it, and 
 are making plans already for work. They'll have a 
 rousing jollification now you've come." 
 
 They welcomed me with shouts aijd the waving 
 
THE RICH MAN OF TH|: MOUNTAINS. 215 
 
 of frying-pans. They sang, " See, the Conquering 
 Hero Comes," and manifested their good spirits in 
 many absurd ways. After supper, I emptied one 
 of the treasure bags, and giving to each of the boys 
 a handsome stone, I left them for the rest I so 
 much needed. Weary as I was, I fell asleep with 
 a sense of perfect peace, as refreshing as it was un- 
 usual. The last words I heard were these : 
 
 " Well, he is in luck ! Here's the storm and it'll 
 be a staver too." 
 
 When all the stones were piled upon the cabin 
 floor the next morning, they made a mound of hazy 
 loveliness which called forth various and character- 
 istic exclamations from the group gathered around 
 them. But I fear the beautiful heap would have 
 excited little interest if each tiny bit had not 
 seemed to represent a genuine greenback. 
 
 " Too bad you can't send them East and realize 
 on them before spring," said one of the group. 
 
 " Yes," added another, " and just how are you 
 going to do it when you do have a chance ? " 
 
 A dozen such questions were put to me at once ; ■ 
 and then it was that J took the letter from my pocket 
 
2l6 THE RICH MAN OF THE MOUNTAINS. 
 
 and told them it was from Tiffany, and from it 
 I should learn the value of my precious stones. 
 
 No one stirred as I opened the letter ; and I 
 might have been amused at the eager faces and 
 attitudes about me, if I had noticed them. 
 
 " Well," said I, " I sent him my specimen and he 
 says — " 
 
 " Well, what ? Do go on ! " cried half a dozen 
 impatient voices. 
 
 I looked at Carter. He took the letter from me, 
 glanced over the three lines, and finished my sen- 
 tence for me. 
 
 " He says," throwing the letter aside, " it's just a 
 bit of chalcedony. 'Tain't worth nothin'." 
 
ONE WAY TO BE BRAVE. 
 
 PAPA," exclaimed six-year-old Marland, leaning 
 against his father's knee after listening to a 
 true storyj " I wish / could be as brave as that ! " 
 
 " Perhaps you will be when you grow up." 
 
 " But maybe I sha'n't ever be on a railroad train 
 when there is going to be an accident ? " 
 
 " Ah ! but there are sure to be plenty of other 
 ways for a brave man to show himself." 
 
 Several days after this, when Marland had quite 
 forgotten about trying to be brave, thinking, in- 
 deed, that he would have to wait anyway until he 
 was a man, he and his little playmate, Ada, a ye;ir 
 younger, were playing in the dog-kennel. It was 
 a very large kennel, so that the two children often 
 crept into it to " play house." After awhile, Mar- 
 land who, of course, was playing the papa of the 
 217 
 
2l8 ONE WAY, TO BE BRAVE. 
 
 house, was to go " down town '' to his business ; he 
 put his little head out of the door of the kennel, 
 and was just about to creep out, when right in front 
 of him in the path he saw a snake. He knew in a 
 moment just what sort of a snake it was, and how 
 dangerous it was ; he knew it was a rattlesnake, 
 and that if it bit Ada or him, they would probably 
 die. For Marland had ^pent two summers on his 
 papa's big ranch in Kansas, and he had been told 
 over and over again, if he ever saw a snake to run 
 away from it as fast as he could, and this snake 
 just in front of him was making the queer little 
 noise with the rattles at the end of his tail which 
 Marland had heard enough about to be able to rec- 
 ognize. 
 
 Now you must know that a rattlesnake is not at 
 all like a lion or a bear, although just as dangerous 
 in its own way. It will not chase you; it can only 
 spring a distance equal to its own length, and it has 
 to wait and coil itself up in a ring, sounding its 
 warning all the time, before it can strike at all. So 
 if you are ever so little distance from it -when you 
 •see it first, you can easily escape from it. The only 
 
THE LITTLE RANCHMAN. (^ From a photograph.') 
 
ONE WAY TO BE BRAVE. 221 
 
 danger is from stepping on it without seeing it. 
 But Marland's snake was already coiled, and it was 
 hardly more than a foot from the entrance to the 
 kennel. You must know that the kennel was not 
 out in an open field, either, but under a piazza, and 
 a lattice work very near it left a very narrow pas- 
 sage for the children, even when there wasn't any 
 snake. If they had been standing upright, they 
 could have run, narrow as the way was ; but they 
 would have to crawl out of the kennel and find room 
 for their entire little bodies on the ground before 
 they could straighten themselves up and run. For- 
 tunately, the snake's head was turned the other 
 way. 
 
 " Ada," said Marland very quietly, so quietly that 
 his grandpapa, raking the gravel on the walk near 
 by, did not hear him, " there's a snake out here, 
 and it is a rattlesnake. Keep very still and crawl 
 right after me.'' 
 
 " Yes, Ada," he whispered, as he succeeded in 
 squirming himself out and wriggling past the snake 
 till he could stand upright. " There's room, but you 
 mustn't make anv noise ! " 
 
222 ONE WAY TO BK BRAVE. 
 
 Plve minutes later the two children sauntered 
 slowly down the avenue, hand in hand. 
 
 "Grandpapa,"' said Marland, "there's a rattle- 
 snake in there where Ada and I were; perhaps 
 you'd better kill him ! " 
 
 And when the snake had been killed, and papa 
 for the hundredth time had folded his little boy in 
 his arms and murmured, " My brave boy ! my dear, 
 brave little boy!" Marland looked up in surprise. 
 
 "Why, it wasn't /" that. killed the snake, papa! 
 it was grandpapa ! I didn't do anything ; I only 
 kept very still and ran away ! " 
 
 But you see, in that case, keeping very still and 
 running away was just the bravest thing the littlefel- 
 low could have done ; and I think his mamma — 
 for I am his mamma, and so I know just how she did 
 feel — felt when she took him in her arms that night 
 that in her little boy's soul there was something of 
 the stuff of which heroes are made. 
 
THE GYPSY'S PROPHECY. 
 
 "1 IS THEN aunt Judic went away, she had a 
 
 » ' pleasant fashion of leaving a surprise. 
 
 She always gave us all, from papa, to Butler the 
 stable boy, a parting gift, and then after she had 
 gone, we always found a surprise for somebody ; 
 and it was always just what nobody expected. 
 
 One year she subscribed for all of the choice 
 periodicals which -we just could not afford. 
 
 Jim and I used to count the visits that we could 
 remember, so : papa's leather-chair visit, mamma's 
 gilded work-stand visit, the summer-house visit. 
 
 Mamma had wanted a summer-house in a cer- 
 tain spot for a long time, and had told aunt 
 Judic all her plans. The week after she went 
 away, carpenters and masons came and put up the 
 summer-house after mamma's own plans, and said 
 
 they were already paid. 
 
 223 
 
224 THE gypsy's prophecy. 
 
 We were never glad to see auntie go, however. 
 She was better than a dozen surprises. She took 
 such an interest in all of our affairs, and all of my 
 ideas, that everybody else laughed at, she listened 
 to as though they were fairy tales. 
 
 The last time she was here the thing I talked 
 most about, was the ponies that some of the girls 
 had. I had thought and thought about them, and 
 had dreamed of a pair that I should like to possess. 
 I never could have told anybody but aunt Judic 
 about that. She never laughed, even at air-castles ; 
 but she did say that when you were building an 
 air-castle for yourself, you must make it fit you, 
 Anything else was bad taste. After I had talked 
 to auntie, I changed my ideas about the ponies. I 
 ^ad imagined myself driving a tiny, fiery pair of 
 calico ponies, shaking and jingling gold bells, and 
 drawing a village cart lined with pale blue satin, 
 and with a blue parasol ruffled with lace ; but 
 aunt Judic said that that would suit a circus pa- 
 rade better than our country roads, and the satin 
 would soil, and the cart not be very comfortable ; 
 so after we had discussed it a while I did think 
 
THE GYPSY S PROPHECY. 22^ 
 
 that a phaeton cushioned in leather and a pair of 
 Shelties would be much nicer. Not that I ever 
 expected to have them. 
 
 After aunt Judic went away, Jim and I looked 
 around for the surprise, and we were surprised 
 when ten days went and there was no sign of any. 
 
 We could not talk about it, for mamma forbade 
 us ever expecting aunt Judic to leave anything. 
 
 Nearly two weeks after she had gone, papa called 
 upstairs, and asked me if I did not want to go for 
 a drive. I was alway? glad to ride in papa's little 
 box buggy, and ran down with my hat and gloves, 
 at once. Mamma and papa were standing on the 
 veranda, and on the drive — ^I fairly rubbed my 
 eyes — were the identical ponies and phaeton that 
 aunt Judic and I had decided would be just the 
 thing for me. Jim was on one side, and black 
 Butler on the other, both grinning their widest. 
 Aunt Polly and Dinah were leaning from the dining- 
 room window, all waiting to see me come out. 
 
 " Aunt Judith's surprise is all for you this time," 
 said mamma. 
 
 I did not receive my gift with much formality. 
 
220 THE gypsy's prophecy. 
 
 I hugged, both shaggy ponies, and named them 
 Rowdy and Dandy on the spot. It took me a 
 week to find out that the names were exactly 
 wrong. Rowdy was very nice, and had all he 
 could do to keep the Dandy in bounds. 
 
 After the turnout had been duly admired, and 
 every appointment examined, Jim and I got in and 
 drove off, and I know there wasn't a happier girl 
 in the United States, than I. 
 
 For a week we were perfectly happy with those 
 ponies, and explored every road for miles. One 
 afternoon as we were driving out through the sub- 
 urbs of the town, we passed some very odd-looking 
 women, walking slowly along, carrying curiously- 
 shaped willow baskets. They were verv brown, 
 and their black hair was pinned into bunches of 
 shining braids. Their hats were large and looked 
 home-braided, and were almost covered with gay 
 flowers. They were very clean and neat, and we 
 could not imagine what people they could be. It 
 was not far from the railroad station, so we con- 
 cluded that they were immigrants. 
 
 We drove around the " Horseshoe," a drive of 
 
TMe gypsy's prophecy. 227 
 
 six miles, tliat brouglit us back into town almost 
 where we went out, and as we were coming back 
 through the " Hutchin's Wood," Jim drew up the 
 ponies and we stared about us. On both sides of 
 the road were cars or vans, gayly painted, looking 
 on the outside, much- like the closed cages in a 
 circus, only much larger. They had windows, and 
 some stood with the doors open. The inside was 
 a little room, snug as a room on an ocean steamer. 
 The beds, or berths, had lace covers, lined with 
 pink or blue, and with lace-trimmed pillows. The 
 curtains were of chintz or lace, and while it was 
 all very coarse, they looked very clean and cosey. 
 There were several children playing among them, 
 and one girl balancing herself on a barrel as she 
 rolled it over the grass. When she saw us she 
 bounded down, ran into one of the cars and shut 
 the door, appearing a moment after in a short red 
 satin skirt, and a velvet bodice, with a tambourine 
 in her hand. She stopped on the grass in front 
 of us, and be^un to dance very slowly, and sing a 
 sort of chant, shaking and pounding her.tambour- 
 ine and once in a while giving it a light kick. Be- 
 
228 THE gypsy's PROPHECY. 
 
 fore she had finished, a woman came from a hollow, 
 where we could see smoke, and horses. As soon 
 as we saw her we knew that the " immigrants " 
 had come from here. They were Gypsies of course, 
 but quite unlike the usual dirty tenting tribes. 
 
 This woman was just like those we had seen in 
 the town, only younger, and with a silk handkerchief 
 bound around her head, instead of the straw hat. 
 
 She was smiling brightly as she came up. " Let 
 me tell the good luck in store for the young lady 
 and gentleman," she said, holding out her hand. 
 
 Jim looked at me, and I looked at Jim. We both 
 wanted our fortunes told, and neither would own 
 being so silly, to the other. 
 
 The Gypsy caught the look, and said : 
 
 " Ah, I see, the young gentleman has no silver, 
 just now. Another time." 
 
 That was more than Jim could stand; for a 
 gypsy to think that he had no pocket-money. He 
 drew out of his pocket his silver dollar, and before 
 I could speak, it was in the woman's pocket. Jim 
 had been saving that dollar for ever so long, to go 
 on a steamboat excursion to Willow Island. 
 
THE gypsy's prophecy. 229 
 
 The Gypsy begun to mutter something over 
 Jim's hand. She told him a lot of nonsense 
 about his going to be a leader of men. That he 
 would travel much, and be pointed out in the crowd, 
 and all that, and then she' came to me. 
 
 " The lines of your hand are of great promise. 
 You are going to have some joy and some sorrow. 
 For a few years you are going to have a quiet life, 
 and then will come pleasure and triumphs. Some- 
 time, it may be soon, or it may be late, you are 
 going to have a loss. A gjrievous loss.'' And so 
 she rambled on. The only tangible thing was my 
 prospective loss, and although I would have scorned 
 to believe in a gypsy, still I wondered what that 
 loss was going to be. 
 
 I suppose we should have told of the Gypsies 
 when we got home, although I doubt if Jim would 
 have told what he had bought with his dollar ; but 
 we found the whole house in commotion. Papa 
 had had a telegram saying that Grandmamma Fair- 
 fax was very ill and we were all to come on at once. 
 
 As we flew through the night on the Northern 
 Express, I happened to think that the fortune-teller 
 
2-0 THE gypsy's prophecy. 
 
 had prophesied a loss. Oh ! could it be dear grand- 
 mamma ? I could tell no one so terrible a fear, and 
 all the long journey I was in agony. When we 
 finally arrived, uncle John met us with so cheerful 
 a face, that we knew before he spoke that grand- 
 mother was better. She had rallied almost as soon 
 as they telegraphed, and was able to sit up among 
 the pillows to receive us. I was very glad that I 
 had not told Jim my fear. 
 
 We stayed two weeks, and then papa and mamma 
 decided to take grandmamma to a little mountain 
 resort, far from the railroads, and to send Jim and 
 me home, with cousin Jack (who was sixteen), for 
 company. We were going to travel back alone, 
 and very important we felt. Hence, the colored 
 man who had come up with us, would go on to the 
 mountains with papa's party. It was the gayest 
 kind of a journey home. Jack had been in Europe 
 the summer before, and had not been down, to our 
 house for two years, so we had plenty to tell. him. 
 But the important topic was the ponies. 
 
 I could not talk enough about them, and Jack 
 was not one of those disagreeable boys, that think 
 
THE GYPSY S PROPHECY. 23 1 
 
 their own things the best in the world ; so it was a 
 pleasure to tell him anything. 
 
 We arrived in the night, and Butler came over 
 to meet us. 
 
 " How are the ponies, Butler ? " I cried the first 
 thing, but he just said " Yessum," and climbed up 
 on the driver's seat. Butler always was stupid ; but 
 I hoped that the ponies had been taken care of. 
 
 The next morning, I was up bright and early, to 
 see my pets ; but early as I was, Jim and Jack were 
 before me. Jim stood in the stable door, talking 
 to Butler in a very excited manner, and Jack was 
 the picture of wonder. 
 
 " See here. Bobolink ! " Jim called out, as soon 
 as he saw me. " Butler says the ponies went away 
 the same evening that we did. And the idiot says 
 he thought we took them." 
 
 " The ponies ! They aren't gone ? " and I ran 
 into the stable. I looked into every stall and the 
 carriage-house, as though Butler might have over- 
 looked them' for two weeks. And then I sat down 
 on the floor and cried. 
 
 " Cheer up ! cheer up. Bobolink," said Jack, 
 
232 THE gypsy's PROPHKCY. 
 
 patting me on the shoulder " They are somewhere. 
 They haven't disappeared off of the face of the 
 earth I reckon, and we'll find 'em." 
 
 " Oh ! oh ! " I sobbed. " The Gypsy woman 
 said I was going to have a loss ; and now I have 
 one." 
 
 " Gypsy ! " exclaimed Jack. " Are there Gypsies 
 around ? Whew ! " with a long whistle. 
 
 " Yes, indeed," said Jim excitedly. " They were 
 out in Hutchin's Wood the very afternoon we went 
 away, and the woman told Bob's fortune, and said 
 she was going to have a loss " . — 
 
 " You needp't say anything, Jim Rosenberg ! " 
 I b topped crying long enough to say. " You had 
 your fortune told too, and yon paid for them.'' 
 
 "That's neither here nor there," said Jack. 
 " The best thing that we can do is to look up the 
 Gypsies. It's a very easy thing to prophesy when 
 you are going to bring the thing to pass.'' 
 
 "Telegraph to papa," I suggested. 
 
 Jim turned on me with scorn : " Precious good 
 a telegram would do, when he is twenty-five miles 
 from a railroad, or a wire," 
 
THE gypsy's prophecy. 233 
 
 If it had not been for Jack, I don't know what 
 we should have done. 
 
 He went to work and managed everything. He 
 found out all about the Gypsies ; how long they had 
 stayed (they had left the next morning after we 
 visited them), and that they had had .dozens of 
 horses and ponies, which they traded and sold. 
 Nobody knew where they had gone, and Jack 
 hired men, to go around the country and track 
 them. He said he knew that papa would want no 
 expense spared to get back the ponies. 
 
 It was some time before the Gypsies were found 
 and then they indignantly denied having even seen 
 them. There was no actual proof, so they could 
 not be held. Jack now had the men go along the 
 roundabout way that the Gypsies had taken, and 
 see if they could find any .trace of the ponies. 
 There were several false clews. One smooth 
 spotted pair, one of the men was sure were mine, 
 clipped and colored. " Them Gypsies can do any- 
 thing at horse-doctor'n'," he said. 
 
 Jim and Jack went out there to see, but found 
 the ponies were a pair which the gentleman who 
 
234 THE- GYPSY S PROPHECY. 
 
 owned them, had just brought from New York. It 
 was discouraging. I did wish I would get a letter 
 from papa. We had written him the first day. 
 
 I sat on the veranda one day about ten days 
 after we had come home, when Jack and Jim came 
 in tired out. 
 
 " I am ever so sorry, Bobolink," Jack said, " but 
 I can't imagine where those ponies can be. The 
 Gypsies must have sent them away somewhere, and 
 we shall have to get a detective to find them." 
 
 Just then Butler came along from the post-office, 
 with a letter. 
 
 I snatched it eagerly, and sure enough it was a 
 letter from papa. I opened it at once, certain he 
 would, say that he would come home and find my 
 ponies. But no — he spoke of grandmamma's im- 
 proved health, of how they were enjoying the 
 mountains, and that he hoped that we were getting 
 along all right. Then : " We laughed at your ex- 
 citement over the ponies. I suppose you have 
 found, long ago, that they are in the upper hill 
 pasture. Shetlands are accustomed to running out, 
 Eind I 4id not think that they would be beriefitecl 
 
THE gypsy's prophecy. 235 
 
 by Butler's care. Henson took them out before 
 we came away." 
 
 I had been reading aloud, and there I stopped. 
 Jim picked up his hat, Jack took his, and I went 
 bareheaded, and we almost ran that mile over the 
 hill to the upper pasture. 
 
 There were the ponies, shaggier than ever, 
 quietly grazing. The boys caught them, and I 
 rode Rowdy home in triumph. 
 
 Jack said, " What will uncle Will say to the bills ! " 
 
 Butler said, •' Maybe Hense'll tell folks sompin' 
 another time ! " 
 
 Jim said, "A pretty way to treat those poor 
 Gypsies ! " 
 
 I said, " I haven't had a loss after all." 
 
 Nor have I as yet. 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 CLARINDA MOFFATT and Lizzie Peters 
 stood together on the platform below the 
 pulpit, and the people crowding Fletcher Chapel 
 held their breath waiting for a decision. 
 
 Clarinda was the Widow Moffatt's daughter, and 
 as the widow was known to have lived through a 
 world of trouble, she had every right to the conso- 
 lation of such a child. 
 
 Clarinda was straight, and made of as softly-cflrv- 
 ing flesh as any girl of seventeen. She had a very 
 white perpendicular forehead, skin as transparent 
 and nicely veined as white flower petals, and full 
 cheeks palpitating with pink color. 
 
 Lizzie Peters was shorter and darker. Her hair 
 crimped over her ears, and she had black eyes and 
 an aquiline nose. 
 
 Both girls were dressed in white, but Lizzie 
 
 2^6 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 237- 
 
 Peters's flowing robes had never been washed and 
 ironed, darned, pieced and new ruffled. 
 
 They held their sheet music in hands crossed be- 
 fore them, and stood for the decision before they 
 could take their seats. This was according to pro- 
 gramme and what John Gill expected. 
 
 Now, John Gill never expe~cted to set the neigh- 
 borhood by the ears when he offered a hundred dol- 
 lars as a prize to the best pupil in the music class. 
 He said he wanted to encourage the girls to make 
 singers and players of themselves. As to music, 
 he knew nothing about that. But his farm bred 
 premium cattle and poultry. He was rich, and still 
 turning everything to money ; public-spirited ; a 
 strong prop to the preachers on the circuit ; he had 
 paid off the last remnant of church debt ; and when 
 the music class was formed he became a patron of 
 musical art. Clarinda Moffatt and Lizzie Peters 
 rose out of the mass of Fletcher Chapel girls, their 
 friends and neighbors took sides, and on this great 
 Saturday afternoon they contested with each other 
 at the end of the exhibition given by the music class. 
 
 More marches, quicksteps and sentimental songs 
 
238 Plum blooms. 
 
 had blessed that audience than they ever hoped 
 to feast upon at one meal again. They were an 
 agricultural people, quite out of musical centres, 
 and gauged all melody by tunes in the Methodist 
 Collection, or the old note-books on family shelves. 
 Of opera they had heard with a dull ear, classing it 
 vaguely as any kind of theatrical performance. So 
 no comparisons tarnished for them the present 
 occasion with its closing moments of suspense. 
 
 John Gill, having offered the prize, was allowed 
 to pick the committee who should award it. And 
 there sat the committee smiling and at ease through 
 those hours which they usually spent finishing up 
 the week's work before Sunday ; two stout farmers 
 and Mrs. Holmes, the busiest woman in the whole 
 country, who took the lead at weddings and funerals 
 and always spoke in meeting. 
 
 These judges occupied the first bench on the left- 
 hand side of the pulpit. But John Gill sat swaU 
 lowed up in the audience, nudging and whispering, 
 and often slapping his hands together like far 
 resounding clappers. The music-teacher, also, to 
 show how little she manipulated her prodigies, sat 
 
Plum blooms. 
 
 239 
 
 among the_ crowd, calling in order the numbers 
 from her written programme until the close, when 
 Clarinda Moffatt and Lizzie Peters alternated in 
 bringing down the house. 
 
 It was thought Mrs. Holmes would announce the 
 verdict. But after consultation among the judges 
 ■Abner Wykoff rose to his feet. He was a slow, 
 confused speaker, and held his hands clasped 
 across his stomach, twirling the thumbs as if that 
 willing motion would help hjm find out his words. 
 He had a heavy lower face and protruding under 
 lip, and wore a blue checked coat and linen trou- 
 sers. His huge neck looked choked by the neck- 
 band of his shirt, and this seemed to account for 
 the bulging of his eyes and the spur-like formation 
 of his eyebrows. 
 
 It was not known how far the Moffatt or Peters 
 interest had corrupted the jury. Mrs. Holmes was 
 a great friend of Mrs. Moffatt's, but the two com- 
 mittee-men had long served with Squire Peters as 
 school-directors, and no teacher distasteful to the 
 Peterses ever secured the school. 
 
 Therefore the Moffattites held their breath in 
 
240 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 apprehension,, and the Petersites held theirs in im- 
 patience when Abner Wykoff rose up instead of 
 Mrs. Holmes. His voice wandered slowly over the 
 house and his thumbs worked steadily, while Clar- 
 inda and Lizzie turned their downcast faces in his 
 direction. 
 
 He said it was a fine thing to be edicated in 
 music and literatoor. They didn't take holt of 
 them things when he was a boy. The country was 
 newer and times was harder. But he liked to hear 
 good singin' and playin' and believed his neighbors 
 liked to hear good singin' and playin'. One of his 
 neighbors had went to the expense of offerin' a 
 prize for the best singin' and playin'. 
 
 There wasn't no main in Fairfield County, no, nor 
 the State of Ohio, that wanted to see the fair thing 
 done by them two young females — young ladies, 
 more than he did ; than all the committee did. It 
 was hard to decide. Both was good on the organ 
 — or pyanno whichever you may call it — both 
 knowed their notes well and was far ahead of us 
 old fogies. And both was well respected in the 
 neighborhood. But the committee thought if there 
 
f>LUM BLOOMS. 24I 
 
 was any tipping of the scale, it tipped — on this oc- 
 casion — a leetle the way of Lizzie Peters. She was 
 a leetle the best performer. 
 
 And being here confused by the loud buzzes ris- 
 ing around his ears, Abner Wykoff said he would 
 close his remarks for this time and resume his seat; 
 which he did, lifting the tails of his checked coat 
 out of his way. 
 
 " Look at Clarie Moffatt — she's as white as a 
 sheet ! " whispered a girl in the audience. 
 
 Widow Moff att instantly rose up in her place, and 
 Clarinda came down the aisle without looking at 
 any one, received her hat and went outwith her 
 mother. They crossed the graveyard, climbed the 
 whitewashed fence and took a path leading up the 
 hill. The church could still be heard buzzing like 
 a great hive. 
 
 Widow Moffatt was a little, firm-mouthed woman, 
 smooth-haired and dark-eyed, always dressed in 
 rusty mourning. She had buried a husband who 
 drank himself into the grave, and a son who was to 
 have been the support of her age, and had lost all 
 her own kinspeople by quick consumption. She 
 
24* PLURi BLOOitS. . ^ 
 
 had been brought up in plenty and her circum- 
 stances were now pinching. Therefore she had 
 tasted disappointment ; but she was wise enough to 
 know that this first taste of it in the mouth of her 
 child — trivial as the occasion might seem — was 
 too bitter for her to meddle with. 
 
 They entered the woods silently, Clarinda walk- 
 ing first and carrying her sheet music in her 
 clinched left hand. And not a word was said un- 
 til they came to a log so moss-grown that one could 
 scarcely trace any line between it and the moss- 
 cupped ground. Its top had already sunk in to 
 form a yielding seat, and against this Clarinda flung 
 herself face downward, frightening many little bugs 
 out of their afternoon dream. Sobbing and crying 
 aloud she pulled her dress with both hands from its 
 pressure against her palpitating throat. 
 
 " O mother, I can't stand it ! it's tearing me to 
 pieces ! It'll kill me ! " 
 
 " O no, it won't, dear," soothed the experienced 
 woman, sitting down on the log and resting her' 
 troubled eyes on her child. 
 
 " And what does he know about music ? It isn't 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 24S 
 
 fair — it isn't fair at all. Lizzie Peters fiats — the 
 teacher says she fiats when she sings. And I can 
 play as well as she can, even when she has a good 
 piano to practice on, and I've just our old melodeon. 
 And what does she want of that hundred dollars ? 
 Her father's rich, and every cent of it was for you. 
 It would make the last payment on the place and 
 set your mind at rest." 
 
 " My mind is used to being harried up, Clarie. 
 But, my child, it hurts me most of anything to see 
 what disappointments is in store for you. You do 
 set your heart so on things." 
 
 " Well, I live among things, and it stands to rea- 
 son I should set my heart on them." 
 
 "Yes, I know," sighed Widow Moffatt. 
 
 " If I's a disembodied spirit, maybe I'd be above 
 wanting what other girls try for. But I'm a girl." 
 
 " Yes, I know," sighed Widow Moffatt again. 
 
 "What's the reason some folks get everything 
 whether they deserve it or not, and other people do 
 a great deal better and don't get anything?" 
 
 ""O, my child, folks have asked that question 
 since the foundation of the world. But there ain't 
 
246 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 no accountin' for the way things turns out. We 
 must just bear our crosses meekly with a Christian 
 spirit." 
 
 " You know perfectly well, Mother MofiEatt, I can't 
 .bear it meekly with a Christian spirit. And very 
 few folks can when it comes to their own case." 
 
 "That's true," admitted Widow Moffatt. 
 
 " O, mother, I never can get over it ! And right 
 before everybody so ! I thought you'd be so pleased 
 if I got it. I could just see the neighbors shaking 
 hands with you, and you puckering up your mouth 
 for fear you'd smile too much. I never can make 
 you happy enough to smile, now, mother, never, so 
 long as I live ! " 
 
 " Clarie, Clarie ! " 
 
 " O, mother,"what is the use of being alive ! " 
 
 " Clarie, you'll break a blood-vessel ! " continued 
 the alarmed widow, smoothing down the girl's scar- 
 let forehead between her palms. " Such feelings 
 is sinful." 
 
 " What kind of feelings could a sinner have but 
 sinful ones ? " propounded Clarinda, bruising her 
 nose in her handkerchief. 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 247 
 
 "But disappointments is so common," admon- 
 ished her mother. " And troubles comes so thick. 
 There isn't a house nor a family free from them." 
 
 " Mother, that doesn't do me a bit of good. I 
 don't want other people to suffer, and I don't want 
 to suffer because other people do." 
 
 " If you hadn't been disappointed this afternoon, 
 Lizzie Peters would have been." 
 
 "That isn't the point at all," declared Clarinda, 
 " I wanted a fair decision made, and I don't think 
 it was a fair decision. And I believe most of the 
 congregation thought it wasn't a fair decision." 
 
 " That's the way the person on the wrong side 
 always feels," murmured Widow Moffatt. You'll 
 never get the worid to do so fair by you as 'pears 
 like it ought to. Make up your mind to that, my 
 child." 
 
 Clarinda shook again with sobs, leaning against 
 her mother's knees, who carded her flossy hair with 
 work-darkened fingers and petted her hot temples. 
 
 " Come to look it over, it's a small matter com 
 pared with your eternal interests." 
 
 " But we've got to look after our earthly interests, 
 
248 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 too, mother, while we stay down here," sobbed the 
 girl. 
 
 " And it'll be all the same to ~you whether you 
 took the prize or not, a hundred years from now,'' 
 added the widow, bringing to her aid a well-worn 
 country proverb. 
 
 " I don't believe that," quivered Clarinda. " Is 
 it the same to you now whether you got a thing or 
 didn't that you wanted real bad when you was a 
 young girl ? " 
 
 " No," admitted her mother, " it ain't. I wanted 
 a drawn white silk bonnet once when I was about 
 Eighteen years old, and father's second wife ob- 
 jected to it. And I always felt the longing for that 
 drawn silk bonnet, even after I's too old to wear 
 it."' ' ' " 
 
 Having made this honest confession. Widow 
 Moffatt got her girl again upon her feet, and they 
 went to the house. ' 
 
 It was an unpainted lichen-eaten shell, built 
 against the side-hill and upon a crazy-looking base- 
 ment of stone. Plum and cherry-trees embraced 
 it, and a stumpy apple orchard spread down the 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 24Q 
 
 slope behind it. The month of May was masking 
 this aged den with leaves and vines. Tulips grew 
 under the front window, and clove-currants hung 
 heavy and sweet over the door. It was home to a 
 heartsick girl. 
 
 Clarinda followed her mother into the bedroom 
 and laid off her starched white dress to replace it 
 with calico. Whatever calamities befell her she 
 was obliged to save her clothes. , 
 
 Widow Moffatt opened the lowest bureau drawer' 
 and put therein her parasol, her rusty bonnet and 
 veil, her black merino shawl and her only pair of kid 
 gloves, which kept the impress of her hands and lay 
 resignedly crossed with the palms uppermost. 
 
 Mother and daughter moved about silently ; and 
 silently built the kitchen fire, and put on to stew 
 that pullet which had been sacrificed to the hope of 
 success. 
 
 The homely tokens of a very plain, very frugal 
 life, surrounded them. There was the loose-jointed 
 melodeon, out of tune, and tremulous under the 
 lightest bellows pressure, which had been a marvel 
 in the mother's old home but was incapable of giv- 
 
250 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 ing the daughter proper expression. There were a 
 couple of horsehair and mahogany chairs preserved 
 as remnants of magnificence ; an album of faded and 
 ghastly photographs ; the homemade striped car- 
 pet and rag-braided door-mat ; a centre table with 
 a crocheted woollen cover ; and green paper win- 
 dow shades which shed a powdery poison upon you 
 if you attempted to handle them. All these items 
 and a hundred less imposing ones, made home to 
 a girl palpitating with the richest possibilities of 
 girlhood. 
 
 The chicken stew was dipped up with a pewter 
 spoon and eaten from blue-edged plates with steel 
 forks and knives. Still, mother had cooked it ex- 
 ceedingly well. 
 
 This occasion suggested the first lonely meal the 
 two had eaten together after the only son's death. 
 The'n Clarinda had made up her mind to be both boy 
 and girl to her mother. Now she was low-spirited 
 as to being a passable girl. 
 
 It was long until milking time. The level shine 
 of the setting sun came across the grass under the 
 plum-trees, and there Clarinda lay down. The 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 25 1 
 
 trees themselves were mighty white hives, hum- 
 ming with bees. 
 
 The breath of the plum-trees filled her entire 
 atmosphere. She got up and gathered some 
 branches to put over her face, and took the perfume 
 with long inhalations. 
 
 It was the first time she ever noticed how Nature 
 comes between ourselves and our miseries. She 
 was shut up among plum blooms in their temple of 
 incense. It did seem useless to have hot temples 
 and fierce thoughts, to be tormented by suspense 
 and torn by despair. Around her came the cool- 
 ness and quiet of the woods, the deep hollows where 
 she had found mushrooms and blue-bells. A thou- 
 sand hints of some better life than her agitated or 
 stagnant existence flowed through her mind. 
 
 " I guess I don't care quite as much as I thought 
 I did," said Clarinda. " Lizzie Peters has got the 
 prize, but I've got plum blooms." With all her 
 lareath she sucked in this compensation. 
 
 The widow came out with an old comforter and 
 a pillow, regarding the daughter's supple attitude 
 with some misgivings. 
 
252 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 " You better get up out of the grass, Clarie. 
 The ground ain't warm enough for that yet." 
 
 Clarinda put the pillow under her head and 
 made a seat of the comforter for her mother. 
 
 " Things do look so pretty out doors," observed 
 Widow MofEatt, settling herself with a sigh; 
 
 " Yes, they're a comfort," said the girl. " Mother, 
 I wish you'd break some more plum blooms. They 
 go right into my soul." 
 
 " What a way to talk ! " objected Widow Moffatt. 
 And she felt an objection to breaking the plum 
 branches, also. They needed every unit of fruit 
 whj.ch would grow thereon. But with liberal hands 
 she twisted a little limb from its place and laid it 
 over her child. 
 
 " You sweet old mother," said Clarinda. " You're 
 a plum bloom yourself. I've lots of them." - 
 
 " You begin to feel as though you see the other 
 side of things," said her mother. 
 
 " No, I don't. I don't see anything or know the 
 wherefore of anything that happens." 
 
 " Sometimes- 1 have thought nobody did," said 
 her mother, " and them that explains the ways of 
 
PLUM BLOOMS. 25J 
 
 Providence the most ain't the deepest into the 
 secret. You don't remember the preacher we 
 had on our circuit that used to lay out all , the 
 Almighty's plans about the Chicago Fire. It did 
 go against me to hear him talk so familiar and con- 
 fident." 
 
 " I can sing, mother," spoke out Clarinda through 
 her plum blossoms, "whatever any committee says 
 about it. And I feel now as if I could sing the 
 anthem to-morrow better than I ever did in my life." 
 
 "Well, I'm glad of that. I was afraid it would 
 be different. My side never could throw off wor- 
 riment of mind. I used to think the Moffatts 
 could, but your father, he took things hard, too." 
 
 " O, the world's big and sweet," said Clarinda, 
 gazing through chinks of fragrance at the sky. " I 
 can't stay mad at things when I lie in the grass 
 this way with flowers over my face." 
 
 Next morning both Moffattites and Petersites 
 were surprised when Clarinda came into chapel 
 before services begun, and kissed Lizzie at the 
 organ. Both girls wore their white dresses again, 
 and Clarinda had hid some stains on hers with 
 
2S4 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 bunches of dew-damp plum blossoms. She looJved 
 as calm and wholesome and as well tuned to the 
 Sabbath as if sweet and vigorous tree sap coursed 
 in her veins instead of hot blood. 
 
 Neighbors in the congregation who had passed 
 words on account of that decision the evening bef orCj 
 now smiled at one another with a sudden melting 
 of the heart. At Fletcher Chapel when once hard 
 feelings began to form around any imperceptible nu- 
 cleus, the ball had been known to roll and gather 
 through generations. Therefore, the mere fact of 
 Clarinda Moffatt's kissing Lizzie Peters, her tri- 
 umphant rival, instead of meeting her without 
 speaking, warmed the morning's entire services. 
 Every Petersite was willing to own that Clarinda 
 never had equalled her singing on this occasion ; 
 and when the preacher after his closing prayer 
 announced the music committee had something 
 to say, no one was unprepared for what followed. 
 
 This time it was Mrs. Holmes who stepped out 
 on the platform to speak in her concise manner. 
 
 She said it was put upon her to make the final 
 announcement about the prize Brother Gill offered 
 
i*LUi\i BLOOkS. 255 
 
 the music class. A good many had misunderstood 
 Brother Wykoil's remarks yesterday at the concert. 
 
 Brother Wykoif from his corner now interrupted 
 her to say they all knowed he wasn't no talker 
 when he was app'inted to serve. But he went into 
 it feeling satisfied Sister Holmes could carry the 
 men-folks through if they got their tongues hobbled. 
 
 Mrs. Holmes resumed that it wasn't Brother 
 WykoflE's fault. He said the committee was a little 
 in favor, of Lizzie Peters's playing and spoke the 
 highest of her on that occasion. But that was not 
 intended to be final. Brother Gill had expressed a 
 wish before the concert that two trials be given the 
 best performers, the second trial on Sunday morn- 
 ing when they would not know they were being 
 tested. Besides, a good many people who could 
 not spare time for the concert right in their busy 
 season, would hear the final trial at church on 
 Sunday morning. This was Brother Gill's in- 
 struction to the committee. 
 
 Brother Gill, speaking up from congregational 
 depths, said yes, it was. Both girls stood a fairer 
 chance that way, and he liked fair dealing. 
 
2S6 PLUM BLOOMS. 
 
 Mrs. Holmes went on to say she^ hoped them 
 that understood yesterday would not blame 'the 
 committee. Something had to be said then, and 
 Brother Wykoff said it. The final decision had to 
 be made to-day, and the committee had consulted 
 together and made it. They were ageed that 
 Clarinda Moffatt deserved the prize, judging to 
 the best of their abilities. 
 
 What had been a buzzing the day before, ex- 
 panded into churchly applause. Hands were 
 clapped, and clapped vigorously when Lizzie Peters 
 in her turn, rose up from the organ and kissed 
 Clarinda Moffatt. 
 
 John Gill said it did his heart good, and he be- 
 lieved it did the neighborhood good, to see the 
 way both girls acted. 
 
 Clarinda Moffatt was too young to define her 
 thoughts ; for though she sat smiling she could 
 not feel sure whether it was because she had her 
 heart's desire, or because the large patience and 
 beauty of this goodly out-doors world had come so 
 closely home to her. 
 
I,