BANCROFT 
 LIBRARY 
 
 <> 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
"ANOTHER JUANITA" 
 
 AND OTHER STORIES 
 
 JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD l& 
 
 BUFFALO 
 
 CHARLES WELLS MOULTON 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1893, 
 BY JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD McCRACKIN. 
 
 PRINTED BY 
 
 CHARLES WELLS MOULTON, 
 BUFFALO, N. Y. 
 
Bancroft Library 
 
 PREFACE AND DEDICATION. 
 
 YEARS have passed since the first of the sketches con- 
 tained in this volume were written, and so many of the 
 Army people of my day have crossed the River before me, 
 j that I stand waiting on this shore, almost alone. To those 
 living, whether grey in honors when the chief drama of my 
 life was enacted, or yet cadets at West Point, and whose 
 friends were my friends, this book is inscribed, with a 
 / thousand remembrances of acts of courtesy and chivalrous 
 protection granted. 
 
 To California, which gave me welcome and a home when 
 my Army life was over, I have endeavored to become a 
 3 daughter worthy of the fair land and the generous, great- 
 hearted people who live in it. 
 
 May their kindness to me never grow less. 
 
 JOSEPHINE CLIFFORD McCRACKIN. 
 
 Monte Paraiso Rancho, Santa Cruz Mountains^ Ca/., 
 September 75, 1892. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 "ANOTHER JUANITA " r 
 
 CAMP LIFE IN ARIZONA 29 
 
 SAN XAVIER DEL BAG 45 
 
 CROSSING THE Rio GRANDE 6 3 
 
 AN EPISODE OF FORT DESOLATION 77 
 
 TOBV 97 
 
 FLIGHT ! A SEQUEL TO TOBY I3I 
 
 A MINER FROM ARIZONA 160 
 
 THAT RANCH OF His 20 7 
 
 THE STORY OF A GARDEN 24 - 
 
 ST. MARY'S 2 g 
 
 MODERN MONTEREY 
 
'ANOTHER JUANITA." 
 
"ANOTHER JUANITA." 
 
 IT was years ago, before railroads or street cars were 
 even dreamed of in Albuquerque, and the arrival of a mili- 
 tary outfit, however large or limited, was always an event of 
 some importance, furnishing entertainment for the unclothed 
 and unkempt youth of this ancient town, as well as change 
 and excitement for the troops garrisoned there. 
 
 The cavalcade approaching now consisted of half a 
 dozen men, and sergeant of Co. N., ic5th United States 
 cavalry, and a dozen or so of recruits for Co. O, of the 
 same regiment, stationed at Fort Craig, the entire outfit 
 serving as escort to Captain 'Dunwood, who was coming to 
 take command of his company and the fort, after having 
 passed what he considered a very unprofitable winter in 
 Washington, on staff duty. 
 
 "So Dunwood is coming," had been the comment of 
 Lieutenant Crane, class-mate and best friend of his captain, 
 and whose ruling passion it was to pose as a cynic. ' 'Why 
 in the name of all that's sensible, didn't he stay where he 
 was well off, and where his military services were needed, 
 as leader of the German at evening parties, and martial lay- 
 figure at presidential receptions. But he was always one of 
 the kind who wanted to go where duty called him, and he 
 will find this, I venture to say, just the field to practice it." 
 
 The younger lieutenant, to whom these remarks were 
 
4 ' ' Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 addressed, reminded his senior how he himself had assured 
 him frequently that everybody liked Captain Dunwood in 
 spite of his perfections; to which the elder laughingly 
 assented, adding with a cynical smile, ' ' but that was before 
 he had spent the winter on staff-duty in Washington." 
 
 In the meantime the captain was slowly nearing his des- 
 tination. His tired horse's hoofs pressed on hot sand, and 
 the dreary mound, rising just ahead of horse and rider, 
 seemed entirely composed of this same material, looking 
 exactly as dull yellow, as dry and as hot as the sand under 
 the horse's feet. He threw rather a disconsolate look upon 
 this mound, but would have relapsed into his former train 
 of thought, had not a movement among his men attracted 
 his attention. 
 
 ' 'Albuquerque ! " he heard some one say, and after a 
 little he descried the low, flat-roofed houses, singly or in 
 clumps of two and three, scattered, without order or system, 
 in among the sand. On closer approach he could see 
 where the flag waved above the military quarters, and the 
 Rio Grande, where it wound its muddy way along. The 
 weary horses seemed to understand that the end of the long 
 tedious march was near; their riders knew what they owed 
 to themselves and their position, and by the time the little 
 half-nude street gamins had heralded the coming of a sol- 
 dier's train to the rest of the population, it was quite like a 
 band of conquering heroes that Captain Dun wood's escort 
 arrived at the adobe buildings representing the barracks at 
 Albuquerque. 
 
 Amidst much clatter and stamping of hores's feet, 
 
' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 5 
 
 clinking 1 of arms and shouting of orders, the captain and 
 his friend clasped hands and exchanged cordial greetings, 
 while the salutation of the junior, an exchange from another 
 regiment, and who had lately joined, was more ceremonious 
 and official, but returned not less heartily on the captain's 
 part. 
 
 The sun had set long before the din and confusion com- 
 mon to such occasions had quite subsided; indeed it was 
 not until after roll-call and retreat that the troopers seemed 
 to have fitted themselves to their new quarters, and not 
 until after "taps" that the captain and his first lieutenant 
 were allowed the luxury of a conversation strictly tete a tete, 
 Lieutenant Howard wearing the sash as officer of the day 
 being necessarily detained outside, by his duties. Many a 
 peal of laughter reached his ears, however, making him feel 
 lonely and isolated, though he knew it was childish to 
 harbor the little jealous pang that tried to steal into his 
 heart. But it was not entirely a discussion of social affairs, 
 or the Colonel's last mot, that filled up the hours intervening 
 between taps and midnight; for by the time the sentinel 
 called out this hour of ghosts and goblins on his short and 
 beaten way, Captain Dunwood had made himself au fait in 
 regard to everything concerning his company from which 
 he had been separated for over a year, as well as the 
 people, so far as necessary, and the conditions of the place 
 where he was to command post. 
 
 After guard-mount, the next morning, Lieutenant Crane's 
 horse was led out for Captain Dunwood, as he had decided 
 to visit the commissary quarters at once, partly to make an 
 
6 ' ( Another Jiianita. ' ' 
 
 inspection of the buildings with a view to extending them, 
 partly to see what portion of its contents might be found 
 available for his own larder. The orderly who held the 
 horse, and was to escort the captain, seemed to have some 
 trouble in keeping the animal quiet, and with the instinct of 
 a cavalry man, Captain Dunwood's attention was immedi- 
 ately fixed upon the handsome black, whose bridle he had 
 taken from the man's hand. Stepping back a few paces for 
 better scrutiny, he soon satisfied himself that the horse was 
 only impatient to be off, and turned to mount the animal. 
 
 The space in front of the quarters was ample enough in 
 dimension to be called "plaza" by the natives, parade 
 ground by the soldiers. An old church, built of adobe, 
 but Moorish in architecture, straggled into the street that 
 ran past the square; and while the captain's back was 
 turned, two figures had come in sight on this street, both 
 females, one dressed in the conventional limp black skirts 
 of the Mexican woman, with a coarse rebozo over her head, 
 the other, the mistress, evidently, arrayed also in black, 
 though dress and rebozo were finer, and different in make. 
 A lithe, slender figure this, that moved along with the half 
 languid grace, which only the Spanish women seem to 
 possess, a little ahead of her companion. The servant had 
 long since passed the last milestone of youth, while the 
 mistress still stood upon its threshold. From the folds of 
 the rebozo over the old woman's head, but one eye gleamed 
 out with watchful fire. The face of the young lady was 
 hardly more than half covered; her eyes, lustrous, soft and 
 black, looked timidly and a little startled at horse and man, 
 
1 'Another Juanita. ' ' 7 
 
 and the straight line of a delicate nose, with thin, sensitive 
 nostrils, was left uncovered. Only one moment, however; 
 the next a narrow, wax-white hand drew the screen closer, 
 and head and face were both averted, leaving nothing but 
 the other hand exposed to view; this hand, as the captain, 
 recovering himself with an effort, and quickly mounting his 
 horse, could not but observe, held a little, shabby prayer- 
 book, and wrapped around it a rosary, composed of some 
 blood-red bead or berry, such as natives of tropic countries 
 love to shape into strands for this pious purpose. 
 
 The women passed to the right of him, while Captain 
 Dun wood proceeded slowly on his way by the old church, 
 from which they had probably emerged. Not that he 
 allowed himself to speculate upon anything of the kind; 
 what concern of his was it where two women had come 
 from or where they were going to ? He did not even cast a 
 look at the church, as he would have done, probably, under 
 other circumstances; but looked straight ahead, so as not 
 to miss the street he was to turn into, in order to reach the 
 commissary. Street, he said to himself, was too dignified a 
 name to bestow upon these mud-baked thoroughfares, 
 running this way and that, accommodating themselves to 
 the mud-baked houses, that stood wherever their builder 
 had seen fit to put them. The window in these buildings 
 was merely a square hole let into the mud wall, high up in 
 some corner; but wherever there was a door, it stood 
 hospitably open, and if there were inmates, they were sure 
 to come out and give pleasant greeting to the stranger. 
 
 Captain Dunwood's severely classic features softened, and 
 
8 " Another Juanita" 
 
 a little later on, when he came to a more pretentious place, 
 where an adobe wall enclosed a garden with peach trees 
 and grape vines, to say nothing of the broad, cool-looking, 
 though rough-built casa, he said to himself: "It is not so 
 bad, after all; a polite, good-natured people, and among 
 the better classes no doubt there is refinement, and probably 
 great comfort in the homes of the wealthy. I wonder " 
 he checked himself, "but blushing like a girl, at his own 
 hypocrisy, he continued, " yes, I wonder what those blood- 
 red berries were, in the rosary." 
 
 At noon they had a cheerful dinner together, the three 
 officers, and in the course of the afternoon Lieutenant 
 Howard declared to his friend Crane that he too liked Cap- 
 tain Dunwood in spite of his perfections. 
 
 Toward sunset, just before retreat was sounded, and 
 while Lieutenant Crane was re-adjusting his sash, as officer 
 of the day, there was borne on the light breeze that 
 wandered in at the window, a sound that startled Captain 
 Dunwood more thoroughly than the firing of cannon would 
 have done; the tones of a woman's voice in song, soft, 
 sweet and expressive, but without great depth or power. 
 
 "What is that?" he asked turning to his friend, sur- 
 prised and paralyzed at the perfect equanimity with which 
 his second in command continued to spread the sash across 
 his breast. 
 
 " That?" he asked in return. "Ah, that is Juanita," and 
 as the orderly appeared at the door just then, he called out 
 some direction to him, following the man immediately so 
 that the captain was left alone in the room, 
 
' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 9 
 
 " Juanita," he repeated, " as if everybody didn't know 
 'Juanita' as well as they know their A B G's; but ' 
 and again a blush came to his face as his thoughts ran 
 back swiftly to that morning's meeting, and he found him- 
 self wondering in which direction the two forms had van- 
 ished after passing him. All this time the tones of the 
 voice still came floating in, nearer now, and more distinct 
 since he was entirely alone; both verses of the old Spanish 
 love-song were sung, though he could not catch the words 
 at this distance. It was not till the last note had died away 
 that he became aware how absorbed he had been; he roused 
 himself with a guilty start when he found that the tramp of 
 the soldiers, the loud voice of the sergeant, even the call of 
 the bugle on the outside, had been completely unheard by 
 him. 
 
 Not another word of information was volunteered by his 
 lieutenant, and no siren's voice could have wooed the 
 captain into compromising his dignity by asking further 
 questions. Next morning, at guard-mount, he observed 
 for the first time, a heavy adobe wall, running around what 
 seemed a fair-sized garden, with the house standing close to 
 the wall next the quarters. Only a narrow street, or lane, 
 divided it from the barracks, and high up in the corner of 
 the house facing the lane, was one of the small, square 
 windows he had noticed everywhere, latticed here, and 
 giving a decidedly Spanish look to the whole place. 
 
 During the day, it must be confessed, the captain's eyes 
 traveled more than once in the direction of the lattice, and 
 he listened, involuntarily, for a sound of the voice he had 
 
i o ' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 heard on the previous evening. But the day passed, 
 somewhat tediously; the fatigue of the long march was still 
 upon him, he thought, making him distrait and averse to 
 earnest application. To-morrow that should be remedied, 
 he resolved; he would take up the duties for which he had 
 left the gay life at the Capitol, and nothing should make 
 him swerve from his self-chosen path. To be sure it did 
 not run among flowers nor along green fields; it had turned 
 into a dry and barren land, without freshness or beauty, 
 unless it were such stray bits as he raised his eyes to now, 
 where he stood in front of the quarters and looked afar oft 
 to the mountain-range that bordered the horizon. The sun 
 was just setting, and as it bathed the lower hills in pale rose 
 and dim yellow, the higher and more distant peaks and 
 mountain-tops were transformed into domes and spires, 
 flushed with deep red and royal purple, save where a cool 
 silver hue marked some pinnacle more lofty than the rest. 
 
 With rapt attention he watched the glorious sight, his 
 deep, earnest eyes full of a warm light, though his form 
 stood erect and unbending, as if ready to give the word of 
 command. Suddenly, and almost beside him, he fancied, 
 the notes of the song he had heard the day before rang out 
 again, coming, as he could not doubt, through the lattice- 
 work of the window high up in the casa on the other side of 
 the lane. Not a soul was in sight, though within the 
 barracks he heard the sounds of preparation for roll-call 
 and retreat, and that, perhaps, was the reason why neither 
 Crane nor Howard was here to listen to the voice that came 
 so clear and sweet from the throat of the singer. 
 
' ^ Another Juanita. " 1 1 
 
 But the next moment, with bent brows and an impatient 
 pull at his moustache, Captain Dunwood turned away and 
 entered his quarters. What had he to do with golden 
 sunsets, or the romance to be woven out of a Spanish love- 
 song, and the woman who sang it behind her latticed 
 window ? 
 
 On the Sunday following, before inspection and dress- 
 parade, the captain and his two subalterns, one acting as 
 adjutant, were assembled in front of the quarters, waiting 
 for the Padre to dismiss his scant congregation from the 
 church, so that the clash of arms and the blare of trumpets 
 might not interfere with the devotions of the little flock. 
 Soon they emerged, passing, for the most part, down the 
 street in an opposite direction to the open square; only 
 three figures turned and came toward where our friends 
 stood. It was impossible for Captain Dunwood to change 
 his position, as the good Padre Carmelo was evidently bent 
 on saluting him, and while he waited for the priest to 
 approach, his eyes scanned the other two figures. To-day 
 the younger, though again clad in the sombre black which 
 the Spanish women so love, was not shrouded in the 
 rebozo; a lace mantilla, while it draped the form, was 
 thrown over the head so as to cover only the heavy braids 
 of hair, leaving the face and a part of the slender throat 
 entirely uncovered. The same shabby little prayer-book 
 was in her hands, and the rosary of blood-red beads; but 
 the slim hands were gloved to-day, and their waxen white- 
 ness hidden. The old woman behind her was dressed as 
 usual, but dress and rebozo were of a more glossy black. 
 
1 2 ' ' Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 Only a moment his eyes had rested on her, our friend 
 thought; he had had time, however, to see that her throat 
 was white as any swan's, and that her lips were not as 
 bright red as some would suppose a Spanish girl's lips 
 ought to be. But the Padre was already shaking him by 
 the hand, and in his stiff and not always correct English, 
 was expressing his acknowledgements of Captain Dun- 
 wood's kindness, branching out into profuse praise of the 
 younger officers and the soldiery in general. These two 
 younger officers, in the meantime, were exchanging brief 
 but significant remarks and observations. 
 
 " She never looked like that at either of us," said the 
 adjutant, and his friend Crane seemed to know at once 
 whom the young man meant, for he replied: 
 
 " Poor thing; but she might as well strangle her young 
 affections. Dunwood is not given to flirtation, and would in 
 cold blood order any man to be shot, if he could, who 
 cast his eye on a female whom he could not, or would not, 
 make his wife. Somerville, of the 1 2th, wrote and said 
 that the women in Washington were too much for our 
 brave captain; he did not capitulate, he simply ran. 
 
 "He is a handsome fellow," the other admitted, "though 
 rather stern-looking for a lady-killer." 
 
 " Does not the greatest glory attach to the taking of the 
 most forbidding fortress ? However, Herbert can be as gay as 
 a lark, and we all know how good and gentle he is at heart. ' ' 
 
 "Indeed he is," was the younger lieutenant's ready 
 acknowledgement, though his face blushed at the remem- 
 brance of the little short-comings, the kindly setting aright 
 
' ' '"Another Juanita. " 13 
 
 of which had made him so enthusiastic in his captain's 
 praise. "A very 'Knight Bayard.' When I had first left 
 the Academy and was in the other regiment, the fellows 
 used to say of him that he would kill his enemy in the field 
 without compunction, but would die of remorse if he 
 thought he had taken unfair advantage of him, or hurt his 
 feelings before he cut him down." 
 
 At this point the interview between Father Carmelo and 
 the post-commander came to an end, as the ceremonious 
 salutations from both sides showed, and the tramp of horses 
 and shouts of sergeant and corporal put every thought, not 
 connected with the service, to flight. 
 
 A soldier's duties do not relax on Sunday, and a com- 
 mander must be ever at his post, so that he could not have 
 escaped the tones of the voice that sang " Juanita" in the 
 old casa next to him, if he had wanted to. But he did not 
 want to; he listened and wondered; wondered how the low, 
 sweet voice that seemed so well fitted to sing 
 
 " Soft o'er the fountain, 
 
 Lingering falls the southern moon " 
 
 could rise to the force and the passion of the love-glowing 
 
 refrain : 
 
 " Nita! Juanita! 
 
 Ask thy soul if we should part." 
 
 It was the first time, perhaps, that he had listened with a 
 critic's ear, and he could hear no change of expression in 
 the singer's voice; throughout the song it was pleading, 
 entreating, beseeching, but there was neither longing nor 
 
14 " Another Juanita" 
 
 passion in the tones. If he had examined the inmost 
 recesses of his heart he would have discovered that the face 
 of the girl whom he took to be the singer, had been present 
 with him all day; the face was so pure, the eyes so soft, 
 and the lips, the lips were not the color that always accom- 
 pany black eyes and ebony hair. They were full and 
 perfect in mold, but the color was pale red, much better 
 suited to the expression of her eyes, he thought, than to 
 the words of that song she was always singing. He arose 
 and left his room before the clang of the bugle sounding 
 roll-call could break into the last faint strains that came 
 from the latticed window. 
 
 In the course of the week Captain Dunwood had occasion 
 to visit what was termed "the pasture," a piece of land 
 close by the river, where a number of cottonwood trees 
 flourished, and underneath, in clumps, grew coarse, wiry 
 grass of some kind. The Mexicans grandly called it a 
 bosque, for in their eyes, in this tree-barren land, it repre- 
 sented quite a little forest, but had been made use of, by 
 that cynical individual, the teniente Crane, to turn any horse 
 into, that had in any manner become temporarily unfit for 
 service. The captain was on foot, and as the nearest way 
 led directly past the front of the garden-wall enclosing the 
 casa with the latticed window, he felt no hesitation in look- 
 ing in at the open gate, and, as the door was just opposite, 
 and it open too, he could see through the hall of the house, 
 and into the little court-yard it enclosed. The sun lay 
 warm and golden on the flags with which it was paved, 
 and drew heavy perfume from the tuberoses and white 
 
' 'Another Juanita. " 15 
 
 Annunciation lilies with which the round beds, raised several 
 feet above the ground and neatly walled in with white slabs, 
 were filled. A Castilian rose covered one side of the 
 house, the foliage fresh and green, a joy to the eye, huge 
 bunches of its sweet-smelling blossoms making the picture 
 perfect in its way. Outside there was not a blade of grass, 
 not the tiniest spot of green to be seen, but the gurgle and 
 drips of water inside the garden, explained the secret of the 
 wealth of bloom; it drew its supply from the chief acequia 
 leading from the Rio Grande, and the owner of the 
 casa unquestionably belonged to the . gente finos of 
 Albuquerque. 
 
 Captain Dunwood's horse had been turned into the pasture 
 after the march out from Fort Riley, and the faithful animal 
 came running up with a glad whinny, when he heard the 
 whistle with which his master had been wont to call him. 
 He was so overjoyed to see his master again, that he seemed 
 broken-hearted when the captain turned to go and leave him 
 behind, and determining to send his orderly for him at once, 
 Captain Dunwood retraced his steps quickly, to have the horse 
 brought in before stable-call. As he neared his neighbor's 
 house he became aware of a sound of chatting and laughter, 
 and looking up saw~a number of young ladies approaching, 
 a sight rare enough in the dreary streets of Alberquerque. 
 It was plain that they were coming toward the house, and 
 that he would meet them almost in front of the gate; but 
 he could neither turn, nor accelerate his already swift pace, 
 so he raised his hat "to the whole bevy, among whom he 
 recognized two of the daughters of the renowned Mexican, 
 
1 6 ' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 General Armigo, of Santa Ana fame, and, as centre of the 
 group, the face and form of her who had been present to his 
 thoughts more than he liked to own to himself. She alone 
 was not laughing; indeed there was something inexpressibly 
 sad in the eyes that were raised to his, though she did not 
 speak when the rest gayly returned the Captain's salute. 
 How delicate, nay, fragile, she looked beside some of the 
 women, whose rich, dark beauty did full justice to the de- 
 scriptions one reads of the star-eyed daughters of the Spanish 
 race. One in particular, who was supporting his young 
 neighbor, in jest, apparently, though the girl looked as if 
 she might well need her support. He felt an impulse to 
 fling off the arm that encircled the girl's slender waist, as if 
 it were the grossest contamination to have it there. 
 
 " That one might sing 'Juanita,' and I would never 
 wonder at it; but the little one with the pale-red lips and the 
 flower-eyes No," he decided, "she ought not to sing it." 
 And he felt fairly indignant, when, just as the sun, with its 
 last rays, clothed the distant mountains with a beauty evan- 
 escent as it was glorious, her voice floated out again, sweet 
 and low at first, but growing almost piercing in its tones 
 beseeching, entreating, pleading. It irritated him so that 
 he left his room to once more fondle his horse, who stamped 
 impatiently for him to come. 
 
 One morning an unusual excitement stirred the pulses of 
 the sleepy old town; commadres and compadres flitted from 
 their own casa to their neighbors', and a sound of loud 
 talking was heard on the street; the Indians had attacked a 
 band of sheep-herders on the river-bank, some fifteen or 
 
1 ' Another Juanita. " 17 
 
 twenty miles below, had driven off the sheep and killed one 
 or two of the herders. This, however, was so common an 
 occurrence, that the Mexicans would hardly have troubled 
 themselves or the post- commander about the matter, but 
 the sheep-herders who came in, reported an unusually large 
 band of savages, and that they had taken the direction 
 toward the camp of Senor Francisco Delagado, who, with 
 his herders, was engaged in branding horses and cattle, ol 
 which he had the greater number by far, of any man in the 
 surrounding country. It was not long till Lieutenant Crane 
 appeared before his commander, in official attitude, to report 
 that some of the citizens had applied for military escort and 
 protection to reach the camp of Senor Delagado, if pos- 
 sible, before the Indians could commit further depredations. 
 The report ended, the subaltern officer quickly lapsed into 
 friend and class-mate of by-gone years. 
 
 " Let me go, Bert," he pleaded excitedly. " You know 
 who Don Francisco is, don't you? " 
 
 "No," replied his captain, "and it makes no difference; 
 he must have succor and protection. But, I say, Fred, let 
 young Howard go give him a chance to win his spurs. 
 And by Jove! the youngster shall have my horse, his own 
 is under the weather." 
 
 And when ' ' boots and saddles ' ' was sounded, there was 
 no prouder mortal on earth than Lieutenant Charles How- 
 ard, Co. N., 1 05th U. S. Cavalry. Twenty men was quite 
 a command, and the young officer felt that he would settle 
 the vexed question of " what to do with the Indians," in 
 very short order, before he got back. His captain made 
 
i ' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 preparations, however, to send re-inforcements if it became 
 necessary. 
 
 Late in the afternoon, just before stable call, a courier 
 arrived at headquarters to report Senor Delagado mur- 
 dered by the Indians, of whom two bands were on the war- 
 path, slaughtering sheep and cattle, driving off horses, and 
 killing and scalping those who tried to protect their herds. 
 The body of the murdered man was being brought home by 
 the herders who had escaped, but as they had saved only a 
 few of the little burros, their progress was slow, having to shift 
 the corpse from the back of one burro to that of another, as 
 the animals tired down. 
 
 At the same time a number of Mexicans living in the out- 
 skirts of the town, came trooping in, fearing that the Indians 
 would attack their forlorn little ranches and besiege the 
 town, wherefore they implored the teniente and his com- 
 mandante not to send any more of the troops away, but 
 issue rations to them, the Mexicans, at once, as they had no 
 doubt the Appaches had stolen the provisions left on their 
 ranches already, and that it had consequently become the 
 duty of the government to feed them. 
 
 "The blind faith these people have in their Uncle Sam's 
 willingness and ability to take care of them, would be 
 touching, if it were not so amusing," remarked Lieutenant 
 Crane with his most synical smile, which died away, how- 
 ever, to give place to an expression of real concern, as he 
 saw, in the fading light, the figure of the old woman from 
 the neighboring casa, coming around the corner and 
 approaching them, making her way fearlessly through 
 
' ^ Another Juanita. " ig 
 
 horses and men, turning neither right nor left till she reached 
 the captain and stepped in front of him. This gentleman 
 had noticed her approach but paid no heed, as he was 
 anxious to have Lieutenant Crane and his men on the march 
 before nightfall, and in the confusion hardly caught the 
 meaning of what she said. Only one word had struck his 
 ear, but being by no means perfect in the language of the 
 country he turned impatiently to his lieutenant. 
 
 " What does she want? Tell her not to bother us now; 
 let her come some other time." 
 
 " Maria comes with a message from her young mistress. 
 The Senorita Juanita wishes, nay begs, to see you at her 
 casa some time this evening, as soon as you can make it 
 possible. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Who ? ' ' asked the captain in bewilderment so deep 
 that his friend could scarce refrain from laughing. 
 
 "Juanita Delagado," he repeated tersely. "Did you 
 not know it was her father whom the Indians killed? " 
 
 ' ' I knew nothing, ' ' and he leaned against the horse of 
 his lieutenant, so white in the face that this individual 
 compassionately suppressed the long, low whistle, which, as 
 a cynic, he felt that he ought to give vent to. 
 
 "But Juanita, she says," continued Lieutenant Crane, 
 interpreting, "knows nothing of her father's death as yet, 
 and Maria says that you must not allude to it when you call 
 on her. She is frail and delicate, and they want time to 
 prepare her for the shock." 
 
 " I can't go, Crane; not to-night. Tell her so," said the 
 captain desperately; then casting his eyes around, "how 
 
2o ' ' Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 can I ? Don't you see, it will be my duty to stay right 
 here, after you go? " 
 
 Lieutenant Crane's good-nature seemed suddenly to 
 leave him, and he showed decided symptoms of mutiny, 
 as he turned to go, muttering something about ' ' martinet- 
 ism " under his breath. 
 
 "No, no, Fred, don't say that!" the great, tall man 
 called after him in piteous tones, and his friend Crane never 
 forgot the look of pain on his face, and never forgave him- 
 self for having brought it there. 
 
 He dismissed the old woman with the assurance that if 
 Captain Dunwood could not come that night, he would do 
 himself the honor to call upon the senorita at the earliest 
 possible moment the next morning, and the old servant, 
 mourning bitterly the loss of her master, expressed her 
 gratification at seeing all these soldiers going forth to punish 
 his murderers. 
 
 During the night Lieutenant Crane with his men re- 
 turned, having met old Arrogo, the guide, whom Lieuten- 
 ant Howard had sent as avant-courier with the message that 
 the Indians had fled to the mountains, after a short, sharp 
 encounter, which had cost one horse and the wounding of 
 two men. As these could be transported but slowly on im- 
 provised litters swung between two horses, the herders 
 bearing the body of Senor Delagado, had attached them- 
 selves to the command, by the teniente Howard's permis- 
 sion, and the whole train would arrive probably sometime 
 before noon on the morrow. 
 
 In the morning, directly after guard-mount, Captain 
 
' Another Juanita. " 2 i 
 
 Dunwood stood irresolute in front of the quarters, with 
 brows contracted, an anxious, troubled look on his face, 
 not aware that the look was reflected on another face, 
 brought close to the window, inside the quarters. For 
 once Lieutenant Crane seemed to have forgotten that a true 
 cynic knows neither pity nor feels concern, for his eyes 
 were full of a compassion for which there was no apparent 
 cause, as he watched the tall figure, standing idly and with 
 an air of indecision entirely foreign to his usually quiet, 
 determined manner. 
 
 At this moment old Maria came in sight, evidently on 
 her way from the Delagado casa to the church, and Dun- 
 wood at once moved forward, so that he intercepted the 
 woman half way between the two places. The little plaza 
 was deserted, as were the streets and winding ways that ran 
 into it, but Maria took no notice of the captain's approach; 
 when he stood before her she stopped, and after some little 
 difficulty he made her understand his wish to be led to her 
 mistress, the Senorita Juanita. The old woman looked up 
 at him with dim, lustreless eye. 
 
 "You wish to see my mistress?" she asked in low, 
 hushed tones; "Come, then, with me, and you shall see 
 Juanita," and she continued on her way to the church, 
 beckoning him on when she noticed him hesitate and stop. 
 Seeing her motion to him, he followed Jher, as in a dream, 
 till they reached the narrow little vestibule of the church, 
 the inside of which he saw to-day for the first time. Only 
 once, passing just as the congregation was dismissed, and 
 both inside doors open, he had observed, half unconsciously, 
 
4 2 ' 'Another juanita, ' ' 
 
 that as in all the old Catholic churches in the Territory, 
 there were neither seats nor benches through the entire 
 body of the church, the pious worshippers kneeling during 
 mass and vespers. 
 
 As the door swung back, the old servant, with a deft 
 motion of the hand, threw a thin spray of the blessed water 
 on the heretic whom she was admitting into the sanctuary, 
 ere she took him by the hand and led him toward the 
 altar. - Tall tapers were burning here, shedding a sub- 
 dued light on the emblems of faith adorning it; but, strange 
 to say there were no flowers there, and the balustrade, 
 running around the raised dais, was shrouded in black. 
 When he grew accustomed to the half darkness, after the 
 glaring light outside, he saw that the church was empty; 
 no worshippers were there, only he and the old servant, 
 and directly in front of them, at the foot of the altar, a 
 bier, upon which lay stretched a figure that might have been 
 molded in wax, or cut out of marble. Snowy draperies 
 enshrouded it, and a filmy, spotless veil was thrown over 
 glossy braids of darkest hair. The face, so fair and sweet 
 to look upon, was still and cold; and the slim white hands, 
 crossed peacefully above the breast, were made to hold a 
 rosary of blood-red beads. 
 
 "Juanita!" Had he shrieked it aloud in his agony ? He 
 never knew, but the old woman drew him down beside her, 
 and after making the sign of the cross above his head, bent 
 weeping, over her rosary, murmuring prayers which his 
 soul echoed, though he neither understood the words nor 
 knew the formula. 
 
' { Another juanita. " 23 
 
 "Juanita " he could think nothing but the one word, 
 which he repeated to himself softly, over and over again. 
 Then suddenly a sharp pain clutched his heart, and he felt 
 the perspiration starting on his forehead, and when he 
 passed his hand across to wipe the damp away, it seemed to 
 him they must be drops of blood, and look like the beads of 
 the rosary in the dead girl's hands. 
 
 He never knew how long he had been there, whether 
 hours or minutes, when he heard a soft footstep behind him 
 and felt a hand laid gently on his shoulder. 
 
 "Come with me, my son." It was the old priest who 
 stooped over him and helped him 'to rise, picking up his hat 
 and gently leading him out of the church. Not through the 
 door by which he had entered, but through a side door, 
 which led to the father's habitation close by. 
 
 "Sit here, my son," he said as he pointed to a home- 
 made settee of brightest calico stuffed with lambs' wool. 
 He stepped into an adjoining room and brought a small 
 glass of wine, with which he insisted his guest must at 
 least moisten his lips. Then he sat beside him silently, 
 with bowed head, grief in every line of his kindly, wrinkled 
 face. 
 
 At last Captain Dunwood turned to him. "When " he 
 began to question, in a voice that struck him as not being 
 his own. 
 
 " When did Juanita die ? " Father Carmelo finished the 
 question for him. "Ah! poor child poor child; she never 
 be very strong, and one time, American doctor, post-sur- 
 geon, he say ' the senorita have trouble with her heart'' 
 
24 ' 'Another Juanita. ' ' 
 
 So when Indians kill her father, I say to Maria: not tell her 
 yet; let me prepare her; she good child oh! so good I 
 tell her by and by, to-morrow, is to say, to-day. She had 
 say to me, when she hear how Indians attack sheep-herders, 
 she say: ' I send for the commandante ; on my knees I will 
 beg him to go to my father and bring him home.' But last 
 night one foolish old woman she run in to see her, and she 
 cry 'oh! you poor child Indians kill your father dead; 
 shoot him with guns, shoot him with arrows, till he die.' 
 Maria, she hear one loud scream, she run in to room, she 
 see Juanita go so " The old man clasped both hands over 
 his heart, and swayed his body to and fro. ' ' Maria throw 
 her arms around her, and Juanita lay her head against her 
 shoulder, so ' ' dropping his head to one side, ' ' and when 
 Maria look in her face, she is dead." 
 
 After a moment's silence the priest, with tears in his eyes 
 went on, " Good child, good daughter; when her father go 
 away, about a month ago, to hold rodeo, on the river-bank, 
 on his rancho, she cry and cry, 'perhaps I never see my 
 father again,' and I say: ' be a good girl, pray to the saints, 
 and ask Holy Virgin to protect him, and he come soon 
 again!' Next day she say 'Padre mio, I will sing every 
 day, when the sun go down, one Ave Maria, till my father 
 come home again, and I know Holy Virgin will protect 
 him.' But the good God has taken her father; was better 
 so, perhaps; we must not complain " 
 
 Captain Dunwood sat rigid, and looked into the father's 
 face with wild, burning eyes. 
 
 ' ' What, ' ' he asked roughly, in a hoarse, broken voice, 
 
' l Another Juanita. " 25 
 
 ''What did she sing every evening, when the sun went 
 down ? " 
 
 "An Ave Maria; oh! it is beautiful, this Ave," the old 
 priest continued. "It is here, in this prayer-book of 
 Juanita's," and he took the little worn book from his 
 writing-table; " I will find it directly." But his eyes were 
 not so ready to find things as they had been twenty years 
 ago, and while turning over the leaves, he spoke again: 
 " The good sisters in Santa Fe they teach her to sing; they 
 all love her so " his voice broke. "Juanita's mother," 
 he went on, "the Donna Inez, she die when Juanita was 
 small little child, and old Maria she take care of her, always; 
 and her heart is broken now. Here, my son, you read the 
 Latin? Here it is, she sing it every day. You never hear 
 her sing ? Oh! she sing beautiful." 
 
 "Father " the captain spoke without looking at the 
 open page of the book, "Father, do you know the air, the 
 song of 'Juanita ' ? " 
 
 " Song ? Of Juanita ? " the Padre asked, incredulously. 
 " No, no one make song of Juanita. Why make song of 
 our Juanita ? Must be another Juanita." 
 
 His visitor arose. "Father," he pleaded, "give me the 
 book," and without a word the litte volume was laid in the 
 young man's outstretched palm; then, as he bowed low his 
 head, the priest raised his hand in benediction, and Captain 
 Dunwood left the roof that had sheltered him in his hour of 
 bitterest pain. 
 
 Outside he staggered like one who had received a mortal 
 blow; his face was ashen and his eyes sunken, as though 
 
26 "Another Juanila.^ 
 
 years ol suffering had passed over him. His way to the 
 quarters lay past the church door; should he enter to see 
 once more the face of the dead girl whom he would not love 
 in life? No; no need of going in; what he should see there 
 was mirrored on his heart so faithfully that a lifetime would 
 not suffice to efface the picture. But his punishment was a 
 just one, for, was not he, after all, like one of the fools 
 and coxcombs whom he had always so despised who 
 believed every girl's glance to be directed to them, 
 every woman's song addressed to their susceptible heart. 
 A just punishment, he kept repeating, and none too 
 great; yet how should he bear it every day of his life till 
 he died. 
 
 Little he thought of his disheveled hair and his reeling 
 gait, as he came in sight of the quarters; the only dread he 
 felt was that he might encounter some one to whom he 
 would have to speak. But that prince of cynics, Lieuten- 
 ant Crane, had never left his post of observation, and, 
 thanks to his forethought, Captain Dun wood, all uncon- 
 scious of his friend's management, safely reached the room 
 he had left that morning with his heart a-flutter. Only 
 that morning? It seemed ages since; and would time 
 always drag like this, till it merged into eternity? 
 Then a heavy stupor took possession of him, he heard 
 -no duty-call, no bugle-sound, till late in the evening 
 when Lieutenant Crane knocked at his door to inquire 
 whether he would receive Lieutenant Howard's report at 
 roll-call. 
 
 When the young lieutenant stood before his commanding 
 
"Another Juanita. " 27 
 
 officer a little later, making the official report of his expe- 
 dition, he seemed utterly oblivious of the haggard face and 
 blood-shot eyes which it pained his tender heart to note. 
 During the hours that followed, Captain Dunwood moved 
 among his men as duty demanded, both his lieutenants, 
 with an adroitness born of the affection they felt for their 
 commander, standing between him and the things that they 
 felt must jar upon his feelings this day. But late in the 
 night, long after tattoo had rounded off the duties of the 
 day, and taps had warned the soldiers in their quarters that 
 lights must be put out, Captain Dunwood sat in his room 
 again, alone and desolate of heart, as he felt he should 
 always be. 
 
 Only the steps of the sentinel, as he paced to and fro 
 with measured tread, fell upon his ear; but the monotonous 
 refrain of "All is well" heard a thousand times before 
 made discord in his soul to-night. Then at last he took, from 
 where it had pressed close against his heart, the little worn 
 prayer-book of the dead girl, and reverently laid it on the 
 table before him. Hot tears shot into his eyes as he read 
 on, and again he heard her singing, in tones that were 
 pleading, beseeching, entreating, the grand old hymn to the 
 mother of God 
 
 "Ave Maria Ave Maria! 
 Gracia plena, Dominus tecum. 
 Benedicts tu, in mulieribus, 
 Benedictus fructus, ventris tue Jesu. 
 Ave Maria Gracia plena, 
 Ave Maria Ave Maria!" 
 
2 g "Another Juanita" 
 
 " Santa Maria Santa Maria! 
 Mater Dei, ora pronobis. 
 Ora pronobis, peccatoribus, 
 Nunc et in hora mortris nostra, amen. 
 Santa Maria Mater Dei, 
 Santa Maria, ora pronobis!" 
 
CAMP-LIFE IN ARIZONA. 
 
CAMP-LIFE IN ARIZONA. 
 
 WE reached Tucson just in time to attend Major Smith's 
 wedding. Looking on the scene that night, I quite forgot 
 that I was in Arizona. The bride was faultless in white 
 moire antique, blonde veil, and satin slippers. Wives of 
 the military officers and civil dignitaries of the Territory 
 were not behind in elegance of dress and appointments, and 
 the gay uniforms and regulation epaulettes of the officers 
 made up, altogether, what Jenks would have called a 
 ''brilliant and recherche assemblage." The General, on 
 whose arm I had been leaning during the performance of 
 the ceremony, was the first to salute the bride, and then the 
 band (six or eight ' ' musically organized ' ' soldiers on fur- 
 lough from Camp Grant) struck up one of those soft, 
 thrilling waltzes that only the dark-eyed Mexicans could 
 have taught these susceptible individuals. I am afraid that 
 I was less interested in the dancing than in the supper, 
 which was a source of unlimited wonder to me, but accounted 
 for, perhaps, in part, by the knowledge that the groom was 
 quartermaster of the United States Army, and the father of 
 the bride, one of the oldest and wealthiest citizens of Tucson. 
 
 I was to spend the summer in camp, some sixty miles 
 below Tucson, and the colonel, his wife and I, started out 
 on the following afternoon, with a dozen cavalrymen as 
 escort, and reached camp just at guard-mount the next 
 
32 Camp- Life in Arizona. 
 
 morning. The officers who had not been fortunate enough 
 to obtain the post commander's permission to attend the 
 grand wedding, soon called at the colonel's quarters to 
 hear the good news in general, and accounts of the festivi- 
 ties in particular. The colonel's junior lieutenant had 
 been particularly anxious to attend, and had been pining 
 away, he said, since the colonel had left camp without him. 
 The commanding officer himself called while he was still 
 complaining, and, to make amends for his cruelty to the 
 youth, the captain requested that I should choose him, the 
 lieutenant, to act as escort and cavalier on my first ride. 
 The lieutenant declared himself amply satisfied with the 
 reparation made, and started joyously to prepare himself, 
 when we were a little surprised to see him turn very 
 abruptly, and re-enter the room somewhat quicker than he 
 had left it. Behind him appeared Braun, the cook, beating 
 the ground furiously with a heavy piece of wood, and 
 screaming, at the top of his voice, ''Look out! look out! 
 he's half dead, but he can crawl yet," and, crowding to 
 the door, we saw a most beautiful specimen of an Arizona 
 rattle-snake, some six feet long, trying to escape from 
 Braun' s vigorous blows. But the blows had been well 
 aimed, and the snake soon lay motionless at the corner of 
 the adobe kitchen, inside which Braun had first discovered 
 it, curled up on the flour-sack. 
 
 Some time after, when I left my tent, equipped and ready 
 to mount my horse, I noticed that he stood just where the 
 snake had breathed its last, but, since I no longer saw it 
 there, I concluded it had been taken away from under the 
 
Camp- Life in Arizona. 33 
 
 horse's feet, and thrown out among the weeds. What my 
 screams were like when, on retiring to my tent for the night, 
 I stooped to look under the bed (pursuant to a time-honored 
 custom) before getting into it, and there found the snake 
 curled up for a comfortable night's sleep, I will leave my 
 lady readers to imagine; they brought half the garrison to 
 the spot. The snake was killed over again and buried in 
 the ground, six feet deep. 
 
 People are accustomed to think and speak of Arizona, as 
 though the whole Territory were one waste of sand and dust; 
 yet, could but that fearful scourge, the Apache, be 
 removed, there are portions of this country that would soon 
 vie, in life and beauty, with the most populous sections in 
 California only small portions of it, I must acknowledge 
 and here, at the foot of the grand old mountain overlooking 
 our camp, was such a spot. The grass and wild flowers are 
 always fresh and green, from the showers of rain that fall 
 almost every week during the summer months here, and the 
 sun, as it sinks slowly behind the mountain, tints the sky 
 with brilliant, yet delicate hues, such as I have never seen 
 elsewhere. Riding forth on such evenings, nothing could 
 exceed the sense of unbounded joy and freedom I felt, not- 
 withstanding my fear of the Indians, whom I always 
 expected to find behind the first little hillock, or the next 
 clump of trees, which the colonel had forbidden us to pass. 
 Sometimes we would play " Central Park," on these rides 
 the colonel and his wife, my companion and myself, and all 
 the officers who did not happen to be on duty. Keeping 
 within the lines the post commander had designated as 
 
34 Camp-Life in Arizona,. 
 
 "safe," we would pass and repass each other some on 
 horseback, some in ambulances, and others on foot assum- 
 ing all the style and air of New York tKte, as we bowed and 
 saluted afresh, every time we met 
 
 The colonel was die only married officer in camp, so it 
 was a matter of course that the general, who was expected 
 on a friendly visit at the post, should be entertained at our 
 quarters. Not that we had room enough to invite him to 
 share our abode; his bachelor friends might give him quar- 
 ters, but we would give him a state dinner, on the day of bis 
 arrival. The colonel's quarters consisted of one odbfe room, 
 which served as parlor, sitting-room, bed-room, and dining- 
 room, in wet weather and on festal occasions. Beside it 
 was the tent devoted to my use, and opposite both stood 
 what had once been another <&&*fc house, but was now a 
 roofless ruin, with crumbling watts, containing gaps, here 
 and Acre, marking the places where doors had once been 
 projected This was our kitchen, as a large, open fire-place 
 in one corner, a 1% pile of ashes in the other, and a large 
 home-made table in the middle of the mud floor, plainly 
 told 
 
 Did I say this structure was roofless? I beg pardon; 
 there was a piece of canvas or tent doth spread over that 
 part of it where the cooking operations went on, only it was 
 not long enough nor strong enough, and, when it rained, 
 the rain water, that gathered in a pool directly over the 
 fire-place, was always sure to break through and come 
 down, extinguishing the fire and all hopes of dinner, just 
 as Braun would get ready to serve that meal It was 
 
Cain}, A/// /// /Iti-rma. 35 
 
 comical to watch Bnimi after such mishaps. With his 
 india-rubber blanket thrown over his shoulders, he would 
 pick his way, through ib<: oVrj> j>u<M)<-s of w;it< r on th- 
 floor, to the ash-pile, opposite the fire-place, and there seat 
 himself, and, with his shaggy head supported by his smutty 
 hands, would grimly stare at the pots and pans, filled and 
 bespattered with ashes from the recent cloud-burst of 
 canvas. 
 
 Our supply of canned fruit and vegetables had almost 
 given out when the time was set, definitely, for the general'* 
 visit, and we devoutly hoped that the commissary train 
 might come in from California before the general's arrival; 
 but when it came, we found that the usual amount of toll 
 had been taken at Fort Yuma, so that there was very little 
 left for the military posts in Arizona. Among the dishes 
 served for dinner were baked beans and a meat-pie. The 
 latter the general gallantly took to be chicken, when told 
 that I had had a finger in the pie; but the desert was excel- 
 lent, for we had still some fruits and jellies left, with plenty 
 of sugar, spice and wine, 
 
 I have forgotten the exact words of the old saying, that 
 " no mortal must prize himself happy before his days are 
 ended/' but I know that the colonel's wife and myself were 
 just exchanging congratulations on the success of our dinner, 
 in an undertone, while placing dessert on the table, when 
 an orderly stopped at the door, and, dismounting, announced 
 the arrival of the major from the neighboring jx>&t, together 
 with his wife, his lieutenant and his lieutenant'* wife. The 
 ambulance was already at the door; the colonel's wile held 
 
36 Camp- Life in Arizona. 
 
 up her hands aside in horror; Braun was rattling among the 
 dishes at a fearful rate; where should we get dinner for the 
 new-comers, if he had made away with the remnants of the 
 feast? But, thanks to Braun, very soon a warm dinner 
 graced the table, and the gentlemen, who had left their 
 meal and dessert untouched on the ladies' arrival, unwit- 
 tingly assisted us in serving quite a handsome repast to the 
 late arrivals. 
 
 The next day was devoted to visiting some curious 
 springs, not far from camp. The captain sent a large 
 escort with us, as the place was not considered safe from 
 Indians, but we forgot all danger while viewing the scenery 
 .along the banks of the creek, or river, into which the 
 springs emptied. It was grand, although desolate in its 
 utter loneliness and silence. ' The petrifactions made by the 
 water of the springs were, possibly, still more remarkable. 
 No sculptor could chisel more delicately, from marble or 
 stone, than the leaves, the flowers, and the vines that were 
 here preserved in undying beauty. Running over bright, 
 green ferns, in some places, -it was singular to mark how the 
 water was gradually freezing the tender leaves into stone. 
 They still looked green, but felt brittle and crisp to the 
 touch, as though a sharp frost had overtaken them, and 
 brushing these leaves aside, underneath were found those 
 already brown, and in a state of perfect petrifaction. 
 
 After admiring all there was to be seen on this side of the 
 stream, we felt a natural desire to cross over and see the 
 other side. The gentlemen brought huge stones to pile up 
 in the water, and the ladies were assisted over. The general 
 
Camp- Life in Arizona. 37 
 
 acted as my cavalier, and it so happened that we were 
 the last to cross. The rocks were wet and slippery, and 
 stepping from one to the other, just in the middle of the 
 creek, where the water was deepest, I glided out, or the 
 rock turned, and I went into the water, drawing the general, 
 who held me by the hand, in after me. Fortunately, the 
 water was not very deep, and the sun hot, so that there was 
 little danger to be apprehended, either from drowning or 
 taking cold. But, for the rest of the day, it was a matter of 
 speculation with the whole party whether the general had 
 meant to commit suicide, or I had contemplated self-de- 
 struction; whether I had tried to drown the general, or the 
 general had wanted to consign me to a watery grave; till it 
 was finally determined that the double drowning-match 
 must have been a preconcerted thing between us, as we had 
 " plumped in" at the same time, and, but for their timely 
 interference, would probably have reached the river Styx 
 arm-in-arm, as we had jumped off the rocks together. 
 
 The camp seemed very quiet after our guests had de- 
 parted; though dull or tedious, as many complain, a camp 
 can never be, as long as the War Department does not take 
 fife and drum from infantry and the bugle from cavalry as 
 it has already taken regimental bands from both. Reveille 
 awakens the sleeper from his dreams in the morning, and 
 throughout the day, the ever-changing and ever- returning 
 calls shorten the hours till " tattoo" and " taps " send us to 
 bed again at night. Waking up in the night, the long- 
 drawn, monotonous ' 'twelve o'clock, and all is well" of the 
 sentinels on guard gives one a delicious feeling of safety and 
 
38 Camp-Life in Arizona. 
 
 security, although, at the same time, what may seem to be 
 the coyotes yelping and barking close to your tent, may be 
 Apache Indians. During the day, every duty, military or 
 household, is regulated and performed by the different calls 
 of the bugle. The colonel's wife would ask of the cook, 
 "Braun, is it not time to put the beef on the fire for 
 dinner?" And Braun would answer, " It is only a little 
 after fatigue- call." Or, if I asked the orderly, "When will 
 you have time to take my saddle to the company sad- 
 dler's?" he would answer, "After stable-call." "And how 
 late is it now ? " " Water-call has just gone. ' ' 
 
 There is one plague in Arizona, more to be dreaded, I 
 think, than scorpion or tarantula, centipede or rattlesnake; it 
 is the fever. I will leave it to the army surgeon I met in 
 Tucson to describe the different phases and stages of this 
 dreaded disease, and will only say that more than one-half 
 the men. of the garrison, and the greater number of officers, 
 had succumbed to its insidious attacks before the summer 
 was half spent. The colonel, too, was falling a victim to it, 
 and the post commander giving the colonel permission to 
 leave the camp in quest of health, we concluded to return 
 the visit of the ladies at the next post. My plan to make 
 the trip on horseback, was violently opposed at first; the 
 colonel was too sick to ride on horseback; the captain, as 
 commanding officer, could not leave the post (for there was 
 no officer well enough to take his place;) the colonel's senior 
 lieutenant was already in the camp whither we were going,, on 
 business, and the junior, with all his songs, and laughter, and 
 gayety, was brought very near to death's door by the fever. 
 
Camp-Life in Arizona. 39 
 
 When the time came I mounted Black Prince, and found 
 the captain on his iron-gray, by my side. The colonel and 
 his wife occupied the ambulance, and the captain rode with 
 us some five or six miles. My side-saddle contained a 
 pocket large enough to hold a pistol, and the captain had 
 sent me a derringer, on the previous day, to carry in it, as 
 he did not consider my undertaking quite safe, though we 
 had ten cavalrymen as escort. On the point of taking 
 leave from us, the captain ordered three of the men to ride 
 close behind me, and then turned to ask: 
 
 "Are you sure that you have that pistol with you now ? " 
 
 " Why, certainly, captain," said I. "It is in my travel- 
 ing-bag, in the bottom of the ambulance." 
 
 The captain looked blank. 
 
 "Just like a woman," he was impolite enough to say. 
 " If the Indians come, of course they'll give you time to go 
 to the ambulance, to hunt up your valise, and find your 
 pistol." 
 
 An indignant reply rose to my lips, but the next moment 
 pity took the place of indignation; the poor man was a 
 bachelor. And I then and there formed the Christian res- 
 olution to introduce him to all the pretty girls of my 
 acquaintance, in San Jose", Alameda and San Francisco, the 
 very next time he came to California, on furlough. 
 
 I believe, to this day, that the captain threw an evil eye 
 after us when we parted, or used some other spell to bring 
 the Apaches on us, to punish me for acting "just like a 
 woman," for when we approached the point of a range of 
 low hills, rising out of the valley we were traversing, the 
 
40 Camp- Life in Arizona. 
 
 corporal in command of the escort suddenly halted the train, 
 and rode up to the ambulance. I, too, rode up, just in 
 time to hear the corporal report to the colonel, that he had 
 seen the head of an Indian, peering over the edge of the 
 hill, a moment ago. 
 
 "The more fool you are, then, for halting, and giving 
 them a chance to cut us down," said the colonel, angrily. 
 " Tell the men to look to their arms. Ride close behind 
 the ambulance," he said tome, hastily: "there is no time 
 to dismount now. See there they come!" 
 
 Around the sharp corner dashed the wild, horribly 
 painted figures of some fifteen or twenty Apaches, mounted 
 on little, fleet, shaggy ponies, yelling like so many devils, 
 and leaning far over their horse's sides, they aimed their 
 arrows at us, while following the curve of the road, that 
 brought them directly on us. They had evidently not 
 expected the ready fire that received them, for their horses 
 swerved from the road. Passing to the right of us, they 
 galloped on, shrieking and yelling, till they were far in the 
 rear of us, and then, without a moment's hesitation or con- 
 sultation, they abruptly turned, and charged on us once 
 more. But the colonel had already given his orders. 
 
 "Whip up your mules," he called to the driver, "and 
 let your horse have his head," He continued to me. 
 " Keep close by the ambulance, and the men will cover our 
 retreat." 
 
 We soon left the men behind, for we were on open 
 ground, and had no ambush to fear. Once in a while a 
 stray arrow would reach us, whizzing through the. air, and 
 
Camp- Life in Aiizona. 41 
 
 frightening the animals into greater speed; but the soldiers, 
 following us at just sufficient distance to prevent the In- 
 dians separating the ambulance from the escort, received 
 the " brunt of the battle " on their devoted heads. I had 
 no need to guide Black Prince; he understood the situation 
 as well as we did. So I could turn, from time to time, to 
 cast a hasty look on the confused scene behind me. 
 
 The colonel was by no means idle, and once, when some 
 of the bravest "braves" had almost succeeded in cutting 
 us off from the escort, and surrounding us, it was his 
 revolver that sent the balls which made some of the savages 
 yell even more horribly, before dropping bow and arrow 
 from their stiffening fingers. I had often heard it said that 
 the Indian warriors, when going forth to fight, were fastened 
 to their horses in such a manner, that, even though they 
 received their death- wound, the enemy never saw them fall. 
 It must have been so in this case; for, though the men had 
 counted five of them reeling, and ghastly through all their 
 paint, not one had fallen to the ground. But they did not 
 again attempt to cut us off from the escort. The soldiers 
 drew closer to the ambulance, and though some of the 
 Indians followed us for miles, probably in the hope that the 
 one mule which had been badly wounded would give out, 
 and leave us to their mercy, we wore out their patience at 
 last, and reached the camp just in time to save the mule 
 from dying on the road. 
 
 Of course, neither the men nor the horses had come off 
 unscathed; but as no scalps had been taken by the Indians, 
 the men regarded the attack as rather a pleasant little 
 
42 Camp-Life in Arizona. 
 
 episode, particularly as it made heroes of them during their 
 stay in the camp. 
 
 Quarters were not more plentiful here than they were at 
 our post, so it was decided that we four ladies should take 
 possession of the major's quarters, while the gentlemen 
 the colonel, his senior lieutenant, and the major were 
 to occupy the quarters of the major's lieutenant, who was 
 also the quartermaster of the post. The colonel's senior 
 lieutenant was quartermaster at our post, and his stay here 
 was connected with some quartermaster transactions. When 
 tea was over, the gentlemen adjourned to the lieutenant's 
 quarters, opposite the parade ground, and some distance 
 off. A long while we waited for their return, as they had 
 promised to come back to say good-night, and when tattoo 
 was gone, and ' ' taps ' ' were sounded, we retired for the 
 night, half expecting to hear the gentlemen's knock on the 
 only door the house contained, sometime before we fell 
 asleep; but we slept without being disturbed. In the morn- 
 ing, the colonel's wife expressed her surprise that the colonel 
 had gone to bed without bidding her good-night; the 
 major's wife betrayed her indignation, and the lieutenant's 
 wife but recently married said such a thing had never 
 happened to her before. Nine o'clock came, and with it 
 the colonel. 
 
 " What had kept him away last evening ? " his wife asked. 
 
 ' ' Oh, the post quartermaster had had some very difficult 
 papers to make out, had his quarterly accounts to send in, 
 so they had helped him till eleven o'clock, and then went to 
 bed." 
 
Camp- Life in Arizona. 43 
 
 Ten o'clock brought the major. 
 
 1 ' Why had he not returned last night ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, the post quartermaster had had some very difficult 
 papers to make out; it was no more than their duty to help 
 him, so they had all sat up till twelve o'clock making out 
 accounts, and then went to bed." 
 
 Eleven o'clock came, and with it the colonel's senior 
 lieutenant. 
 
 1 ' Was it right to neglect the ladies, as he had done last 
 night ? ' ' 
 
 "Well, no; but the post quartermaster had had some 
 very difficult papers to make out; it was no more than fair 
 that they should help him, so they had all sat up with him 
 till two o'clock, and then it was certainly too late to bid the 
 ladies good-night." 
 
 The post quartermaster himself failed to put in an appear- 
 ance altogether, and when his wife visited their quarters, 
 late in the afternoon, she found him in bed, with an excruci- 
 ating headache. So we all came to the conclusion that 
 those quartermaster papers must have been very difficult 
 indeed to make out. 
 
 A dark rumor reached our ears some weeks later, which, 
 however, we utterly refused to believe. The soldier on 
 duty as orderly, while we were at the camp, was reported to 
 have said, that on the morning following the day of our 
 arrival there, the floor of the "little black-room" at the 
 sutler's had been thickly strewn with playing-cards, cigar- 
 stumps, and empty champagne bottles. We never could 
 quite account for this singular phenomenon; the soldiers, of 
 
44 Camp- Life in Arizona. 
 
 \ 
 
 course, are neither admitted to the sutler's "little back- 
 room," nor do they, as a general thing, take champagne 
 and cigars with their surreptitious games of cards; there had 
 been no officers at the post except those mentioned. So 
 the most natural conclusion we could come to, was, that the 
 sutler, a young man of twenty-four, (who, I always thought, 
 had quicksilver in his veins, from his utter inability to 
 remain in one position longer than five minutes) had passed 
 the night in that "little back-room," playing solitaire, and 
 had drank champagne, and smoked cigars, to keep from 
 falling asleep over this most harmless and interesting game. 
 
SAN XAVIER DEL BAG. 
 
SAN XAVIER DEL BAG. 
 
 THE major's wife had the brightest and most roguish 
 black eyes, and the reddest lips I ever saw. The general 
 called her his " youngest child," as the major had only 
 recently been married, and she had just been installed pre- 
 siding genius over the handsome adobe building on the 
 corner opposite the general's headquarters in Camp Lowell 
 (Tucson). The flag waved proudly above this house, since 
 the general had rooms here, and messed with us; this cir- 
 cumstance being greatly in our favor just now, as we had an 
 object to accomplish. 
 
 Captain W. had come to Tucson on a ten day's furlough, 
 and since neither Mrs. S. nor I had ever seen the two old 
 missions which have acquired so much distinction in the 
 course of years, he was anxious that we should all visit 
 them together. The mission nearest us, that of San 
 Xavier del Bac, was only nine miles from Tucson; the 
 other, Tomacarcori, near Tubac, was over fifty miles 
 from there. However, it was impossible to visit even 
 San Xavier without a strong and reliable escort of sold- 
 iers, for the Papagoes themselves, living in consider- 
 able numbers in the immediate vicinity of the old church, 
 were not always safe from the attacks of their savage 
 brethren, the Apaches, and to "gobble up" a party 
 consisting of two military officers and two white- women, 
 
48 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 would have been of the greatest imaginable relish to the 
 ferocious Johns. 
 
 So we had two points to make; in the first place, the 
 general must be brought to give the major an eight days' 
 furlough; in the next place, he must give us at least ten or 
 twelve men as escort. The major's wife was careful to 
 instruct the cook not by any means to get the roast over- 
 done; the pudding received my special attention, and Mrs. 
 S. also prepared the coffee with her own hand, and saw that 
 the rice was put into the soup early enough. Of course the 
 captain was in the secret of the attack meditated on the 
 general, and smiled like a cynic when he heard his superior 
 officer unwarily praise the soup and unsuspectingly ask for 
 the second cup of coffee. 
 
 And now the fire was opened. The general resisted for 
 awhile; he could not spare the major, his quartermaster, 
 and how was he to spare twelve men to follow two venture- 
 some women around the country? Besides, there was no 
 ambulance at the post, except that assigned to his own use, 
 and were we all four to crowd into the captain's buggy ? 
 And how was he ever to get his breakfast, if James was 
 left to his own devices ? He never got his coffee now till 
 ten o' clock in the morning and then it was generally cold. 
 No, neither the major nor his wife could go that was his 
 fiat. Silence followed, and then fearful threats of chilly 
 coffee, cold bread and frigid beefsteak, to the end of all 
 time to say nothing of pouting looks and refusals to play 
 ' 'dummy ' ' at whist were brought into the field. The 
 general quailed, wavered, and finally capitulated and 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 49 
 
 surrendered. Terms of capitulation were: six day's fur- 
 lough granted to the major, the general's own ambulance, 
 and ten men to protect it. 
 
 Soon after guard-mount next morning, the train was at 
 the door; the ambulance with four mules, the buggy with 
 two, and the ten men mounted on horses. I don't know 
 exactly how long it took to pile and stow away all the 
 baskets, guns, blankets, demijohns, revolvers, books, shot- 
 pouches, champagne-baskets, powder-horns, boxes, car- 
 bines, coffee-pots and general drinking appliances, into the 
 two vehicles; but the sun was pretty hot when we left the 
 general in front of the house, looking after us through a 
 cloud of dust. We all anticipated a very pleasant time; 
 we were to inspect the mission of San Xavier that day, and 
 drive from there to Somebody's Ranch, where we expected 
 to spend the night, and starting out again the next morning 
 early, we would reach Tubac in the evening. Here we 
 could rest for a day if we so chose, before going on to the 
 Tomacarcori mission, from whence we were to proceed on a 
 visit to a neighboring post. 
 
 The road, too, was pleasant enough, particularly where 
 the Santa Cruz River wound its narrow band of silver along 
 through the plain. The mesquite grows into large trees 
 here, and though the dust was intolerable, away from the 
 river, we should still have thought the landscape charming, 
 considering it was in Arizona, had it not been for the 
 numerous rude wooden crosses which decorated a great 
 many of the trees, marking a grave at the foot of each. 
 Americans, foreigners and Mexicans alike, have this mark 
 
50 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 of respect paid them, when the Indians have made away 
 with them and their scalps. A wooden cross is hung up in 
 the tree, if there is one in the neighborhood; if not, every 
 one who passes the grave lays a stone, or, where this can 
 not be obtained, a clod of dirt, or the bone of some defunct 
 animal, on it. 
 
 A dozen or two of low buildings, half underground, part 
 adobe > part brush, occupied by Papagoes, surrounded the 
 mission. Of the extensively-cultivated fields they are said 
 to have once possessed, I could see no trace, save a few 
 acres in the immediate neighborhood; though the rank 
 vegetation of this low-lying portion of the country proved 
 abundantly that flourishing gardens might be established, 
 did but the Apaches give more peacefully disposed people 
 permission to live here. It is said that the Papagoes were 
 the most devoted and industrious subjects of the Jesuit 
 Fathers who established the mission, and the great regard 
 which their descendants still have for the mission building 
 plainly speaks for this. 
 
 The reader must not smile to find me growing enthusi- 
 astic over Arizona at times; it is a country inexhaustible in 
 its curiosities, natural and artificial. I stood mute with 
 astonishment when I first saw the mission of San Xavier. 
 How was it possible that the stolid-looking, brute-like 
 creatures, burrowing in their filthy huts, could have had any 
 share in erecting this truly magnificent building? They 
 their ancestors rather must have been not only willing but 
 pliable tools in the hands of the padres who devised and 
 planned the structure. It is built of hard-baked, solid 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 51 
 
 adobe, and covered with light-colored plastering on the 
 outside. The high wall, likewise of adobe, enclosing the 
 corral and other buildings, had been stained with flakes and 
 dots of brighter colors, but was crumbling to ruin faster 
 than the church itself. This was decorated with massive 
 cornices in appropriate places, and though the dust and sand 
 lay thick in all the crevices and cavities of these embellish- 
 ments, there was no gainsaying the fact that they had been 
 designed by the hand of an artist. The domes and bell- 
 towers were particularly solid, and though none of them 
 aspired to a very great height, still we enjoyed a view " far 
 over the land ' ' when we ascended one of them by means of 
 winding stairs built entirely of adobe. 
 
 The interior of the building is in a state of excellent pre- 
 servation; the bright colors of the frescoed plafond and 
 tessallated floor are as fresh and glowing as on the day the 
 Jesuit Fathers were driven from this country by the edict 
 abolishing the order and expelling its members from the 
 mother-country, sometime in seventeen hundred and seventy. 
 It is surprising that this building has not in the course of all 
 these long years been made even with the ground by the 
 bands of hostile Indians continually prowling through the 
 country. But a small number of people, comparatively 
 speaking, live in the neighborhood; still these few Papagoes 
 seem to have beaten off successfully every attempt the 
 Apaches have made to get possession of the treasures held 
 within the heavy walls of the mission building. I say treas- 
 ures, for though the wooden images, executed, however, 
 with life-like fidelity, and dressed out in all the colors of the 
 
52 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 rainbow, might not be considered as such by the Apaches, 
 still the heavy altar service, made of pure silver, would have 
 as much attraction for them as for the white man, and the 
 beads and flowers decorating the shrines of the wooden 
 saints would be highly prized by the gay Indian belles. 
 
 In my eyes there was great interest attached to this altar 
 service. I had been told by one of the American gentlemen 
 in Tucson, who had lived there for twenty-five years, that it 
 had been made of silver taken from a ledge owned by the 
 padres, worked by their Indians, and covered, so as to hide 
 it effectually from all profane eyes, when driven from the 
 country, as above stated. It cannot be estimated how many 
 lives have been lost in vain attempts to discover this hidden 
 mine. That it exists there is no doubt, for documents 
 found in the old archives of Tucson state clearly that the 
 locality is a certain number of miles in a given direction 
 from the old plaza of Tucson. The difficulty is, that there 
 are not American citizens enough in Tucson to form a com- 
 pany to hold the territory around the supposed location of 
 the mine for a sufficient length of time to hunt it up, and 
 when military officers are sent out to assume command of 
 this district, they are generally disinclined to furnish escort 
 a second time, when they discover that the stolen-cattle- 
 hunt or the citizen- Indian-scout for which the protection of 
 the United States soldiers was claimed, was in reality a gold 
 or silver hunting expedition. And so the Lost Ledge 
 remains a Fata Morgana luring thousands to disappoint- 
 ment and death. 
 
 From the bell tower we could look down into a narrow 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 53 
 
 churchyard, filled with unadorned but remarkably well-kept 
 graves, the last earthly home of many of the self-sacrificing 
 men who came here with weary feet and aching shoulders, 
 bearing the cross they have so successfully planted in every 
 part of the world. There were seven ponderous bells in 
 the tower, the eighth having fallen from the decaying beam 
 on which it swung. Great was the desire of the captain to 
 hear the tone of these bells; but the Mexican, who had 
 acted as cicerone, implored him earnestly not to touch the 
 ropes attached to them. The Papagoes, he said, were 
 extremely jealous of people visiting the mission, and would 
 allow no one to stir or move anything on the premises. 
 Nevertheless the captain could not resist the temptation 
 of striking one of the bells with his pocket-knife, and the 
 next moment a glance at the row of huts in front of us dis- 
 closed to our view a number of dark faces so ferocious in 
 expression that Mrs. S. and I declared we would have the 
 rights and possessions of these people no longer infringed 
 on, if they were "friendly Indians," and forthwith we 
 returned to the protecting cover of the ambulance. The 
 gentlemen could do nothing but follow, and the ladies 
 intimated to Francis, the driver, their pressing desire to 
 travel at an accelerated speed. 
 
 We had soon left the Mission behind, and saw nothing 
 but sand, a few straggling mesquite trees and an occasional 
 verde bush, till we reached the ranch. Traveling in Arizona 
 is not like traveling in a respectable Christian country, where 
 houses, farms, cattle, stables, cabins, are to be seen now and 
 then. Anyone may take up the line of march here and 
 
54 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 continue in any direction he chooses for weeks and not see a 
 solitary human being in all this time, if he is not inclined to 
 turn out of his way to hunt up the few settlers and cast-a- 
 ways to be found here, providing, always, that a chance 
 Apache does not break up his ramble. 
 
 I have forgotten the name of the man who ' ' kept the 
 ranch ' ' at which we were entertained that night. Nor do I 
 know why the place was called a "ranch;" the supposition 
 being that a ranch is a farm Mexicanized, of course, but 
 still a place where vegetables and cereals are raised, and 
 cows are kept, and butter is made, and eggs laid by chick- 
 ens popularly believed to unalterably exist in and on such 
 places. To give people who have not visited Arizona an 
 idea of a ranch in this delightful country, I would simply 
 and briefly state that we found, on an open flat, a corral, 
 in which were incarcerated five or six lean Spanish cows 
 (that always have one failing they give no milk), three 
 lame mules, and one shadowy goat. Furthermore there 
 was a house, built of the same material as the corral adobe; 
 and in front of this house there was a stake driven into the 
 ground to which was securely chained a pig! Sharing, 
 however, in the general aspect of things and creatures here, 
 he was so thin as to be almost transparent resembling 
 much more the skeleton of a departed grunter than a live 
 
 Pig- 
 
 The man, an American, was truly glad to see us, and his 
 wife, a Mexican, had probably never seen American 
 women before. She was sick and looked as thin as her four- 
 footed prolegt, the pig; but she jabbered most delightedly 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 55 
 
 and delightfully whenever we came within her reach. 
 Her husband cooked a very plalatable supper for us, which 
 consisted mainly of chili Colorado, tortillas and frijoles, and 
 after we had despatched it, in the cool of the evening, we 
 became dimly conscious of the fact that the house before us 
 consisted of just one room, and it not very large. The 
 woman was sick, so we could not hear of her sleeeping out 
 of doors though the original plan had been that Mrs. S. 
 and I should sleep in the house, and the major, the captain 
 and everybody else, out of doors. The man felt duly 
 grateful to us for not wanting to turn his sick wife out of the 
 house, and kindly offered to turn his stock out of the corral 
 and let us two ladies sleep there; but this offer we declined 
 on our side and we all slept out of doors. 
 
 The preparations and procedures in this case, I give for 
 the benefit of those who may find themselves placed in the 
 same situation under like conditions. Four piles of fresh 
 hay were spread on the ground in front of the house (the 
 pig having been previously removed out of harm's way) a 
 distance of about ten paces between the piles; on each hay- 
 pile was spread one blanket to lie on, another to cover with, 
 and here, reader, we all four slept the sleep of the just. 
 The night was pleasant, and for a wonder I was not afraid, 
 because half the number of our escort were on guard, 
 patroling the space in front of the house where we lay 
 hedged in by the ambulance on one side and the buggy on 
 the other. No matter what the earth might be where we 
 lay, the heavens above were beautiful, clearer, bluer than 
 they could be anywhere else. 
 
56 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 We started for Tubac betimes next morning, and here we 
 found no lack of quarters. I don't mean " quarters " in a 
 military sense, for the troops stationed here in the spring of 
 the year had been removed to a new camp, actually leaving 
 behind them the roofless walls of the old church in which 
 their horses had been stabled. The house we took possess- 
 ion of was a comfortable adobe building with a stone floor 
 and two small windows containing several panes of glass. 
 The proprietor, an American, had taken his invalid wife 
 "out of town" for change of air, leaving behind him, in his 
 anxiety for the health of the enfeebled woman, everything 
 that could not be gotten into his traveling carriage. The 
 table, and chairs constructed of wood and cowhide, were of 
 some value in this country, not to speak of the straw-mats 
 and bedstead we found in one room and the olio filled with 
 sweet, fresh water, and the gourd dipper. We felt that our 
 lines had fallen in pleasant places, and concluded to remain 
 here the next day. 
 
 What a decayed, dead place Tubac is! So silent, so 
 graveyard-like, that the few American gentlemen who still 
 lived here, and came to call on us in the course of the even- 
 ing, impressed me as being so many ghosts who had left 
 their graves and were digging their way out from among 
 wasted gardens and crumbling walls, to look upon their own 
 kind in the flesh once more after, they themselves had been 
 "dead long dead." 
 
 The next day was hot and cloudless, the sun burning 
 down fiercely on the silent streets and ruined houses. It 
 looked hopeless enough, this "deserted village," once 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 57 
 
 teeming with life and industry, now lifeless and devastated 
 from the effects of the plague that had depopulated the 
 cities, laid waste the rural districts, and closed the mines of 
 the territory the Apache Indian. All along the road we 
 traversed that day, we passed by groves of cottonwood-and 
 willows, and along neglected gardens where the vine was 
 still clustering and the melon trailing over the untilled 
 ground. The land looked fair to the eye where the Santa 
 Cruz river gratefully refreshed the fields that bordered it 
 with trees and flowers, and had it not been for the oppress- 
 ive silence, in which there seemed to lurk danger and death, 
 could we have seen man and beast laboring together in these 
 rich fields, could we have heard the song of the ploughman 
 at his plough, and the shout of sturdy children at play 
 among the waving corn and the willows by the stream, 
 nothing could have been more lovely than this scene. But 
 instead of that, there were only silent graves among the 
 tangled masses of vegetation which had sprang up from the 
 seed planted there by the hands of the men who now slept 
 in these graves; the men who had been scalped and toma- 
 hawked and racked and tortured by the red fiends, before 
 the land they had tilled in the sweat of their brow had had 
 time to bring forth its crops. 
 
 Why do not the philanthropists of our eastern cities, who 
 cry out on the military authorities and the brave men who 
 spend their lives battling against the common foe, why do 
 not they, with their doctrine of eternal kindness, and for- 
 bearance toward the "noble red man," come out among 
 the Apaches and try the effect of their preaching in person ? 
 
58 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 Let them but make the short trip from Tubac to Calabazas, 
 let them count the graves by the wayside, and let them 
 hear how this man was surprised in his little brush cabin 
 and killed while fighting his way out of its smoking walls; 
 how that one's scalp had been taken and his body mutilated 
 before life had left it; how the family of five, in the graves 
 near that pile of ruins there, had held out against the 
 enemy year after year, till at last, after suffering tortures 
 more appalling than the demons in hell could invent, their 
 remains were laid to rest here by a party of white men who 
 chanced this way after long, long days! 
 
 We were approaching a neighborhood now that had a 
 sad interest for me, and I had obtained a solemn though 
 reluctant promise from the captain to point out to me the 
 exact spot where the tragedy I am about to speak of had 
 been enacted. While on a visit at a military post some dis- 
 tance from here, the circumstance took place, and left an 
 impression I can never shake off. It was nothing unusual 
 at this place for one or two men to be " picked off" by the 
 Indians in the course of the week. The colonel, whose wife 
 I was visiting, spared neither himself nor his subordinate 
 officers in regard to scouting and general watchfulness; still 
 the Indians continued to surprise the men tending herd, or 
 at work in the company garden, mail-carrying, or on escort 
 duty. 
 
 One day three men came in, reporting two men killed 
 and the third (the colonel's bugler during the war) taken 
 prisoner. The colonel himself went in command of the 
 scouting party sent out in pursuit of the Indians. It was 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 59 
 
 horrible to think of the poor bugler having fallen into the 
 hands of the Apaches alive, better dead, a thousand times! 
 But search and pursuit were fruitless, and the party returned 
 bringing the bodies of the two murdered men. While 
 waiting for further orders from District Headquarters, the 
 colonel was told by a wagon-master, who had just brought 
 in a team from Tubac, over the very ground on which this 
 last murder had been committed, that the colonel's cousin, 
 and another gentleman belonging to the quartermaster 
 department, would be likely to get into camp in the evening. 
 They were both mounted, he said, and had traveled under 
 cover of the wagon-train till reaching a ranch belonging to 
 an American, Mr. M., where they had stopped to take 
 dinner and to water their horses at a neighboring spring. 
 Night came on, but we saw no travelers coming up the dusty 
 road, and we watched for them again in the morning, think- 
 ing they had stopped at the ranch over night. We walked 
 quite a distance, the colonel's wife and I, to meet this 
 cousin of the colonel's, who had grown into our affections 
 during the long and tedious voyage we had all made 
 together. But the man we espied at last, in the cloud of 
 dust rolling toward us, was not the man we had come out to 
 meet; it was Mr. M., pale and haggard from over exertion 
 and hard riding. 
 
 There was a dead man lying by the spring, he said, and a 
 wounded man in his house, and he himself had made his 
 way through the Apaches as best he might to obtain help. 
 
 The colonel's cousin was dead, and his companion told 
 us, later, of the attack by the spring. The colonel's cousin 
 
60 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 had his right hand disabled from some accident, so that he 
 could not use his revolver, and when they stopped to let the 
 horses drink, he had said suddenly: " I don't like this, 
 let's go," and turning his horse, he received the first arrow 
 in his side. Urging his horse up a little hill back of the 
 spring, he dismounted, probably hoping to escape into the 
 bushes; but the blood was streaming from his side, and, 
 sinking down, the Apaches sprang on him, threw him to the 
 ground, and pierced him through with their lances till he 
 died. 
 
 Strangely enough, the detachment of soldiers sent to 
 bring his body to the camp found that of the bugler in the 
 bushes near, partly decomposed, torn by coyotes, and 
 recognized only by some rags of clothing and his teeth. 
 They were buried together, the boxes containing the bodies 
 being taken to the burying-ground outside the camp on an 
 army-wagon. 
 
 When we had reached almost the summit of a high hill, 
 over, or rather along, the edge of which wound a narrow 
 road, our train halted; for from here could be seen the 
 spring and the little hill back of it, which we were not to 
 pass on our way. We left the ambulance, the better to see, 
 and to get still a better vjew of the surrounding country. 
 Mrs. S. and I proposed to climb up the steep bank just 
 above us, which was covered with brushwood and loose 
 rocks. But the gentlemen would not hear of it; indeed, 
 the captain proposed to place sentinels if we chose to remain 
 long enough to dispose of our lunch in this place. Seeing 
 that we had left the ambulance, the corporal in charge of 
 
San Xavier Del Bac. 6 1 
 
 the escort gave the men permission to dismount and they 
 were standing and lying on the ground as best suited them 
 to rest from riding. The ambulance-driver, too, had left his 
 seat, and was holding conversation with his mules, while 
 looking over the different straps and buckles of the harness, 
 stepping very carefully on the side nearest the fall of the 
 hill, as it would be quite a little distance to roll down, should 
 he slip or stumble on the loose pebbles. 
 
 Though declining to take our lunch on this eminence, 
 Mrs. -S. and I nevertheless clambered into the buggy to see 
 what the gentlemen had provided, and we were just descant- 
 ing on the merits of some tcmales, prepared and baked 
 between maize leaves by a Mexican woman of Tubac, when 
 a shot startled the mules, which, jumping aside, threw me 
 from my perch to the ground. Another and another shot 
 followed, and cries and yells mingled with them, while 
 arrows rent the air with their own peculiar ' ' whiz. ' ' My 
 first thought was retreat to the ambulance; but the mules, 
 frightened and bewildered, plunged and kicked, till an un- 
 fortunate spring brought the ambulance too near the edge 
 of the hill,' and down it went, vanishing from sight as it 
 overturned heavily, as though trying hard to maintain its 
 equilibrium. Mrs. S., in her terror, was trying to extricate 
 herself from the buggy, where she had comfortably seated 
 herself between baskets and hampers just before the attack; 
 and the captain, unarmed, defenceless, and exposed to the 
 musket-balls and arrows of 'the Indians lying in ambush 
 among the rocks and bushes overhead, was holding the 
 terrified mules attached to the buggy, calling on Mrs. S. to 
 
62 San Xavier Del Bac. 
 
 remain where she was and on the major and me to get into 
 the buggy as quickly as we could. All was confusion and 
 bewilderment, the worst of the enemy's fire, of course, being 
 directed to the buggy ^and the women; but a number of 
 savages breaking from cover to rush down the hill after the 
 ambulance and secure the mules, considerably hastened my 
 movements in entering the buggy, and the last I saw was a 
 confused mass of major, soldiers, Apaches and horses. 
 
 I regret to say that the captain was not polite enough to 
 wait till I was comfortably seated, but allowed the mules to 
 rush off at break-neck speed the very moment he himself 
 had placed his foot in the vehicle, scattering in this manner 
 all the tomales, which the Apaches had not given us time to 
 secure, and a number of hard-boiled eggs, over the road. 
 Altogether, it was a fast drive, but I can think of others, 
 which, if not quite so rapid, were better enjoyed by me, and 
 besides, the captain stepped on my toe getting into the 
 buggy, and Mrs. S. lost her new hat But we did not men- 
 tion these things to the captain till we were safe in port at 
 the next camp, for which we made in a straight line, with- 
 out turning off to visit the mission Tomacarcori, as we had 
 intended on starting. No doubt we lost a great deal by not 
 seeing Tomacarcori mission; but it was better to lose that, 
 we concluded, than to lose our scalps. 
 
CROSSING THE Rio GRANDE. 
 
CROSSING THE RIO GRANDE. 
 
 WE were to cross the Rio Grande at Los Pinos, some- 
 where below Albuquerque. This was our first crossing; 
 many and dire were our subsequent crossings of this 
 crooked stream, which repeatedly threw itself across our 
 path, as it pursued its course in fitful windings through the 
 land. Orders had been issued by the general commanding 
 the district that neither the officers nor men of the th 
 cavalry should enter Santa Fe" or Albuquerque, and as the 
 general's headquarters were in Santa Fe (Fort Marcy) the 
 officers reluctantly refrained from making their appearance 
 in a place they had an almost irresistable desire to see. 
 Of the four ladies with our command, only one, the major's 
 wife, had been in the Territory before; but as she spoke 
 with no great enthusiasm of the beauties and attractions of 
 Santa F6, we, for our part, were tolerably content to pass 
 by within twenty-five miles of it. There had been heavy 
 rains throughout the Territory, and the low land along the 
 river was mostly under water; but in the spot which the 
 colonel had selected for fording, the water was shallow, and 
 we expected to cross in safety. 
 
 Our train was quite respectable in size, three companies 
 of cavalry, some twenty-five army wagons, two or three 
 pieces of ordnance, and the carriages and ambulances 
 which we were occupying. The mounted men were to 
 
66 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 cross the river first. It was singular to see how many of 
 the horses rebelled against going into the water, and 
 distressing to witness the terror they displayed when the 
 treacherous quicksand gave way under their feet, and the 
 wicked flood seemed to engulf them deeper and deeper. 
 The colonel, in his light carriage, guiding the horses with 
 his own hands, next went in, followed by the carriages of his 
 subordinate officers, ranged strictly according to the rank 
 of their respective owners. I gave a convulsive gasp when 
 the water, coming into the bottom of our travelling-car- 
 riage, first touched my feet; the running of the current 
 made me dizzy and faint, so I covered my eyes with my 
 hands, and opened them only when I felt the water rise 
 higher and higher over my feet. When we had gained the 
 other side, the officers rode from carriage to carriage, 
 offering the ladies congratulations on the first safe passage 
 of the Rio Grande, and a draught of commissary-whisky 
 from their field flasks. I, for one, accepted both with 
 thanks; for the little keg stowed away under the seat was 
 empty; in fact, we were out of supplies of every kind, 
 as we had counted on drawing from the Santa Fe" 
 commissary. 
 
 The captain had been stationed in the Territory before 
 the war, and, as it happened, our present colonel had been 
 his commanding officer then. We were to pass almost 
 within sight of Albuquerque on the following day, and the 
 command was to camp some eighteen miles above, at 
 Peralta, for the night, and upon these facts the captain 
 based his plans for mutiny on a small scale. When we had 
 
Crossing the Rio Grande. 67 
 
 reached the top of a low chain of hills, he ordered Melville, 
 the driver, to stop, and said to me: 
 
 ' ' There is a road leading down from here across the 
 flat into Albuquerque. If I can but remember the road, 
 we can drive into Albuquerque, get supplies from the 
 quartermaster, and reach Peralta before nine o'clock to- 
 night," 
 
 I was delighted with the prospect, for the brown sugar 
 with which we had of late been compelled to sweeten our 
 coffee, was not at all to my liking; I knew there was white 
 sugar in the commissary at Albuquerque, so I did not in 
 the least object to going there, although contrary to 
 orders. Our orderly, with the saddle-horses, was to con- 
 tinue on with the command, while we were to turn down 
 the mountain road, here, where we were out of the colonel's 
 sight. But the mules drawing our carriage were warmly 
 attached to my white horse, and they set up such an 
 atrocious screaming on seeing him led off, that we were 
 forced to recall Mohrman and let him take the lead with 
 Toby. 
 
 Reaching the flat, we found the acequias, the deep 
 ditches dug by the Mexicans for the purpose of irrigating 
 their fields with water from the Rio Grande, all over- 
 flowed, and covering the fields with water; but we man- 
 aged to pick our way over the precarious road, and soon 
 discovered a low round sand-hill in the distance. Pointing 
 toward it, the captain said: " There is Albuquerque; " but, 
 open my eyes as I might, / could see nothing but the sand- 
 hill and a strip of water beyond. The windings of the 
 
68 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 river had left us far in the interior of the country on the 
 previous day; now as we approached the Rio Grande 
 again, I saw at the foot of the hill a number of low adobe 
 buildings. It was one of the largest cities in the Territory, 
 this clump of mud-houses growing up out of the cheerless, 
 monotonous plain, where neither a blade of grass nor a 
 single wild-flower sprang up to gladden the heart. Over 
 toward the mountains, the country was more pleasing, and 
 a number of Pueblo Indian women, bearing baskets filled 
 with the most delicious of grapes, peaches and melons, 
 testified to the fact that all of New Mexico was not a sterile 
 plain, and that all of its Indians were not savages. 
 Mexican women, with the inevitable revoso covering head 
 and shoulders, flitted through the streets, or haunted the 
 shops kept by a few enterprising Jews. 
 
 Making our way to the Quartermaster's Department, we 
 were somewhat startled to see the colonef s light carriage 
 drawn up in front of it. We were on the point of beating 
 a hasty retreat, when the colonel's querulous voice accosted 
 the captain: 
 
 " Don't you know, sir, that the commanding general's 
 orders are that neither officers nor men of the th cavalry 
 are to enter Santa Fe or Albuquerque ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' I was not aware that any exception had been made in 
 favor of the colonel commanding the th cavalry," 
 answered the captain, recovering himself, and for the rest 
 of the day the captain was invisible to the colonel's official 
 eye, though they niet at every corner they happened to 
 turn. 
 
Crossing the Rio Grande. 6g 
 
 The captain knew that his salvation depended on reach- 
 ing camp in advance of the colonel. Should the colonel 
 make the camp before we did, he would immediately 
 inquire for the captain, and place him under arrest, if not 
 court-martial him, for "absence without leave." So we 
 hastily concluded our purchases, entered the carriage, and 
 were just about to leave the quartermaster's corral, when we 
 discovered that Mohrman was missing. Great was our 
 distress, and many and deep, I fear, the captain's curses. 
 The men's quarters were hunted through, and all the 
 saloons of which the city could boast were searched, but 
 our Dutchman was not to be found. At last the bugler 
 was ordered out, and the first note of the well-known 
 signal brought Mohrman to the spot, flushed and excited, 
 but totally ignorant of the unpleasant consequences which 
 his delay might cause the captain. 
 
 I must stop here to state that the servant-girl whom I had 
 engaged at Leavenworth City had basely deserted me and 
 gone over to the enemy; that is, she had married an 
 infantry sergeant at Fort Union, leaving me without cook or 
 laundress. So Mohrman, still panting and breathless, and 
 turning his hat around in his hands very fast, came 
 out with: 
 
 II Madame, I know you don't like Charlie for a cook, and 
 you have no laundress; now, I found such a nice Mexican 
 girl here this afternoon, her name is Joaquina. I think 
 she would learn to cook very easily; and if you would only 
 get me the Captain's consent, I'd marry the girl right awa) r , 
 so that she could wait on you all the time." 
 
70 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 The Captain answered in my place; I could not tell 
 exactly what, but I know the guard-house was men- 
 tioned. 
 
 Night was on us before we had left the neighborhood of 
 the ranches surrounding Albuquerque; but the acequias 
 were growing less frequent, so that I flattered myself we 
 should have little difficulty in reaching camp. It grew 
 darker and darker, until at last it was almost impossible to 
 distinguish Toby's white form as he was led just in advance 
 of the carriage. The captain thought he could not have 
 forgotten the "lay of the land" in seven short years, and 
 assured me that it was perfectly safe travelling along the 
 sand-hills that border the Rio Grand, where there is not an 
 inch of ground between the carriage-wheel and the precipice 
 high over the river. The stars were reflected in the waters 
 far below me, and I knew that one false step of our mules 
 would send us all down to those bright orbs in the water. 
 On the other side, the hill rose high above us; and had the 
 driver turned but the length of a finger to that side, the 
 rebound would have capsized the carriage and hurled it 
 over the bank. 
 
 Thus the minutes crept on; and when I rejoiced at last to 
 find that the road descended and I could no longer see the 
 stars below me, I was rudely torn from my fancied security 
 by the most savage yells that ever greeted humnan ears. 
 They proceeded from a spot not very far distant, where a 
 crowd of half-naked and demon-like forms were dancing 
 around a flickering fire. 
 
 "Oh, heaven!" I exclaimed, "we have fallen into the 
 
Crossing the Rio Grande. 71 
 
 hands of hostile Indians, and you always told me there 
 were only friendly ones here!" 
 
 The Captain tried to explain to me that they were only 
 celebrating some feast, and proposed to take one of the 
 Indians with us to act as guide to Peralta; but I refused to 
 consent, and Melville gave them a wide berth, landing us 
 after a little while in the midst of acequias and numberless 
 pools of water forming one endless ocean. 
 
 My terror was considerably increased when I heard the 
 heavy plunging of a horse, laboring through the morass 
 behind us. " Those are robbers, " I whispered, " and they 
 will challenge us directly." But, to my horror, the Cap- 
 tain addressed the rider, whose figure I could now discern 
 close to the carriage. He was a Mexican, who had seen 
 where the ' ' Cabelleros ' ' were camped near Peralta, and 
 would guide us there. So he rode before the orderly, and 
 we followed Toby as well as we could, though it seemed to 
 me we were getting into deeper water at every step. I 
 could distinguish trees, too, such as I knew grew only along 
 the Rio Grande; and I felt convinced that the treacherous 
 Mexican was leading us straight into the river. The water 
 had long since saturated the bag of white sugar which I had 
 put under the seat with my own hands, and the package of 
 tea beside it would not be improved in flavor by the muddy 
 water; but all this did not trouble me so much under these 
 circumstances, my chief aim being at present to keep myself 
 out of water and my eye on Toby the latter rather difficut, 
 I must own, in the Egyptian darkness. Suddenly I heard 
 the Mexican call out something in Spanish, and Toby 
 
72 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 vanished into an abyss of some kind before my eyes, while 
 the carriage at the same time struck against something hard, 
 and was lifted out of the water. Then the truth of the 
 happy escape we had made, dawned on us. The water 
 from the neighboring river had flooded the whole flat, and 
 had hidden from our sight the deep acequia cutting through 
 the country here; the Mexican had given warning, but 
 Mohrman, not understanding the language, had missed the 
 bridge which we were fortunate enough to strike. The 
 camp-fire flashed on us a few moments later. Charlie had 
 made the tent look so comfortable, and prepared so excel- 
 lent a supper, that I was glad to think "Joaquina" had 
 not superseded him. The colonel's orderly had not yet 
 inquired for the captain; so I presumed, with a great deal 
 of complacency, that our revered commander was still 
 floundering in the slush and water of the Rio Grande. 
 
 There were long and dreary day's marches to be made 
 between here and Fort Craig, where the headquarters of the 
 th Regiment were to be established; and there, too, I 
 should lose the company of the other ladies the adjutant, 
 the major, and the lieutenant all belonging to the colonel's 
 staff. We had but one more stream to cross together the 
 Tecolate ' ' creek ' ' at the village of the same name. I did 
 not know why the officers should show so much more aver- 
 sion to crossing this ' ' creek ' ' than they had evinced at the 
 passage of the Rio Grande. Thinking, perhaps, that 
 1 ' ignorance is bliss, ' ' they had not enlightened me, but left 
 me to enjoy my ramble among the ruins of an old church, 
 or mission, which I had discovered in the neighborhood of 
 
Crossing the Rio Grande. 73 
 
 the little town. The other ladies not becoming so deeply 
 interested in the scraps of glass and pottery strewing the 
 ground here, had returned to the carriages; and when the 
 colonel sent word that the large hospital ambulance in which 
 we were to cross were ready, I could not be found. When 
 I made my way to the ' ' creek ' ' later, the ambulance had 
 already returned and was waiting to carry me over. The 
 creek was a wild, turbulent stream, rushing along with a fury 
 that had already carried the strong bridge before it, and had 
 lodged it against a sharp bend in the river, where the skele- 
 tons of the first three army-wagons that had been launched 
 in the flood were keeping it company. 
 
 ' ' Is there no other way of crossing beside getting into 
 that ambulance ? " I asked in a very subdued manner. 
 
 "None," was the colonel's answer; " but the mules are 
 led by ropes, and an escort follows the ambulance." 
 
 It was not an easy task to hold conversation in the 
 immediate neighborhood of the stream. The colonel 
 screamed at the top of his voice, to make himself heard 
 above the loud roar of the water, and I was compelled to 
 repeat every word I said three times over; so I entered the 
 ambulance without another syllable. The ropes attached to 
 the heads of the mules were taken in charge by four mounted 
 men; the officers, including the captain, had been ordered 
 to remain with their respective companies, but they came to 
 the river a moment to speak some encouraging words to 
 me, after which the signal was given and we started. It 
 seemed impossible for the mules to drag the heavy vehicle 
 behind them when they had once lost their footing, and 
 
74 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 they were themselves almost dragged along by the ropes 
 which the soldiers held. One of the soldiers allowed his 
 rope to slacken when the mules first began to swim, and in 
 an instans it was twined around the animal's legs; the mule 
 struggled and kicked, frightening the others, and soon I 
 could see nothing but one wild mass, battling and plunging 
 in the water. From the shore came confused cries of, " Let 
 the mules go ' ' ' ' Cut the ropes ' ' ' ' The ambulance is 
 going over " " Hold on to the ropes " and a hundred 
 other things that seemed still to ring in my ears after the 
 ambulance had toppled over, and I was clinging to the 
 covering with all the energy of desperation. I must have 
 lost my hold after a while, for I was thrown against the 
 ruins of the bridge with such violence that my conscious- 
 ness returned all in a moment, and I clung to the beams 
 and planks until rescued. I was taken to a Mexican house, 
 where I was wrapped in the blankets which the soldiers, 
 who had already crossed, carried rolled on their saddles. 
 It was not very cold, still I should not have voluntarily 
 gone swimming with my clothes on, just that day, for one of 
 the three wrecked wagons had contained my trunks, and 
 none of the other ladies could have furnished me with any 
 of their clothing, even had they known of my predicament; 
 for their trunks were still on the other side. 
 
 Mohrman had been left to keep watch at my door, to be 
 ready in case I should want for anything, and I asked him 
 presently: 
 
 " Did the other ladies get over the river safely ? " 
 
 " Yes, madam," was the grave answer; "only the escort 
 
Crossing the Rio Grande. 75 
 
 riding so close behind the ambulance splashing so, the 
 ladies were wet through, and the colonel, who was over 
 here when they came, put them out on the little flat, just, 
 behind the bank there, to dry, and he has placed a sentinel 
 so that nobody can come that way till the sun has dried 
 them." 
 
 I could not help smiling to think what two interesting 
 groups we formed, the three ladies "drying in the sun," 
 and I enjoying all the luxury of a regular "water-cure 
 pack," rolled up in a dozen gray soldier blankets. 
 
 From Fort Craig, Company M proceeded alone, crossing 
 the Rio Grande once more before entering on the Jornada 
 del Mitcrto, the "Desert of Death." It was a long and 
 tedious march through the desert, really almost a "Journey 
 of Death," for the sun was fearfully hot and water scarce. 
 To be sure the Rio Grande could be reached by turning a 
 distance of ten or twelve miles out of the straight line of 
 march; but what the penalty of such a rash act might be, I 
 learned as we neared the Point of Rocks, a favorite ambush 
 of the Indians, for we were in the Indian country now, 
 since we had left Fort Craig behind us. 
 
 I saw a number of moving objects as we approached, 
 and was greatly alarmed; but with the aid of the captain's 
 field-glass, soon made them out to be a party of soldiers. 
 They drew up in line when they saw the captain approach- 
 ing; perhaps they had not discovered my presence in time, 
 for before the sergeant could throw a blanket over the cold, 
 stark form lying on a pile of rocks by the roadside, I had 
 already seen the ghastly face and mutilated limbs of the 
 
76 Crossing the Rio Grande. 
 
 wretched man who had found a cruel death here only the 
 day before. It was the usual story; two men (civilians), 
 mounted, were crossing the desert together, when, driven 
 almost crazy with thirst, they had attempted to turn down 
 to the river to fill their canteens, but were attacked and 
 chased for miles by the Indians; one man escaped to Fort 
 Selden, but the other fell into the devils' hands, to be tor- 
 tured to death. The soldiers dug his grave, wrapped him 
 in a gray blanket, and laid him to rest on the silent and 
 lonely desert. Many such scenes have I witnessed since; 
 but there, by this stranger's grave, I knelt to say a short 
 prayer, while the soldiers, with uncovered heads, threw the 
 last earth on the low mound. 
 
 We reached Fort Selden in the evening; after a night's 
 rest we crossed the Rio Grande there, for the third and last 
 time, leaving it behind us, on the way to our still far distant 
 post. 
 
AN EPISODE OF -FORT DESOLATION." 
 
AN EPISODE OF " FORT DESOLATION." 
 
 " How much you resemble Mrs. Arnold!" exclaimed the 
 Doctor's wife, after an hour's acquaintance, the day we 
 reached Fort Craig. It was not the first time that I had 
 heard my resemblance to this, to me, unknown lady remarked 
 on. A portion of the regiment of Colored troops to which 
 Doctor Kline belonged, and which we met on their way 
 into the States, as we were coming out, had been camped 
 near us one night; and a colored laundress, who had good- 
 naturedly come over to our tent to take the place of my 
 girl, who was sick, had broken into the same exclamation 
 on first beholding me. Captain Arnold belonged to the 
 same regiment, and was expecting, like all the Volunteers 
 then in the territory, to be ordered home and mustered out 
 of service, as soon as the body of Regular troops to which 
 my husband belonged, could be assigned their respective 
 posts. Their expectations were not to be realized for some 
 time yet; and when I left the territory, a year later, a part 
 of these troops were still on the frontier. 
 
 Fort Craig was not our destination; to reach it, we should 
 be obliged to pass through, and stop for a day or two, at 
 the very post of which Captain Arnold had command 
 which would afford me excellent and ample opportunity for 
 judging of the asserted likeness between this lady and myself. 
 I must explain why we were, in a measure, compelled 
 
8o An Episode of "Fort Desolation." 
 
 to stop at Fort Desolation (we will call it so). It was 
 located in the midst of a desert the most desolate and in- 
 hospitable that can be imagined in the heart of an Indian 
 country, and just so far removed from the direct route across 
 the desert as to make it impracticable to turn in there with 
 a command, or a large number of soldiers; for which reason, 
 troops crossing here always carried water-barrels filled, with 
 them. A small party, however, such as ours was then, 
 could not with any safety camp out the one night they must, 
 despite the best ambulance-mules, pass on the desert. 
 
 With most pardonable curiosity, I endeavored to learn 
 something more of the woman who was so much like me in 
 appearance; and I began straightway to question Mrs. Kline 
 about her. The impression of a frank, open character, 
 which this lady had made on me at first, vanished at once 
 when she found that Mrs. Arnold was to be made the sub- 
 ject of conversation between us. 
 
 "Is she pretty?" 
 
 " Yes quite so." Ahem! and looked like me. But my 
 mother's saying, that there might be a striking resemblance 
 between a very handsome and a very plain person, presented 
 itself to my memory like an uninvited guest, and I concluded 
 not to fall to imagining vain things on so slight a support. 
 
 1 ' What kind of a man is Captain Arnold ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' The most good-natured man in the world. ' ' 
 
 " Oh!" Something in the manner of her saying this in 
 praise of Captain Arnold made me think she wanted to say 
 nothing further; so I stopped questioning. 
 
 We left the doctor and his wife early the next morning, 
 
An Episode of "Fort Desolation:' 81 
 
 and reached Fort Desolation at night-fall. The orderly had 
 preceded us a short distance, and, when the ambulance 
 stopped at the captain's quarters, Mrs. Arnold appeared on 
 the threshold, holding a lantern in her hand. She raised it 
 to let the light fall into the ambulance; and as the rays fell 
 on her own face, I could see that she looked like a sister I 
 had. The captain was absent, inspecting the picket-posts 
 he had established along the river, and would return by 
 by morning, Mrs. Arnold said; and she busied herself with 
 me in a pleasant, pretty manner. She could not resemble 
 me in height and figure, I said to myself, for she was smaller 
 and more delicately made; nor had anyone in our family 
 such deep-blue eyes, save mother we children had to con- 
 tent ourselves with gray ones. 
 
 The night outside was dark and chilly; but in the cap- 
 tain's house there were light and warmth, and it was bright 
 with the fires that burned in the fireplaces of the different 
 rooms all opening one into the other. I was forcibly 
 struck with the difference between the quarters at Fort Craig 
 and Mrs. Arnold's home at Fort Desolation. Comforts 
 (luxuries in this country) of all kinds made it attractive: 
 bright carpets were on the floors here; while at the Doctor's 
 quarters at Fort Craig, one was always reminded of cold 
 feet and centipedes, when looking at the naked adobe floors. 
 Embroidered covers were spread on the tables, and white 
 coverlets on the beds; while at the doctor's all these things 
 were made hideous by hospital-linen and gray blankets. 
 Easy-chairs and lounges, manufactured from flour-barrels, 
 saw-bucks and candle-boxes were made gorgeous and 
 
82 An Episode of "Fort Desolation" 
 
 comfortable with red calico and sheep's- wool; but the 
 crowning glory of parlor, bed-room and sitting-room was a 
 dazzling toilet set of china gilt-edged, and sprinkled with 
 delicate bouquets of moss roses and foliage. 
 
 "Where did you get It? " I asked in astonishment not 
 envy. 
 
 "Isn't it pretty?" she asked, triumphantly. "The 
 captain's quartermaster, Lieutenant Rockdale, brought it 
 from Santa Fe for me, and paid a mint of money for it, no 
 doubt." 
 
 At the supper-table I saw Lieutenant Rockdale, who 
 commanded the post in the captain's absence, being the only 
 officer there beside the captain; and, as he messed with 
 them altogether, I need not say that the table was well 
 supplied with all the delicacies that New York and Baltimore 
 send out to less highly favored portions of the universe, in 
 tin cans. Lieutenant Rockdale was a handsome man a 
 trifle effeminate, perhaps, with languishing, brown eyes and 
 soft voice. He seemed delighted with our visit, and took 
 my husband off" to his own quarters, while Mrs. Arnold and 
 I looked over pictures of her friends, over albums and at all 
 the hundred little curiosities which she had accumulated 
 while in the territory. The cares of the household seemed 
 to sit very lightly on her; a negro woman Constantia, 
 and a mulatto boy of twelve or thirteen, sharing the labor 
 between them. The boy seemed to be a favorite with Mrs. 
 Arnold, though she tantalized and tormented him, as I after- 
 ward found she tormented and tantalized every living creature 
 over which she had the power. 
 
An Episode of ''Fort Desolation" 83 
 
 I had noticed, while Constantia and Fred were clearing 
 off the table, that she had cut him a slice from a very choice 
 cake, toward which the child had cast longing looks. Plac- 
 ing it carefully on a plate, when he had to leave it for a 
 moment to do something his mistress had bidden him, in 
 the twinkling of an eye she had hidden it, and when the 
 boy missed it, she expressed her regret at his carelessness, 
 and artfully led his suspicions toward Constantia. Hearing 
 him whimpering and sniffling as he went back and forth be- 
 tween dining-room and kitchen, his childish distress at 
 losing the cake seemed to afford her the same amusement 
 that a stage-play would, and she laughed till the tears 
 rolled down her cheeks. Later, he was summoned to 
 replenish the fire, and, knowing the little darky's aversion 
 for going out of the house bare-headed (he had an idea 
 that his cap could prevent the Indian arrows from pene- 
 trating his skull), she hid the cap he had left in the adjoin- 
 ing room, and then laughed immoderately at his terror on 
 leaving the house without it. The next morning, she led 
 me out to the stables to show me her horse, a magnificent, 
 black animal, wild-eyed, with a restless, fretful air. Cross- 
 ing the space in front of the house, she called to a soldier 
 with sergeant- chevrons on his arms, a man with just enough 
 of Negro blood in his veins to stamp him with the curse of 
 his race. 
 
 " Harry!" she called to him, " Harry, come hold Black 
 for me; I want to give him a piece of sugar." She 
 opened her hand to let him see the pieces, and he touched 
 his cap and followed us. He loosened the halter and led 
 
84 An Episode of ' ' Fort Desolation. ' ' 
 
 the horse up to us, but the animal started back when he 
 saw Mrs. Arnold and would not let her approach him. 
 Harry patted his neck and soothed him, and Mrs. Arnold 
 holding the sugar up to his view, the horse came to take it 
 from her hand; but she quickly clutched his lip with her 
 fingers, and blew into his face till the horse reared and 
 plunged so that Harry could hold him no longer. Laugh- 
 ing like an imp, she called to Harry: 
 
 " Get on him and hold him, if you can not manage him 
 
 in that way: get on him anyhow, and let Mrs. see him 
 
 dance." 
 
 The mulatto's flashing black eyes were bent on her with 
 a singularly reproachful look; but the next moment he was 
 on the horse's back, the horse snorting and jumping in a 
 perfectly frantic manner. 
 
 When Mrs. Arnold had sufficiently recovered from her 
 merriment, she explained that the horse had not been 
 ridden for a month; the last time she had ridden him he 
 had thrown her she had pricked him with a pin to urge 
 him on faster. 
 
 About noon the captain arrived, and I found him, as Mrs. 
 Kline had described, ' * the most good-natured man in the 
 world," and, to all appearances, loving his wife with the 
 whole of his big heart. He was big in stature, too, with 
 broad shoulders, pleasant face and cheerful, ringing voice. 
 The shaggy dog, who had slunk away from Mrs. Arnold, 
 came leaping up on his master when he saw him; the horse 
 he had ridden rubbed his nose against his master's shoulder 
 before turning to go into his stable, and Constantia and 
 
An Episode of "Fort Desolation" 85 
 
 Fred beamed on him with their white teeth and laughing 
 eyes from the kitchen door. Later in the afternoon, he 
 asked what I thought of his quarters, and told me how 
 hard his colored soldiers had worked to build the really 
 pretty adobe house in strict accordance with his wishes and 
 directions. But I could not quite decide whether he was 
 more proud of the house or of the affection his men all had 
 for him. Then he told me the story of almost every piece 
 of furniture in the house, and, moving from room to room, 
 we came to where their bed stood. Resting beside it was 
 his carbine, which the orderly had brought in. Taking it 
 in his hand to examine it, he pointed it at his wife's head 
 with the air of a brigand, and uttered, in unearthly tones: 
 
 " Your money or your life." 
 
 With a quick, cat-like spring, she was by the bed, had 
 thrust her hands under the pillow and the next instant was 
 holding two Derringers close to his breast. Throwing back 
 her head, like a heroine in velvet trousers on the stage, she 
 returned, in the same strain: 
 
 ' ' I can play a hand at that game, too, and go you one 
 better!" 
 
 She laughed as she said it, the laugh that she laughed 
 with her white teeth clenched, but there was a "glint" in 
 her eye that I had never seen in a blue eye before. 
 
 When once more on the way, my husband asked me 
 how I liked Mrs. Arnold. "Very well," said I; " but" 
 and I did not hesitate to tell him of the peculiarities I had 
 noticed about her. He himself was charmed with her 
 sprightliness, so he only responded with, <( Pshaw! women!" 
 
86 An Episode of "Fort Desolation:' 
 
 after which I maintained an offended (he said, offensive) 
 silence on the subject. 
 
 Not quite four months later, my husband was recalled to 
 Santa Fe", and we again crossed the desert, with only three 
 men as escort. I had heard nothing from either Mrs. 
 Arnold or the captain in all this time, for our post was far- 
 ther out than theirs; indeed, so far out that nothing belong- 
 ing to the same military department passed by that way. 
 It was midsummer and the dreary hills shutting in Fort 
 Desolation and running down toward the river some distance 
 back of the place, were baked hard and black in the sun; 
 the little stream that had meandered along throug the low 
 inclosure of the fort in winter time, was now a mere bed of 
 slime, and the plateaux, which had been leveled for the pur- 
 pose of erecting the captain's house and the commissary 
 buildings on them, could not boast of a single spear of 
 grass or any other sign of vegetation. The captain's 
 house lay on the highest of these plateaux; lower down, 
 across the creek, were the quartermaster and commissary 
 buildings (here, too, were Lieutenant Rockdale's quarters), 
 and to the left, on the other side of the men's quarters, was 
 the guard-house, part jacal, part tent-cloth. 
 
 How could any one live here and be happy ? Black and 
 bald the earth, as far as the eye could reach; black and 
 dingy the tents and the huts that strewed the flat; murky 
 and dark the ridge of fog that rose on the unseen river; 
 murky and silent the clefts in the rocks where the sun left 
 darkness forever. 
 
 Jt might have been the fading light of v the waning day 
 
An Episode of "Fort Desolation." 87 
 
 that cast the peculiarly sombre shadow on the captain's 
 house as we drew up to it; but I thought the same shadow 
 must have fallen on the captain's face, when he appeared in 
 the door to greet us. Presently Mrs. Arnold fluttered up 
 in white muslin and blue ribbons; and both did their best to 
 make us comfortable. How my husband felt, I don't know; 
 but they did not succeed in making me feel comfortable. 
 Perhaps the absence of the light fire made the rooms look 
 so dark, even after the lights had been brought in, there 
 was certainly a change. Supper was placed on the table, 
 but I missed Constantia's round face in the dining-room. 
 In answer to my question regarding her, I was told she had 
 expressed so strong a desire to return to the states that she 
 had been sent to Fort Craig, there to await an opportunity 
 to go in. Lieutenant Rockdale's absence I noticed also. 
 He did not mess with them any more, I was informed. 
 
 My attention was attracted to a conversation between 
 Captain Arnold and my husband. The guard-house, he 
 told him, was at present occupied by two individuals who 
 had made their appearance at Fort Desolation several days 
 ago, and tried to prevail on the captain to sell them some of 
 the government horses, and arms and ammunition, offering 
 liberal payment, and promising secrecy. They were Ameri- 
 cans; but as the number of American settlers, or white set- 
 tlers, in this country is so small, it was easy for the captain 
 to determine that these were not of them, and their dress 
 and general appearance led him to suspect that they be- 
 longed to that despicable class of white men who make 
 common cause with the Indian, in order to rob and plunder, 
 
88 An Episode of "Fort Desolation" 
 
 and, if need be, murder, those of their own race. Of course 
 they had not made these proposals directly and openly to 
 the captain at first representing themselves as members of 
 a party of miners going to Pinos Altos; but they soon be- 
 trayed a familiarity with the country which only years of 
 roaming through it could have given them. He had felt it 
 his duty to arrest them at once, but had handcuffed them 
 only to-day, and meant to send them, under strong escort, 
 to Fort Craig, where the regimental commander was 
 stationed, as soon as some of the men from the picket-posts 
 could be called in. 
 
 It was late when we arose from the supper-table, and the 
 captain and my husband left us, to go down to the guard- 
 house, while Mrs. Arnold led me into the room where their 
 bed stood. This room had but one window, of which 
 window the captain was very proud; it was a French window, 
 opening down to the ground. Throwing it open Mrs. 
 Arnold said: 
 
 " What a beautiful moon we have to-night; let us put out 
 the candle and enjoy the moonshine," with which she laugh- 
 ingly extinguished the light, and drew my chair to the 
 window. 
 
 From where I sat I could just see the men's quarters and 
 the guard-house, though it might have been difficult from 
 there to see the window. We had not been seated long 
 when I fancied I heard a noise, as though of some one 
 stealthily approaching from somewhere in the direction to 
 which my back was turned; then some one seemed to brush 
 or scrape against the outside wall of the house, behind me. 
 
An Episode of "Fort Desolation." 89 
 
 "What's that?" I asked, in quick alarm. It had not 
 remained a secret to Mrs. Arnold that I was an unmitigated 
 coward; so she arose, and saying, " How timid you are! 
 it is the dog; but I will go and look," she stepped from the 
 low window to the ground outside, and vanished around 
 the corner of the house. Some time passed before she re- 
 turned, and with a little shudder, sprang to light the 
 candle. 
 
 " How chilly it is getting," she exclaimed; and then con- 
 tinued, " It was the dog we heard out there. Poor fellow; 
 perhaps the cook had forgotton him, so I gave him his sup- 
 per. ' ' 
 
 Rising from my seat to close the window on her remark 
 about the cold, I stepped to the opposite side from where I 
 had been sitting; and there, crossing the planks that lay 
 over the slimy creek, and going toward the comissary 
 buildings, was a man whose figure seemed familiar; I could 
 not be mistaken, it was Lieutenant Rockdale. No doubt 
 the man had a right to walk in any place he might choose; 
 but, somehow, I could not help bringing him in connection 
 with ' ' the dog, poor fellow, ' ' for whom Mrs. Arnold had 
 all at once felt such concern. 
 
 Soon the gentlemen returned, and we repaired to the 
 parlor, where a game of chess quickly made them inaccessi- 
 ble to our conversation. The game was interrupted by a 
 rap at the front door, and Harry, the sergeant whom Mrs. 
 Arnold had compelled to mount her black horse that day, 
 appeared on the threshold. In his face there was a change, 
 too; his eyes flashed with an unsteady light; as he opened 
 
go An Episode of "Fort Desolation." 
 
 the door, and ever and again, while addressing the captain 
 whose thoughts were still half with the game his looks 
 wandered over to where Mrs. Arnold sat. We were so 
 seated that the captain's back was partly toward her when 
 he turned to the sergeant; and he could not see the quick 
 gesture of impatience, or interrogation, that Mrs. Arnold 
 made as she caught the mullato's eye. Involuntarily, I 
 glanced toward him, and saw the nod of assent, or intelli- 
 gence, he gave in return. 
 
 The seargeant had come to report that the prisoners in 
 the guard-house had suddenly asked to see the captain: 
 they had disclosures to make to him. When Captain 
 Arnold returned, his face was flushed. 
 
 "The villains!" he burst out. "They had managed to 
 hide about $5,000 in United States bank-notes about them, 
 when they were searched for concealed weapons, and they 
 just now offered it to me, if I would let them escape. Not 
 only that, but from something one of them said, I -have 
 gained the certainty that they are implicated in the massa- 
 cre of the party of civilians that passed through here about 
 two months ago: you remember, the general ordered out a 
 part of K Company, to rescue the one man who was sup- 
 posed to have been taken prisoner. The wretches! But 
 I'll go myself, in the morning, to relieve the men from 
 picket-duty, and select the best from among them to take 
 the scoundrels to Santa Fe"1 ' ' 
 
 When about to begin my toilet the next morning, I gave 
 a start of surprise. Was that what had made the house 
 look so dark and changed? Before me stood a large, tin 
 
An Episode of "Fort Desolation" 91 
 
 wash-basin of the kind that all common mortals used out 
 here and the beautiful toilet-set of China, with its splendors 
 of gilt edge and moss roses, had all disappeared, all save 
 the soap dish and hot water pitcher, which were both defec- 
 tive, and looked as though they had gone through a hard 
 struggle for existence. 
 
 When our ambulance made the ascent of the little steep 
 hill that hides Fort Desolation from view, I saw three horses 
 led from the stable to the captain's house the captain's 
 horse and two others. He was as good as his word; and 
 before another day had passed, the two men penned up in 
 that tent there would be well on their way to meet justice 
 and retribution. A solitary guard, with ebony face and 
 bayonet flashing in the morning sun, was pacing back and 
 forth by the tent; and walking briskly from the commissary 
 buildings toward the men's quarters, was Harry, the mu- 
 latto sergeant. 
 
 From the first glance I had at Mrs. Kline's face, when 
 we reached Fort Craig, I knew that the mystery of the 
 change at Fort Desolation would be solved here. Constan- 
 tia was there, and acting as cook in Dr. Kline's family. 
 She was an excellent cook, and we did ample justice to her 
 skill, at supper time. The gentlemen leaving the table to 
 smoke their cigars, Mrs. Kline and I settled down to 
 another cup of tea and mZdisance. From what Constantia 
 had stated on coming to Fort Craig, it would seem that in 
 some way Captain Arnold's suspicions had been aroused in 
 regard to the friendship of Lieutenant Rockdale for his wife. 
 About two months ago, he one day pretended to start off on 
 
92 An Episode of "Fort Desolation." 
 
 a tour of inspection to the picket posts, but returned, late 
 the same night, by a different road. Stealing into the 
 house through the kitchen, he had, rather uncermoniously, 
 entered the bed-room, where he found Lieutenant Rock- 
 dale, toasting his feet before the fire. Raising his carbine 
 to shoot the man, Mrs. Arnold had sprung forward, seized 
 his arm and torn the gun from it. In the confusion that 
 followed, the toilet-set referred to, and other articles of fur- 
 niture, were demolished; but Constantia, who had crept 
 in after the captain, to prevent mischief, if possible, gave it 
 as her opinion that Mrs. Arnold " had grit enough for ten 
 such men as him an' de leftenant." 
 
 " If you did but know the ingratitude of the creature," 
 continued Mrs. Kline, "and the devotion of her husband 
 has always shown her!" And she gave me a brief sketch 
 of her career: Married to Arnold just at the breaking out 
 of the war, and of poor parents, she had driven him almost 
 to distraction by her treatment when thrown out of employ- 
 ment some time after. At last he went into the Union forces 
 as substitute giving every cent of the few hundred dollars 
 he received to his wife, who spent it on herself for finery. 
 Later, when for bravery and good conduct he was made 
 lieutenant in a negro regiment, she joined her husband and 
 finally came to the territory with him. In their regiment it 
 was well known that he always blindly worshiped his wife, 
 and that she had always ruled him, his purse and his com- 
 pany with absolute power. 
 
 Before retiring for the night we debated the question: 
 Should we remain the next day at Fort Craig or proceed on 
 
An Episode of l ( Fort Desolation. ' J 93 
 
 )ur journey ? The mules needed rest, as well as the horses, 
 or the quartermaster could not furnish fresh mules which 
 ve had rather expected; still, my husband was anxious to 
 each Santa Fe as soon as possible and we left the question 
 >f our departure where it was to settle it next morning at 
 >reakfast. The news that came to Fort Craig before the 
 lext morning, made us forget our journey for that day, at 
 east. Captain Arnold had been murdered! The big, true- 
 learted man was lying at Fort Desolation dead with his 
 )roken eyes staring up to the heaven that had not had pity 
 m him his broad breast pierced with the bullet that a 
 voman's treachery had sped! 
 
 Before daybreak a detachment of six men had come in 
 rom Fort Desolution to Fort Craig, to report to the com- 
 nander of their regiment that Captain Arnold had been 
 issassinated, and Sergeant Henry Tulliver had deserted, 
 :aking with him one horse, two revolvers and a carbine, 
 "aptain Arnold had started out the morning before, with 
 )nly two men, to call in the picket posts. An hour later 
 :he two men had come dashing back to the fort, stating that 
 :hey had been attackted and Captian Arnold killed by the 
 ;wo white men who had been confined in the guard-house. 
 [t was ascertained then, for the first time, that the prisoners 
 lad made their escape. A detachment of men was sent 
 Dut with a wagon and the captain's body brought in the 
 nen with their black faces and simple hearts gathering 
 iround it with tears and lamentations heaping curses on the 
 Lilians who had slain their kind commander. 
 
 Suddenly a rumor had been spread among them that 
 
94 An Episode of ( ' Fort Desolation. ' ' 
 
 Harry, the sergeant, had set the prisoners free, and instantly 
 a hundred hoarse voices where shouting the mulatto's 
 name a hundred hands ready to take the traitor's life. 
 Vainly Lieutenant Rockdale who, after the captain's de- 
 parture, had at once repaired to his house tried to check 
 the confusion that was quickly ripening into mutiny: the 
 excitement only increased, and soon a crowd of black 
 soldiers moved toward the men's quarters, with anything 
 but peaceful intentions. Perhaps Harry's conscience had 
 had warned him of what would come, for while the mob 
 were searching the quarters, a little figure sprang over the 
 planks across the creek, ran to the stables below the captain's 
 house, and the next moment dashed over the road mounted 
 on a wild-looking black horse. 
 
 Could they but have reached him the infuriated men, 
 who sent yells and carbine balls after the fugitive he would 
 have been sacrificed by them to the manes of the murdered 
 man, and perhaps this effect had been calculated on when 
 the fact of his having loosed the prisoners had been brought 
 to their ears. 
 
 1 ' How did it come to their ears ? " I asked the doctor, 
 under whose care one of the six men, overcome with fatigue 
 and excitement had been placed. It seems that Mrs. Arnold 
 had expressed her conviction of the Sergeant's having 
 liberated the prisoners, to Lieutenant Rockdale, in little 
 Fred's hearing; and the boy had innocently repeated the 
 tale to the men. In the afternoon of the same day the 
 detail had been made of the men who brought the news to 
 Fort Craig, but when the detachment had been only an hour 
 
An Episode of ' ' Fort Desolation. ' ' 95 
 
 or two on the way, they found the trail of the escaped 
 prisoners. The men could not withstand the temptation 
 to make an effort, at least, to recapture them. They knew 
 them to be mounted, for two horses which Sergeant Tulliver 
 had that morning separated from the herd were missing; 
 but the trail they followed showed the tracks of three horses, 
 which led them to suppose that Harry had found the men 
 and joined them. 
 
 But the trail led farther and farther from the road, and 
 fearing to be ambushed, they turned back, leaving the man 
 who had been driven from the companionship of his brethern 
 by a woman's treachery, to become one of the vultures that 
 prey on their own kind. 
 
TOBY. 
 
TOBY. 
 
 SHE was the most nervous woman I ever met. Not 
 nervous in the common acceptation of the term; she did 
 not scold, or fret, or worry and lay it to the state of her 
 nerves; nor was she fidgety, or cross, or irritable. But she 
 would grow pale at an unexpected knock at the door, or 
 flush painfully red if she heard a quick footstep behind her. 
 I have seen her grasp the banister for support, if, looking 
 down the stairs into the hall-way, she discovered a form not 
 instantly familiar to her eye, and at night, when she first 
 came to our house, she used to beg piteously that I should 
 leave the door between her room and mine open, so that I 
 could rouse her quickly when her cries for help told that 
 she was dreaming the one dream over and over again. 
 
 We were as good friends as two women get to be after a 
 six month's acquaintance; she told me many things of her 
 past life, but I felt that she did not tell me all there was to 
 be told. She said she abhorred a "woman with a history," 
 yet I knew she had a history if ever woman had. Long 
 after we had parted I was surprised, one day, to find that 
 she still thought of me, nay, she even missed me. I give 
 you the letter as I received it from her, 
 
 You have often asked me, dear Delia, what became of 
 Toby, the horse I so loved in my ' ' cavalry days. ' ' As 
 
ioo Toby. 
 
 often have I answered that I could not tell you this without 
 telling you at the same time a somewhat lengthy story. 
 Since you have gone abroad I have so missed you that I 
 think I can best find time now to write what you always 
 wanted to know. 
 
 Though I have an idea that you are not a devoted reader 
 of '* Reports and Statistics," you may still have seen or 
 heard something of the <( Personal Narrative" of J. R. 
 Bartlett, of the Boundary Commission of the United States 
 and Mexican Boundary Survey. The Santa Rita del 
 Cobre, the ancient New Mexico copper mine was selected 
 for the headquarters of the Boundary Commission in 1850- 
 51, and fifteen years later, in 1866, after the close of the 
 war, the United States troops (regulars) to which my 
 husband belonged, were sent by General Carleton to build 
 a fort where, during the war, a camp had been established 
 by the California Volunteers, within eight miles of these 
 famous old mines. 
 
 It is one of the loveliest spots the sun ever shone upon. 
 Grand as well as lovely; a pleasant valley, the low green 
 hills surrounding it overshadowed by the Mimbres mountain 
 range, in which the copper mines are lying; while the Sierra 
 Diavolo, holding the treasures of the Pinos Altos, was blue 
 in the distance, and far off, like a misty dream, the outlines 
 of the Three Brothers, mountains in Mexican territory, rose 
 phantom-like against the horizon. 
 
 We had the clear blue sky of California there, but as I 
 had not then been in this blessed land of ours, I hailed it as 
 a boon and compensation to those who were cut oft" from 
 
Toby. i ol 
 
 civilization and home comforts at a lonely frontier post. 
 Every morning seemed to me a fresh spring day breaking 
 over the camp. Our tents were comfortable, the com- 
 missary well supplied; game could be easily found; fresh 
 meat was always abundant, as we carried a large herd of 
 cattle with us, and last, but not least, the cook and waiter, 
 whom we drew from the company, were both faithful and 
 diligent. The consideration of commissary supplies may 
 seem ' ' of the earth, earthy, " to an ethereal being like 
 yourself; but a few month's residence in a country 
 where Apache Indians, a few scattered sheep-herds, and 
 fat tarantulas are the chief agricultural productions, 
 would effectually cure you of turning up your delicate 
 little nose at the contents of the commissary depart- 
 ment. 
 
 The company laundress was an Irishwoman, and the only 
 white woman except myself within a distance of over a 
 hundred miles. Though my husband was not commanding 
 officer, I enjoyed all the privileges, benefits and amenities 
 that generally fall to the commanding officer's wife; for this 
 gentleman was not married, and I was the only lady in 
 camp. So, whatever there was of comfort, convenience or 
 pleasure to be found in or about this isolated post, was lav- 
 ishly bestowed upon me, and all that could make life 
 pleasant or enjoyable was literally at my tent door. For, as 
 I looked out, the fair land lay bathed in sunshine before 
 me; the laughing waters of the tiny brook that flowed 
 through the camp flashed into my dazzled eyes; the soft 
 winds stirred the live oak by my tent, and Toby, saddled 
 
lo2 Toby. 
 
 and bridled, came up with a whinnied greeting" to bear me 
 off up into the mountains. 
 
 Dilapidated mining-shafts, covered by the growth of half 
 a century of gnarled trees and mountain shrubs were 
 explored; in the ravines and gulches we came upon old 
 arastras, and remnants of habitations of a later date, but 
 moldering and in ruins, too, with the skull of an Indian 
 unearthed here and there, and a half-hidden grave to show 
 that the victims of treachery or savage ambuscade had been 
 decently buried by those who had escaped the Indian's 
 scalping knife. They were dreary enough, some of these 
 places, down by the waters of the little camp-brook, which 
 here had turned into a brawling, rapid-running stream, 
 hemmed in by steep banks, from which hung blackberry 
 vines and the wild growth of the country. Then up again 
 a steep ascent, that taxed all Toby's strength and agility, 
 though it was not a heavy burden under which he labored, 
 and having by this rough pilgrimage gained several miles in 
 a "cut-off," the clear stream that runs through the canon 
 leading to the copper mines winds bright and sparkling 
 before us. 
 
 How Toby loved this stream! "Whitewater" we 
 called it, for ' ' Coppermine Creek ' ' did not seem pretty 
 enough. Its bed was paved with pebbles glistening in a 
 thousand different hues, Pescadero and its pebble-beach 
 could not have vied with it in wealth of color. The old 
 Presidio at the copper mines was then invaded. Half fort, 
 half smelting works, as it had been off and on since the 
 beginning of the present century, there could be found in 
 
Toby. 103 
 
 and about it the traces of murderous Apache arrows, and 
 the rank growth of the vine and the peach tree, planted and 
 cultivated once by the Spaniards, later by Mexicans, and 
 destined to be replanted and nurtured by "us Americans." 
 For the iron horse now goes snorting and shrieking by a 
 strip of fair country which in those days lay so entirely 
 outside the reach of civilization that in my wildest dreams I 
 should never have forseen its connection with the rest of the 
 world. 
 
 Here lunch was spread, the extensive works were in- 
 spected, the enormous piles of copper gazed at, and regret 
 at the thought that the grand old place had been abandoned 
 and was falling into ruins was uppermost in every mind. 
 
 Before the shadows grew long we remounted, for these 
 mountain canons were not pleasant in the gloaming, and 
 more than once have I been startled by the trunk of a tree, 
 which, with its turning leaves, looked like the blanketed 
 form of a lurking Apache. On these occasions Toby was 
 my sole reliance. He seemed to have the same kind of 
 shuddering horror of an Indian that I had, and I think he 
 would have saved me by his swift feet without my ever 
 drawing rein on him, and wherever we dismounted he was 
 always beside me. Anywhere near the water- 1 could take 
 off his bridle and let him go. He would splash in the 
 water, drink his fill, and come back. The saddle always 
 remained on him; but, though he had no respect for the 
 gay saddle-cloth and would come back with it dripping, he 
 never once attempted to roll with the saddle on him. 
 
 There was something human in his affection for me. 
 
104 Toby. 
 
 Many a time did he stand beside me while I poured all my 
 trouble and my fears into his ear, which he seemed to bend 
 nearer to me, stamping the ground sometimes as if to say, 
 "Too bad! too bad! Come, let's up and away." 
 
 When we got tired exploring the copper mine region and 
 the abandoned shafts lying about it, we would wend our 
 way in the direction almost opposite, to Pinos Altos, as well 
 known for its wealth of gold as was the Santa Rita del Cobre 
 for its inexhaustible treasures of copper. In former years, 
 before the war, there were only the rich placer diggings 
 worked here, but now, since the returning troops had once 
 more given at least nominal protection to the place, there 
 had been a saw-mill established, and many of the magnifi- 
 cent tall pines from which the Mexicans had named the 
 place were being felled and fed to the horrid buzzing mon- 
 ster with the sharp, insatiable teeth that seemed always cry- 
 ing for more more! 
 
 The mountains we climbed to reach the spot were called 
 the Diavolo Range, though I failed to see anything about 
 them that was diabolical. The miners, perhaps, who battled 
 with the Indians here after the troops had been withdrawn 
 from the Territory at the beginning of the war, may have 
 had a different opinion. To me the country seemed very 
 grand and beautiful different in character from the copper- 
 mine region, a little sterner in feature, I thought, but the 
 same cloudless sky smiling above it, and the same deep, un- 
 broken, eternal silence brooding over it. I cannot realize 
 that the hum and traffic of a growing settlement are now 
 awakening echoes that have slept for centuries. Yet they 
 
Toby. 105 
 
 tell me that Silver City has been established within ten miles 
 of the very spot that once looked so hopelessly death-like 
 and so deserted to me in my despair. For I was in despair. 
 Beautiful as was the country, pleasant as seemed my sur- 
 roundings, in spite of the devotion shown me by the soldiers 
 who composed the garrison, the repect and attention of the 
 officers, and last, but not least, the undivided affection of my 
 white horse, Toby, I was not only in despair that is too 
 mild a term I was living, day and night, in sunlight or dark- 
 ness, in a state of terror, fear, and suspence, such as cannot 
 be described. In the midst of apparent safety and protection, 
 death stared me constantly in the face not the swift, sudden 
 death that the Indian's arrow or the ball of an assassin 
 grants, but the slow tortures with which the cunning of the 
 maniac puts its victim to the rack ; for my husband was a 
 madman and a murderer, and I was given, helpless and 
 without defence, into his hands. 
 
 I tnink the discovery must have paralyzed me, for I can- 
 not now explain to myself the dazed, unresisting state in 
 which I remained for months after I knew the whole truth. 
 Partly, perhaps, the consciousness that I was thousands of 
 miles away from where help could reach me from my own 
 people, the natural reluctance of a wife to disclose her misery 
 and wretchedness to strangers, and the knowledge of the 
 power which to a certain degree my husband possessed, at 
 least, over his immediate subordinates all these consider- 
 ations, a mixture of fear and pride, held me in thrall for 
 long, long days, Another thing, rediculous as it may seem, 
 prevented me from seeking protection at the hands of my 
 
to6 Toby. 
 
 husband's superior officers. Months afterwards, when I had 
 at last made my escape, one of the ladies at Fort Union 
 asked me: 
 
 ' ' Why did you not call on the captain for protection ? ' ' 
 " How could I ? " I asked in return. " You see, when- 
 ever Mrs. Mack (that was our laundress) had had a hand- 
 to-hand misunderstanding with her husband, Dennis, over- 
 night, she always went to the captain to complain of him in 
 the morning. Dennis got three days in the gaurd- house, 
 and straightway on coming out got drunker than he had 
 been before. Now, I could not go and complain to the captain 
 of my husband as Mrs. Mack did of hers could I ? " 
 
 No! But I would tie a strip of flannel around my throat 
 and complain of a bad cold, in order to hide the marks that 
 his fingers had left where he had strangled me just one de- 
 gree short of suffocation. With what feeling of gratitude I 
 used to step to the tent-door in the morning when my liege 
 lord gave permission to take one more look at the sky 
 above me, after a night passed waking, in momentary ex- 
 pectation of a blow from a hatchet he had concealed about 
 the tent during the day, or with the silent horror of the sit- 
 uation growing on me till I was ready to shriek out, ' ' Be 
 merciful! Kill me at one blow, or pull the trigger the next 
 time you hold the death-cold muzzle of your pistol to my 
 head" for you must know it was a favorite way he had of 
 amusing himself. He would hold the revolver pressed close 
 against my temple and let that horrid " click-click " sound 
 in my ears till I was fairly numb with terror. Then he would 
 explain to me in a low voice how utterly impossible it would 
 
Toby. i of 
 
 be for any help to reach me in time if I screamed for help; 
 would dilate upon the numerous strings and loops he himself 
 had added to the fastenings of the tent, and would describe 
 how he could cut me into small bits, and roast the bits in 
 the fire, before being discovered, if I ever so much as dared 
 to breathe what passed in those quiet, peaceful-looking 
 quarters of ours. For out tent had really a cheerful home- 
 look about it. Strictly speaking, there were two tents set 
 up close together in one, and the soldiers, in their solicitude 
 for my comfort, had built a wall some four feet high about it, 
 and the canvas had been partly removed at either end to 
 make room for a fire-place they had built of mud and stones, 
 the chimney reaching high above the tenf. So that in reality 
 we had two rooms, a fire-place in each; and altogether our 
 quarters were looked upon as exceedingly fine and comfort- 
 able, exciting surprise and envy in the minds of the few stray 
 visitors that passed through camp. 
 
 That these visitors were few and far between was a great 
 blessing, as I soon found; for after my husband had once 
 admitted to me that he had been a murderer and had fled 
 from justice, he was seized with an insane idea, whenever an 
 arrival was announced in camp, that the officers of the law 
 had tracked him here from Texas, where the crime had been 
 commited years ago, and that / had communicated to them 
 where he could be found. He had cut a round opening in 
 the top of the tent and through the fly as if the space had 
 been intended for the passage of a stove-pipe and from 
 this point of observation he could see the dust flying up in 
 the road when any one approached the camp. Then he 
 
io8 Toby. 
 
 would make a spring at me as a tiger springs upon his prey 
 grasp my throat with both his murderous hands, aid urge 
 me to confess for whom I had sent, and by whom I had sent 
 the message, swearing direst vengeance on all concerned did 
 he did but discover them. If, however, the orderly came 
 to the door the next moment to announce that Mr. So-and- 
 so, or Such-a-one, had arrived and desired to see the lieu- 
 tenant, this gentleman was all good nature and condescension, 
 sending an immediate invitation to the visitor to come to our 
 tent, or going in person to meet him. I had to smooth my 
 ruffled feathers then as best I might, for I knew that the least 
 failure to appear happy and cheerful in the presence of the 
 guest would be rigorously punished as soon as the stranger' s 
 back was turned. 
 
 Oh, the abject, trembling misery of that time! Often 
 when the captain saw us as we left camp without escort as 
 the lieutenant was inclined to do he remonstrated with us, 
 telling my husband how wrong it was to risk my life, even 
 if he chose to expose his own, to an Indian ambuscade. 
 Little did the kind man think that I was actually praying 
 God forgive me! that an arrow or a bullet should come, 
 quick and painless, and put an end to my wretched existence. 
 
 Little, too, did he know that these lonely excursions were 
 undertaken because his lieutenant deemed it necessary, or at 
 least expedient, to find a place of shelter where he could hide 
 when that dreaded sheriffs posse came from Texas till 
 he could be supplied by me with means and ways for his 
 escape. How is it possible that a crazy man can have the 
 sense, or at least the cunning, to plan and prepare every 
 
Toby. 109 
 
 detail and particular for his own flight, and for the baffling 
 of his pursuers? And yet he was crazy; for in the muster 
 of arguments that could be used for his defence should he be 
 tried for murder, he placed his main reliance on the fact of 
 his having been for two years the inmate of a Philadelphia 
 lunatic asylum. 
 
 Not over three miles from the camp, on the left of the 
 road that comes up trom the Mimbres River crossing, there 
 was a dreary, flat, table-like rock, without a trace of verdure 
 or a sign of life about it. Underneath this, amid broken 
 stones and drifted sand, was a small opening into which a 
 man could crawl, where there was a small cave or burrow. 
 This spot he selected; and here I, who was afraid of the very 
 darkness itself, was to come every night and bring him food, 
 water, and everything he needed, until he should find a 
 chance to quit the country. You must remember there was 
 nothing in this country then save military posts at long 
 intervals and a very few poverty stricken Mexican towns and 
 settlements, separated by hundreds of miles of waterless 
 sand-deserts and barren rocks, wilh Indians of different 
 tribes, but all alike hostile, sprinkled over the whole ad lib- 
 itum. And yet I was often on the point of braving all those 
 horrors to escape the terrors of my captivity and torture. 
 Often when Toby came whinnying around our quarters, I 
 was sorely temped to cut the fastenings of the tent and make 
 a bold dash for liberty or death: for you must understand 
 that during the lieutenant's absence from the tent I was never 
 permitted to go to the entrance under any excuse. I might 
 have taken an opportunity of that kind to appeal for help, 
 
no Toby. 
 
 or send word of my wretched condition to the commanding 
 officer by a passing soldier don' t you see ? And this he 
 was determined to prevent. Poor Toby, never coralled or 
 hobbled as the other horses were, would clatter around the 
 tent for hours, pawing the ground, tugging at the ropes and 
 scratching at the entrance; but never till the lieutenant made 
 his appearance was I permitted to give him the lump of 
 sugar or other tidbit I had ready for him. 
 
 Day by day my life grew more intolerable, and .1 don't 
 know how soon it might have been ended, either by that 
 man's hand or my own, had he not finally bethought him 
 of a way in which I could perhaps benefit him. He had 
 been placed under arrest for some trifling neglect of duty 
 soon after we reached camp, and, thongh this might have 
 been all the more pleasant under ordinary circumstances as 
 giving him more time to pursue his own pleasure, he began 
 to chafe under this inactivity, and at last concluded that it 
 was a deep, underhanded plot of his superior officers to injure 
 and annoy him. If the conception of this idea strongly 
 suggested one of the common fancies of the insane, the 
 remedy he concluded to .adopt certainly afforded proof con- 
 clusive that his brain was turned. As, however, I saw in it 
 a possible means of escape, I grasped at it as a drowning man 
 grasps at a straw. 
 
 His plan was this: I was to apply to the commanding 
 officer for an ambulance and escort as far as Santa Fe, and 
 there I was to lay his grievances personally before General 
 Carleton, and as-k at his hand redress and protection for my 
 husband. Redress and -protection for him! The bitter 
 
Toby. in 
 
 irony and humor of the thing was not lost upon me even in 
 the abject state of mind I was then in; but I took good care 
 to allow no trace of my real feelings to appear upon my face. 
 
 The purpose was quickly carried out. Next day the 
 orderly bore a note from me to the captain, written, I need 
 hardly say, under the eyes of my tormentor; and in a little 
 while after, a polite note from him assured me that my train 
 would be ready at the hour mentioned, the following 
 morning. Very gladly had this kind-hearted man con- 
 sented to my request; for, as I learned later, something of 
 the true condition of affairs at our quarters had become 
 known to him through our orderly and the cook, and the 
 captain felt but too happy to grant me safe escort on my 
 way back to my friends, which he thought I was now 
 taking. 
 
 Women, however, are the most foolish, unaccountable, 
 soft-hearted idiots in creation. The night preceding my 
 departure was spent in great part by the lieutenant on his 
 knees, imploring my forgiveness, vowing reform, and 
 explaining how it was only his great love for me that had 
 made him at times a little tyrannical. Then, the outrageous 
 treatment under which he had been suffering at the hands of 
 his superior officers had well nigh driven him mad, he said. 
 To be sure, I had seen nothing of this ' * outrageous treat- 
 ment," except that Uncle Sam paid his salary as regularly 
 as that of the other officers; that the commissary supplied 
 him with the best there was; that his brother officers 
 showed him all the courtesy he allowed them to, and that 
 his time was entirely at his own disposal. Only in one 
 
ii2 Toby. 
 
 direction had any restraint been used. The commissary 
 elerk had been restricted to a certain quantity of com- 
 missary whisky to be issued to him. To this restriction I 
 think I owe my life. A madman pure and simple is bad 
 enough, in all conscience; but let this same madman intoxi- 
 cate himself with liquor, and a demon would blush to own 
 him for a brother. I know whereof I speak. 
 
 At last the morning dawned. The ambulance stood at 
 the door; our orderly was seated beside the driver; six 
 mounted men and a sergeant had been detailed as escort. 
 Much as I had begged, the lieutenant had not allowed Toby 
 to accompany me; the Indians would see me if I rode 
 Toby, whereas they would never know that a woman was 
 inside the ambulance. The captain, who came to take 
 leave of me, said my husband was right, that the escort was 
 not large and that it would be like tempting Providence 
 and the Indians for me to ride through the country on 
 horseback. 
 
 Toby, poor fellow, had been confined in the corral, and 
 his whinnies grew first rebellious and then heart-breaking, 
 as, dragging at his chain and wildly pawing the ground, he 
 saw the train moving out and leaving him behind. My 
 heart smote me at the horse's cries, for they were cries, if 
 it was only a horse; but the lieutenant had got into the 
 ambulance with me, to go as far as the limits of the post, 
 and was giving me his parting instructions and making his 
 parting promises of repentance and reform, and I did not 
 even dare to express my grief at leaving my dear, devoted 
 friend. Pinkow, the orderly, for whom the lieutenant had 
 
Toby, 113* 
 
 obtained the captain's permission to accompany me all the 
 way to Santa Fe" and back, sat beside the driver of the 
 ambulance, as I said, while the lieutenant and I sat in the 
 seat behind. My mounted escort was to return when we 
 reached a post where a fresh escort could be conveniently 
 furnished, either at Fort Cummings, Fort Selden of Fort 
 Craig. Fort McRea, but lately established at a distance of 
 a mile or two from the Rio Grande, and to be reached only 
 by turning aside some eight or nine miles from the straight 
 road across the much dreaded Jornada del Muerto, had no 
 soldiers to spare. There had been a line of picket posts 
 established near the river, to protect from the ever-lurking 
 Apache those coming here for water, on their weary journey 
 or prospecting tour, and it required all the men they had to 
 keep the Indians in check and afford the necessary pro- 
 tection. But the captain felt confident that at either of the 
 other posts I could exchange my escort and draw fresh 
 mules for the ambulance. 
 
 Hardly had the lieutenant left the ambulance and vanished 
 from sight when Pinkow turned in his seat and laced me 
 with an eager, questioning look in his eyes. I was startled 
 by the man's sudden movement, and asked in some alarm: 
 
 "What is it, Pinkow?" 
 
 "Thank God!" he cried, with a great sigh of relief. 
 "You are free, madam. I have counted the moments 
 since the lieutenant came into the ambulance with you, 
 dreading that he would change his mind at the last minute 
 and drag you back to that horrid tent, to murder you at his 
 leisure." 
 
H4 Toby. 
 
 " Why Pinkow ' I protested, " the lieutenant " 
 ' ' is my commanding officer and has detailed me to wait 
 on you, with secret instructions to bring you back from 
 Santa Fe" dead or alive. Alive, if possible; dead, should 
 you refuse to return of your own free will to the prison he 
 has prepared for you. Do you think, madam, that because 
 your silent, uncomplaining endurance of the lieutenant's 
 tyranny was honored by the captain and the other officers, 
 it is not known at headquarters ? And in the company 
 there is not a man who has forgotten your courage and 
 kindness on the long march out here. All these men here 
 will go into Santa Fe" with you if you but say the word, 
 and once under the general's protection the lieutenant can 
 never more approach nor harm you. The captain, though 
 not advised of your intention, feels convinced that you will 
 never return to our camp or the lieutenant again. I have 
 his orders to see that everything you may need on your 
 journey in, whether undertaken with a military escort or on 
 the overland stage, be furnished you; though indeed the 
 general himself will see to that, and the captain also thinks 
 that some of the other officer's wives are at Fort Marcy 
 (Santa F6) at present." 
 
 " But, Pinkow," I remonstrated, tremblingly, "I prom- 
 ised to come back; he will come after me if I break my 
 promise; I know he will, and kill me wherever he finds 
 me." 
 
 ' ' Do you suppose the captain will give him permission to 
 leave camp to follow you ? Not while he thinks that you 
 will seize upon this opportunity to make your escape. He 
 
Toby. 115 
 
 is under the firm impression that you are anxious to get out 
 of that madman's clutches, and would be surprised if he 
 heard that you had conscientious scruples about breaking 
 your word with him. Do you know," he continued, in a 
 lowered voice, ' ' that he is a condemmed criminal, that he 
 escaped the gallows only by flight, and lives in hourly 
 dread of being recognized and handed over to the civil 
 authorities by his brother officers ? And to such a man's 
 power you would return ? ' ' 
 
 1 ' It will break his heart if I go and leave him in his 
 trouble," I cried, thinking of his parting appeals and 
 promises. "He is not bad, Pinkow; he was young and 
 hot-headed when that man in Texas enraged him, and he 
 shot him in a fit of passion, It has been kept secret so 
 long; why raise up that dread ghost now ? And think of 
 Toby, I should never see Toby again, and you heard how 
 he cried. I must go back, Pinkow, oh, I must go back ! ' ' 
 and I burst into tears. 
 
 It was not so much the recollection of the horse that 
 made me cry my nerves were suddenly unstrung; the 
 prospect of life and liberty before me was overpowering; I 
 feared to give room to the flattering hope that tried to take 
 possession of me. It looked so utterly impossible that I 
 could really become free once more; that I could ever again 
 breathe without fear and dread, as other people did. 
 
 "That is just what the lieutenant counted on," pursued 
 Pinkow; " he knows how you love the horse, and told me 
 to insinuate to you, in case you should refuse to come back, 
 that I thought he would beat and starve the poor brute to 
 
ii6 Toby. 
 
 death. I do not doubt that he would if he got the chance, 
 but I have posted both the captain and the men, and they 
 would look after Toby for your sake, if not for his own." 
 
 The farther away I got from the post, the higher my 
 spirits rose. I dried my tears at last and asked the faithful 
 fellow if he really and truly thought I could get away and 
 reach my friends in safety. He made it appear so plain 
 that it depended on my own wish alone, that I began to 
 breathe more freely, and at last said: 
 
 11 Be it so; I will at least try for my life." 
 
 Then I made him promise to say nothing of my intention 
 till I had reached Santa Fe, partly because my pride 
 rebelled against being looked upon as a runaway wife, and 
 partly because I so dreaded my husband's pursuit that I felt 
 as if a word spoken aloud might be carried back to him on 
 the passing breeze. 
 
 Once determined on gaining my freedom, I could not 
 travel fast enough. I urged the driver to hurry his mules 
 to the utmost, telling him I was anxious to reach Fort Cum- 
 mings before nightfall. Though I gave no hint of my real 
 intentions, I felt that he, as well as the soldiers of the 
 escort, knew why I hurried them; and all through the day 
 we traveled briskly over that silent and desolate portion of 
 the country where the Southern Pacific now runs its daily 
 trains. Not a human soul did we meet; a herd of antelope 
 came scudding down the broad valley of the Mimbres 
 River while we were passing through; and in the mountains, 
 toward where the copper mines lay, one of the soldiers sud- 
 denly spied a thin, blue column of smoke arising. The 
 
Toby. i i 7 
 
 sergeant grew alarmed for my safety, and asked whether I 
 preferred turning back to the post, as there was no doubt 
 that the Indians had discovered us and were communicating 
 our presence on the road to some distant portion of their 
 tribe. But the sun was still riding high in the heavens, and 
 I felt that I would rather brave death out here, under the 
 blue sky, than encounter it in the gloomy darkness of that 
 dreadful tent. So I told the sergeant to keep on, asking if 
 there were an extra revolver I could have. Pinkow had 
 prepared for everything, and a neat deringer proved to me 
 that the captain had been consulted on this point, too. 
 Then we hastened on, stopping only long enough at the 
 crossing of the Mimbres River to refresh the horses and 
 mules, and at nightfall we entered the rocky canon which 
 takes its name from the spring that has gladdened the heart 
 of many a weary traveler on this road. Cook's Canon has 
 an unpleasant sound in connection with Apache reminis- 
 cences, and even the spring, a large, square sheet of water, 
 surrounded by a low, hand-built wall of rock, looked black 
 and inhospitable in the darkening night. 
 
 The commanding officer of Fort Cummings received and 
 entertained me with all possible kindness, saying it was not 
 surprise to him that a lady should grow weary of the soli- 
 tude and hardships of camp life. But I hastened to explain 
 that indeed, indeed, I was not tired of living in camp; that 
 I was only going to Santa F to urge General Carlton to 
 grant my husband an early trial by court-martial, as he 
 wished to be restored to duty, and that I intended returning 
 without delay as soon as my object was accomplished. 
 
n8 Toby. 
 
 Whether he believed me or not, I don't know; but he 
 offered me fresh mules for my ambulance and an exchange 
 of escort when I refused to remain the next day and rest 
 before continuing my hard journey. I declined both offers, 
 from an insane fear that the very mules in the ambnlance 
 might have caught a whisper of the word " Flight." 
 
 The first day's journey had really not been a severe one, 
 and I felt that it was neither cruel nor selfish to order an 
 early start the next morning. We had nearly sixty miles 
 before us, and no water to be had till we struck the Rio 
 Grande; but I did not want to carry water-kegs till it was 
 absolutely necessary; we would have to come to that soon 
 enough. 
 
 I had no eyes for scenery or surroundings. Magdalena 
 Pass was to me only something to be hurried through in 
 order to reach a place of safety, as I felt Fort Selden would 
 be to a certain degree, for I knew that I should find a lady 
 there an old friend she seemed to me, for we had met at 
 Carlisle Barracks, and her husband, like mine, belonged to 
 the Third. He was commanding officer at the time, Cap- 
 tain Tilford having not yet arrived in the territory. And 
 this lady I had determined to take into my confidence. 
 Good, warm-hearted woman! How she wept over me and 
 deplored the vanishing of all my hopes and illusions! 
 We had been so happy together at Carlisle I had looked 
 so hopefully and fearlessly into the future! 
 
 A plucky little woman she was, too; and she declared 
 that if my tormentor should really evade the vigilance of 
 the officers at our camp, she would never allow him to pass 
 
Toby. 119 
 
 through theirs. He was under arrest and had no right to 
 leave camp, and a transport of soldiers should carry him 
 back to Fort Bayard if necessary by force, she vowed. We 
 deemed it best to send back the escort from here, and the 
 sergeant of my new escort was instructed as far as necessary 
 by the post commander. This escort was to remain with 
 me till I reached Santa Fe"; there were no married officers at 
 any other post between here and Santa F6, except at Fort 
 McRea, and I shrank from making the necessary explana- 
 tion to any but a woman, while I knew they could spare no 
 soldiers from the last-named post. Having fresh mules I 
 could start early in the morning, and, kindly as I had been 
 treated, tenderly as I had been cared for, I was eager to 
 shake the dust of Fort Selden from my feet. 
 
 It was a terrible day's journey we had before us. No 
 soldier who has ever crossed the dreary, hopeless stretch of 
 ninety-five miles, where neither water nor shade can be 
 found, called the Jornauda del Muerto, speaks of it without 
 a shudder. A scorching sun above, a barren waste be- 
 neath; a chain of dull brown mountains on the right, a ridge 
 of low hills far to the left. Thus the road winds, drearily, 
 silently, changelessly along. Hour after hour you gaze 
 upon this blank, vast monotone, never daring to hope that 
 one bright spot may greet the eye, but dreading ever that 
 the brooding stillness of the heavy air be rent in sudden 
 horror by the Indian's savage cry. Oh, the long, slow 
 hours that dragged their leaden wings across this waste! 
 To me, there were twin demons lurking in every isolated 
 clump of lance-weed that we passed. Where the men looked 
 
1 20 Toby. 
 
 for only one enemy, I feared two the Indian's painted vis- 
 age was not more dreaded by me than the diabolical smile 
 I had seen on that madman's face. And I could not shake 
 off the feeling that he was pursuing me that he was even 
 now on the road I had just passed over. 
 
 Though it was still daylight when we turned off from the 
 direct line across the desert into the road that leads to Fort 
 McRea, it was nearly dark when we reached this desolate 
 post; and the uninviting features of the spot looked still 
 more repulsive in the heavy gloom of the coming night. 
 The captain's wife was extremely kind to me. Captain 
 Horn of the volunteers himself was absent at one of the 
 picket-posts on the river I spoke of before. There was a 
 band of white marauders making the country unsafe at that 
 time, which was as much to be dreaded as the red Indians; 
 and therefore these pickets by the river were constantly 
 inspected personally by the captain. 
 
 The next day's journey was a short one, and we reached 
 Fort Craig while it was yet day-light. I am unable to 
 explain why it was that a volunteer officer, Colonel Gerhart, 
 was in command of this post at that time, though to be sure 
 it was months before the volunteer forces in the territory 
 were everywhere replaced by regular troops. Doctor Day 
 also belonged to the volunteers, and his wife had the coziest 
 quarters in all this large fort. The colonel, young and full 
 of life, called at the doctor's quarters and grew enthusiastic 
 over the prospect of the pleasant day we should all pass to- 
 gether to-morrow, Sunday. The tire had come off the 
 ambulance wheel, and he was rejoiced to say that there was 
 
Toby. 121 
 
 not another ambulance at the post that could be got ready in 
 less than forty-eight hours' time. 
 
 I felt the color leaving my face at this disclosure, but 
 hoped it might only be a pleasant little ruse of the colonel's, 
 when suddenly Pinkow's woe-begone countenance appeared 
 at the door to report that the blacksmith had pronounced 
 the wheel in urgent need of a soaking, or a scraping, or 
 some other like attention I have forgotten what, but I 
 knew we could not proceed in that ambulance. I sat dumb 
 with dismay, and I fear the colonel thought me very dull 
 and stupid. I spent a restless night, was up by six o'clock, 
 and summoned Pinkow. 
 
 "Pinkow," I said "we must go on. All last night I 
 dreamed of the lieutenant; he had overtaken us, and every- 
 where around me was blood blood. I am going on; if 
 here is no ambulance to be had they can give me a horse, 
 or I will ride one of the ambulance mules. Somehow, I 
 feel that the lieutenant knows by this time that I mean to 
 escape, and if he catches up with us now he will kill me 
 sure." 
 
 Pinkow could have replied that even if one of the "L" 
 Company soldiers had known of my design he could not 
 have yet imparted it to the lieutenant h ad he been so inclined, 
 as the escort was to rest for two days at For t Selden ; and the 
 probabilities were all against any of the soldiers playing 
 traitor toward me. But the poor fellow was himself so 
 thoroughly impressed with the unhesitating wickedness of 
 the gentleman in question, that he believed him capable of 
 all sorts of unheard-of deeds. 
 
122 Toby. 
 
 "You are right, madam," he said; "and I was only 
 afraid they would pursuade you to stay. I have discovered 
 that the post sutler has a very handsome ambulance, more 
 like a carriage, but very strong. If we could get that." 
 
 The sutler was known to me by reputation as a well-bred 
 man, one of the prominent men of the territory, a personal 
 friend of the general ; and when I had at last prevailed upon 
 the colonel to ask for his carriage, of course it was gladly 
 given. Nevertheless, it was eleven o'clock before we could 
 set out on our journey, and we had agreed in the council 
 held that I should stop at San Antonio, where a discharged 
 soldier kept the government station. Doctor Day said I 
 looked as if I needed rest, and Mrs. Day, dear soul ! packed 
 me a splendid lunch which my soldiers relished exceed- 
 ingly. 
 
 For my part the anxiety I had undergone since the pre- 
 vious night, the fear of being delayed one whole day, had 
 completely prostrated me with nervous headache, and all 
 through that blowing, blustering autumn day I lay back 
 half unconscious in the cushioned seat of the ambulance. 
 I had tenaciously clung to my Fort Selden escort, though 
 the colonel had wanted to replace them with men from his 
 own command. I knew that Sergeant McBeth had been 
 made acquainted to a certain extent with the real object of 
 my hasty journey, and he seemed to be such a manly, kind- 
 hearted young follow that I felt great reliance on him. 
 They were all good men. Indeed, who ever heard of an 
 unworthy act on the part of a soldier, whether he wear 
 bullion epaulettes or the coarse cloth of the rank and file ? 
 
Toby. 123 
 
 When we reached the station at San Antonio, Pinkow 
 and Sergeant Brown, who kept the station, an elderly 
 bronze-faced man, lifted me out of the ambulance and helped 
 me into the house. It was an adobe built in the regular 
 frontier New Mexican style the house the base of a hollow 
 square, high adobe walls forming the other three sides, with 
 a heavy gate opposite the house, and never a door or a 
 window to be seen on the outside of the entire structure. 
 The court-yard was bare of foliage, flower, or fountain, such 
 as are sometimes found in the habitations of the wealthier 
 residents along the Rio Grande. But the interior of the 
 house was kept faultlessly neat, as might be expected 
 of an old soldier like the sergeant. A number of very 
 comfortable beds were -kept for the officers and their 
 families who passed by this place at long intervals; and on 
 the most comfortable of these beds I threw myself, without 
 removing any article of my clothing for fear of being unable 
 to replace it in the morning I was so completely exhausted, 
 so thoroughly convinced that I was pursued, and so firmly 
 determined to continue my journey at daylight. 
 
 I remember well that good Sergeant Brown brought 
 broiled chicken to my bedside an unheard-of luxury and 
 tea, and the sweetest kind of Mexican bread. In one 
 corner of the room was a queer, triangular little fire-place, 
 and in the grate was burning a bright fire of coal brought 
 up from the bowels of the Soledad Mountain, in whose 
 somber shadow we had but yesterday been traveling. 
 
 Day had hardly dawned, when Pinkow knocked at my 
 door to know if I was able to resume the journey. I 
 
1 24 Toby. 
 
 convinced him of my determination by ordering a cup of 
 coffee and the ambulance, which, to satisfy me, was at once 
 dragged out of the court-yard and left in front of the open 
 gate where I could see it. The mules had not yet been fed, 
 and I actually scolded Pinkow for being so tardy. I said he 
 wanted to see me murdered right there; I knew the Lieu- 
 tenant was close on our heels. The good-natured fellow 
 protested not against my injustice, but against my wearing 
 myself out with unnecessary fears. 
 
 ' ' They will not allow him to pass any of the posts, ' ' he 
 said, "for they all know he is under arrest; and where else 
 could he find anything for himself, his escort, or his animals 
 to subsist on ? " 
 
 But who ever succeeded in reasoning a woman out of her 
 determination to be afraid ? So I clambered into the ambu- 
 lance, bade Pinkow fasten back the curtains, and looked out 
 upon the dreary scene. Truth to tell, I was more dead than 
 alive, and nothing save the most absolute terror could have 
 given me strength to venture out in the bleak, raw blustering 
 morning. 
 
 San Antonio was more name than habitation at that time. 
 The two or three wretched adobe houses that made up the 
 place were a fitting relief to the dry, barren country. Slug- 
 gish, gray, and sullen, the Rio Grande passed at a little 
 distance from the spot; and while I lay back in the cushions, 
 peering anxiously in all directions that my eye could reach, 
 a strange cortege came slowly gliding down the stream. 
 Was it the funeral barge of Lily Maid Elaine drifting across 
 the River Usk of Mexico? Ah, no! Something sadder far 
 
Toby. 125 
 
 than this. The Indians in making another raid on a large 
 herd of sheep had killed the herder and driven off the sheep, 
 and this was the funeral procession. His mother, a widow, 
 had crossed the stream the night before, and was now bringing 
 back with her the body of the murdered man her only son. 
 
 The sight struck a chill to my heart, and I turned to Pin- 
 kow, who was hovering near. 
 
 "A terrible omen that," I cried. "Oh, Pinkow, if we 
 were only safe in Santa Fe, I should tell the general all I 
 have suffered, and I know he will protect me. Why don't 
 we start? " I asked in conclusion, trying to raise myself to 
 look back into the court. 
 
 Sergeant Brown was just crossing it with a lunch for me, 
 and the mules were led up to the ambulance at the same 
 time, while the escort prepared to mount. 
 
 A cold wind swept over the hard ground, whirling up 
 small clouds of sand and red adobe dust, and a dull gray sky 
 made everything around look inexpressibly dreary. There 
 was something heavy and oppressive in the atmosphere in 
 spite of the keen air, and the falling in line of the escort 
 reminded me of the military funerals I had seen. Sergeant 
 Brown lent a hand while the driver was putting in the mules, 
 and when they were ready he wished me a last "good-bye." 
 His hand was still raised to his cap, when, as the ambulance 
 felt the first impetus of the straining mules, one of the 
 springs snapped, and the whole cavalcade was thrown into 
 momentary confusion. Pinkow was on the ground in an 
 instant, and the driver had just reined in his frightened mules, 
 when a commotion among the escort, a low exclamation 
 
126 Toby. 
 
 from Pinkow, caused me to turn my eyes in the direction to 
 which they all pointed. 
 
 A horseman, indeed a stranger of any kind, was an unusual 
 sight here in those days; but the sight of this horseman 
 turned my heart to stone, and paralyzed every nerve in my 
 body. 
 
 " The lieutenant! " said Pinkow, faintly; and involuntarily 
 Sergeant McBeth urged his horse closer up to my ambu- 
 lance. 
 
 I did not not faint, but there was a blank of several minutes 
 in my memory, and then I heard a hissing whisper close to 
 my ear. 
 
 "So you tried to get away from me, did you? But you 
 see I have overtaken you, and alive you will never get away 
 from me again. Don't scream or call on those men for 
 help I have two revolvers with me. I would kill them all, 
 and then tie you to Toby's tail and let him drag you to 
 death. Do you hear me ? " 
 
 There must have been something death-like in my wide- 
 open eyes, for he bent over me with sudden apprehension; 
 but I had heard him. Every word of his had burned itself 
 into my brain as with a searing-iron. The words are there 
 to this day the Lord help me! and I answered, hardly 
 above a breath: 
 
 11 1 hear you." 
 
 Not that I wanted to whisper or speak in a low tone. I 
 could not have spoken a loud word if my life had depended 
 on it, as perhaps it might. 
 
 "Come back into the house with me," he said in a louder 
 
Toby. 127 
 
 tone; "lam hungry and tired; neither Toby nor I have 
 had rest or food since leaving camp, except what we could 
 get at a Mexican ranch back there. I knew that they 
 would keep me back at the posts, in order to give you a 
 good start." He lowered his voice again, and his strong 
 yellow teeth gleamed viciously behind his drawn lips. His 
 hollow eyes were burning with the fire of madness, arid 
 strands of long, uncut hair were hanging wildly about his 
 face. He laid his talon-like hand on my arm. 
 
 " Come," he continued aloud; " we shall not be able to 
 go from here to-day; the ambulance will need an overhaul- 
 ing. Come into the house with me." 
 
 "Never!" I said, speaking low, and trying to speak 
 firmly. ( ' Kill me right here, if you want to I shall not 
 go into the house with you." 
 
 ' ' Then you insist upon bloodshed and open disgrace. ' ' 
 He spoke close to my ear again. ' ' Remember that I 
 promised to reform, and that you promised to be patient 
 with me and aid me. Is this what your promise is worth ? 
 You want to deliver me into the hands of my enemies to 
 see me wronged and murdered. Come with me and I will 
 forgive you." 
 
 He to forgive me! 
 
 ' ' But refuse and I will kill you and the rest here on this 
 spot." 
 
 And he raised me from my reclining posture and lifted 
 me from the ambulance to the ground. 
 
 Pinkow stood by, pale and motionless with suspense, but 
 Sergeant McBeth had dismounted and stepped up to me. 
 
1*28 Toby. 
 
 "Madam," he said, touching his cap, "the damage to' 
 the ambulance can be repaired in half an hour's time; you 
 need not even alight, for we shall not take the mules out at 
 all." 
 
 " Have the mules taken out, sergeant," the lieutenant 
 interposed sharply, " and.let your men dismount. My wife 
 will not continue her journey to-day." 
 
 But the sergeant approached still nearer, and with an 
 inclination of the head replied as sharply: 
 
 " My instructions are to obey madam's orders and I see 
 none of my superior officers here who could countermand 
 the order. As soon as madam signifies her wishes, I shall 
 hold my men in readiness to carry out her commands." 
 
 Every man of the escort had dismounted, and they stood 
 clustered about me as if ready and eager to carry out any 
 order I might give. I saw an appealing look in Pinkow's 
 eye, and noted the gleam of hate and fury that flashed on 
 him from the lieutenant's blood-shot orbs, while with a 
 quick movement he threw back the old soldier overcoat he 
 had on and displayed the shoulder-straps on the cavalry 
 jacket he wore under it. But even now the gallant sergeant 
 would not submit. 
 
 ' ' Your orders, madam ? " he asked with eager eyes and 
 glowing cheeks. 
 
 "I have none to give, sergeant," I replied sadly, "except 
 that you take the best care of the outfit in your command. 
 I thank you and the men for their attention and obedience, 
 and I want them all to have a rest after their long journey." 
 
 " Stand aside, sergeant," the lieutenant said harshly; " I 
 
Toby. 129 
 
 will now take charge of the command, and herewith relieve 
 you of all further responsibility. You will consider yourself 
 under orders to me." 
 
 He gave me his arm and led me back into the court- yard, 
 where, somehow, all the escort had collected, and again I 
 was reminded of a military funeral as I passed through the 
 file of sober-faced, heavily armed men. 
 
 Entering the low door which I had left but an hour ago 
 forever, as I thought, I turned my head wistfully back, and 
 there, at the foot of the court-yard, near the gate, stood 
 sergeant McBeth, the wind blowing about the folds of his 
 short soldier's cape, his hand resting on the hilt of his cav- 
 alry saber, and his eyes following me with a questioning, 
 pitying look. Sergeant Brown stood gravely holding the 
 door open for us, offering the lieutenant a military salute; 
 but I vainly sought Pinkow with a last, despairing look. 
 
 Suddenly his voice came, rough and broken, from the 
 open gate of the court- yard. 
 
 " Madam," he cried in evident distress, "madam oh! it 
 is too late. Toby is here, but ' ' 
 
 Toby! True, had I not seen him totter under the lieu- 
 tenant's cruel spurring when he was urging him up to the 
 ambulance a while ago ? Swiftly and with sudden strength 
 I snatched my hand out of the lieutenant's encircling 
 fingers and was flying back across the yard and outside, 
 where I saw Pinkow leaning, sobbing against Toby's neck. 
 The animal was trembling in every limb, but when he spied 
 me a low whinny struck my ear, and he moved forward a 
 step to reach my side. I rushed toward him, but before I 
 
130 Toby. 
 
 could reach him he had tottered and fallen at my very feet, 
 with a deep, almost human groan. 
 
 I cried out with grief and knelt by his side, stroking his 
 white, silky mane and trying to bed his shapely head in my 
 lap. But his eyes broke even while I was caressing him, 
 and I bent over the faithful, long-suffering animal, and my 
 tears fell hot and fast tears as honest and sincere as any I 
 ever shed for a human being. 
 
FLIGHT. 
 
FLIGHT. 
 
 A SEQUEL TO "TOBY." 
 
 LET me confess, dear Delia, that, next to a woman with 
 a history, I abhor a woman who faints; though my own ex- 
 perience has been that we cannot in all cases escape either 
 the one affliction or the other, no matter how hard we try. 
 
 I know, at least, that when Toby had drawn his last breath, 
 I tried my best not to succumb to the numbness I felt creep- 
 ing over all my senses after the first storm of grief had passed. 
 But I can not remember, for the life of me, how I got back 
 to Sergeant Brown's adobe house. The first thing I re- 
 member was the lieutenant's haggard face bending over me, 
 and most unexpectedly his protestations of affection, repent- 
 ance, and reform were as profuse as they had been on the 
 night preceding my departure from Fort Bayard. He 
 needed my sympathy he said, and my aid; for we must now 
 proceed to Santa Fe"; it was almost a matter of life and 
 death with him, an officer under arrest, to escape from camp 
 and venture directly into the lion's den the Commanding 
 General' s headquarters. 
 
 I was to assist him in denouncing to the general the con- 
 stant and systematic annoyance and persecution to which he 
 had been subjected by the other officers at the fort, and 
 which had driven him to this step at last. To retort that I 
 
134 Flight: A Sequel to "Toty." 
 
 had seen and known nothing of these annoyances and per- 
 secutions would have been of no benefit to me or the gentle- 
 men in question; whereas, the prospect of going to Santa 
 F instead of returning to Fort Bayard held out at least a 
 faint hope for me. So on toward Santa F6 we proceeded 
 the next day; and no devoted lover, no model husband, 
 could have been more attentive and affectionate. The 
 trouble was that he was too attentive; so completely en- 
 veloping me, as it were, that not even to Pinkow could I 
 speak a word, either in public or in private. 
 
 From Albuquerque the lieutenant was wise enough to 
 send back the escort; it would hardly have been advisable 
 to enter the presence of the district commander with flying 
 colors. As it was, the ambulance alone attracted immedi- 
 ate attention as it rolled through the narrow, crooked streets 
 of Santa F6; and we had barely entered the dAfonda near 
 the plaza, when an orderly of the general's came to inquire 
 what officer had arrived, and on what business ? The lieu- 
 tenant's trepidation was plain to me, though he forced him- 
 self to an air of bravado. Of course, he could keep me 
 locked up in the close, low room with him, but he could 
 keep neither Pinkow or the ambulance-driver there. I 
 trembled lest a word of my trouble or attempted flight 
 should escape them, for I knew they could do nothing to 
 help me under existing circumstances, and knew that I 
 should feel the effects of the lieutenant's wrath sooner or 
 later, no matter how honeyed was every word he spoke to 
 me now. 
 
 Not an hour had passed till the general sent back his 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 135 
 
 orderly to request the lieutenant to report, at once, to the 
 general in person. He hastened to obey, locking the room- 
 door on the outside, and taking the key with him a pro- 
 ceeding at which I was not even surprised. But in a 
 moment he returned, his eyes aflame, his face purple with 
 suppressed rage. 
 
 ' ' Put on your bonnet, and come with me, ' ' he said. 
 
 "To the general's?" I asked, in astonishment. "But 
 that is impossible; he has ordered you to report to him he 
 will think me crazy to come with you." 
 
 "Do as I say, ' ' he insisted, and to hear was to obey. 
 
 In five minutes I was ready; and in passing out through 
 the principal entrance of the fonda, which was reading-room, 
 lounging-place, and hall in one, I suddenly comprehended 
 the reason of the lieutenant's dragging me with him. 
 Colonel Lane, one of the most highly-esteemed officers of 
 the Third, came up to shake hands with me, regretting that 
 Mrs. Lane had not come with him to Santa Fe* (they were 
 stationed at Fort Union) but consoling me with the informa- 
 tion that Mrs. Suttorins, the wife of the adjutant, was here, 
 and one or two other ladies of the Third. 
 
 General Carleton was too well-bred a man to let me feel 
 the awkwardness of my position. I thought I could read 
 in his eyes that Pinkow had been talking (indeed, I felt that 
 that also was the way to account for the colonel's presence 
 at \hefonda); and in his kindliest tones he inquired whether 
 I was on my way into the States: adding that the overland 
 stage left \hefonda every morning at seven; but by stopping 
 a week or two with the ladies, at Fort Union, he thought 
 
136 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 he could promise to send me in with a military outfit. I 
 trembled when I looked up at the lieutenant's face; but he 
 controlled himself so far as merely to answer in my place: 
 
 "No, general, madam is not going in; she is going to 
 remain with me." 
 
 As we rose to go, the general detained the lieutenant a 
 moment, saying to him, half aloud: 
 
 ' ' Lieutenant, you will return to your station at once and 
 report to the commanding officer, under arrest. The cap- 
 tain will receive further instructions from me. ' ' 
 
 The shades of night were already falling, as we left the 
 general's quarters. The colonel was still standing at the 
 door of ihefvnda, but after an ineffectual attempt to detain 
 the lieutenant in conversation, I saw him wend his way 
 toward headquarters, as I half turned my head on entering 
 the house. The lieutenant ordered supper in the room, 
 bidding me hasten to retire after supper, as we should have 
 to be up and away before daylight in the morning. I 
 clenched my hands in dumb despair as I listened, but did 
 not dare to answer a word. Just then a hubbub arose at 
 the door. I raised my head, and the lieutenant silently laid 
 his revolver on the table beside him. But they were only 
 light knocks resounding at the door, and women's voices 
 and laughter reassured the lieutenant so far that he opened 
 the door to admit the adjutant and his wife, Mrs. Lieutenant 
 Ennis, Colonel Lane and one or two other officers. The 
 gentlemen at once surrounded the lieutenant; and Mrs. 
 Suttorins, approaching to greet me, whispered in my ear: 
 
 ' ' Come home with me I must see you alone. ' ' 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 137 
 
 I grasped her hand, but already the lieutenant's eyes 
 were fastened on me, in spite of the friendly demonstrations 
 of the visitors to absorb his attention. Conversation be- 
 came general for a little while, and Mrs. Ennis, with perfect 
 sangfroid, exclaimed suddenly, to me: 
 
 ' Oh! Before I forget, I want you to deliver a confiden- 
 tial message from me to Mrs. Captain Home. But the 
 gentlemen must not hear it," she continued, laughing 
 "they talk too much. Come out into the corridor with 
 me." 
 
 But the lieutenant stood beside her in a moment, laying a 
 detaining hand on her arm. 
 
 V You will have to excuse my wife from going into the 
 cold with you; she is not well, and much fatigued. And 
 besides, we shall hardly see Mrs. Home, as we do not 
 intend to stop at McRea, but shall camp out on the 
 Jornada. ' ' 
 
 There was an uneasy movement among the gentlemen; I 
 noticed that one of them put his hand into his breast- 
 pocket, and Colonel Lane bless his kind heart sent a 
 long inquiring look over to me. But I felt the lieutenant's 
 basilisk eye fixed on me, and I did not dare to raise mine. 
 Neither of the ladies were allowed to approach me, on 
 taking leave, and I saw my friends and would-be preservers 
 depart from that low, gloomy room with the feeling of the 
 condemned prisoner, who takes leave of his last earthly 
 ties. 
 
 Months later, when I met them all again at Fort Union, 
 they blamed me for the passive submission to a man who 
 
138 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 was a coward at heart, though a bully in behavior. Ah, 
 yes; that was easy enough said, but they had never stood 
 in my shoes. The gentlemen had all been armed that night 
 at the fonda, knowing so much of the circumstances as 
 Pinkow could relate, and fully appreciating what manner of 
 man they might have to deal with. But not a word or a 
 sign from me told them that I wanted their help, and how 
 could they interfere without or against my wish and desire ? 
 
 We did not start as early the next morning as the lieu- 
 tenant had said we should. Indeed, we staid long enough 
 for me to hear the call of the postilion-horn, as the overland 
 stage stood ready to start at the door of the fonda, and oh, 
 how the notes tore my heart! Then the ambulance came 
 and I climbed in, leaving all hope behind. 
 
 And I was right to leave all hope behind. I had never 
 believed that the lieutenant's repentance and conversion 
 were sincere, in spite of his demonstrations and protestations 
 and I soon had proof of it. During the few hours of our 
 stay at Santa Fe", Pinkow, who perhaps thought it policy, 
 on my account, to regain the lieutenant's favor, had, some- 
 how or somewhere, managed to capture a dog, a splendid, 
 long-haired hunting-dog. He said a soldier had given the 
 dog to him, and I really don't think Pinkow would have 
 fc pressed " the dog if he had not fancied the animal might 
 serve as a lightning-rod to divert the storm from my poor 
 head occasionally. If such was his intention, he succeeded 
 at once. 
 
 When we started, the dog stood apparently in high favor; 
 he was taken into the ambulance, where he crouched down 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 139 
 
 at my feet, and would lick my hand whenever I stroked his 
 hair or patted his head. I stopped caressing him when I 
 saw the lieutenant's face commence to darken, fearing that 
 perhaps it offended him. It was of no avail, however; the 
 dog was thrust out of the ambulance at the first opportunity, 
 but the lieutenant's humor did not improve. Pinkow cast 
 uneasy glances, now at the lieutenant, now at the poor dog, 
 who seemed bewildered and more than half inclined to turn 
 back to Santa Fe. Pinkow whistled to him, but the lieu- 
 tenant bade the driver stop the ambulance, sprang quickly 
 out, called the dog to him, held him down with one hand 
 while he drew his revolver with the other, and reversing the 
 weapon had beaten the struggling animal's brains out 
 before I fairly knew what he was about. 
 
 "I'll teach you to try and get away from me," he 
 shouted in mad fury, and pointing to the quivering body of 
 the brute, he called out to me: " That is the way I serve all 
 runaways," and then quietly proceeded to rub his hands 
 clean in the dust of the road, before re-entering the 
 ambulance. 
 
 I sat in speechless horror, for I knew now what I had to 
 expect. Oh! why had I not cast all fear and false shame 
 aside, and seized the helping hands held out to me in Santa 
 Fe? But regret was unavailing, and afraid almost to 
 breathe, for fear of exciting my tyrant's displeasure, I rode 
 on through the long, dreary day, hardly daring to lift my 
 eyes to the gray sky, but unconsciously trying to count the 
 rain-drops that came slowly drizzling down from there. 
 This day was but a precursor of many similar ones. 
 
140 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 Wherever he could, the lieutenant avoided stopping at the 
 military posts, making night-journeys whenever it was 
 possible, and camping out, passing through the forts during 
 the day, remaining only long enough to draw forage and 
 rations, and hurrying on under the excuse of the General's 
 orders to report to his post-commander as soon as possible. 
 
 Perhaps it was well for me that he so hurried by the 
 posts, for the surprise that was more implied than expressed 
 on seeing me return, gave me anything but a comfortable 
 feeling in my tyrant's presence. Not till we reached Fort 
 Craig did he ask for escort: two men were furnished him 
 or rather me; for I really do not think that any one would 
 have cried much whether the Indians got the lieutenant or 
 not. 
 
 My friend at Fort Seldon fairly trembled when she came 
 to the ambulance to greet me; it was not fear that shook 
 her, it was rage that flashed from her eyes, and in very 
 ungracious tones she addressed the lieutenant: 
 
 ' ' I think you are trying to kill your wife, hurrying her 
 through the post like this. Come out and rest with me a 
 day or two " she turned to me "my husband will see 
 you safe to Fort Bayard, whenever you want to go there." 
 
 " My wife goes there with me," the lieutenant replied in 
 my stead, "and I must ask you to permit us to proceed; 
 we wish to get through Magdalena Pass before night." 
 
 " But you will have to wait till my husband's return," 
 she persisted; "he has gone to Dona Ana, and may be 
 back in an hour or two." 
 
 " I have no orders to that effect," the lieutenant retorted; 
 
Flight: A Sequel to " Tofy." 141 
 
 * ' my instructions are to report to the post-commander, at 
 Fort Bayard, as soon as possible. ' ' 
 
 Perhaps the most puzzled of all was this same post- com- 
 mander, when he discovered that I had returned, together 
 with my tormentor. All circumstances considered, it was 
 only proper that he should not call to greet me on our 
 arrival, but he immediately sent his servant to me with 
 supper and compliments. My husband had reported to 
 him at once, had been ordered not to leave his quarters 
 without special permission, and late at night the captain 
 sent an orderly to demand his side-arms. The lieutenant 
 was furious, but I knew what it meant, though the future 
 proved that all the captain's efforts to insure safety to me 
 were futile. 
 
 For a day or two he seemed cowed; but, unfortunately, 
 one of his men, mistaking his quiet bearing for reform, al- 
 lowed himself to be persuaded into having the lieutenant's 
 two-gallon keg filled with whisky at Pinos Altos. The poor 
 fellow went to the guard-house, where he had time to repent 
 of his mistaken kindness; but the lieutenant enacted such 
 scenes that a guard was placed at our quarters, ostensibly 
 for the purpose of preventing the lieutenant from leaving 
 tent, in reality to protect me from his murderous attacks. 
 So day and night I heard the passing of the sentinel, up and 
 down, up and down, by the side of the tent. A bright fire 
 blazed all night in front of it, and when the relief came I 
 could hear them exchange a few low words with each other, 
 as they stood for a moment warming their hands at the 
 flames. But even this proved no protection; and though 
 
142 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 his side-arms had been removed, the Lieutenant found no 
 difficulty in obtaining access to the tool-chest of the com- 
 pany carpenter, and a hatchet is as formidable a weapon, in 
 the hands of a crazy man, as a pistol or revolver. 
 
 One day a great excitement took possession of the Lieu- 
 tenant. He had learned that General Alexander, (brothe- 
 in-law of the late General Upton) formerly of the Third, but 
 just then transferred to the Eighth, was coming as Military 
 Inspector to the camp. After a few preliminary admoni- 
 tions, that he would kill me in the most frightful manner, 
 should he discover that I had sent to him to come with the 
 sheriff from Texas, he settled down to a persistent watching 
 of the General's every step in camp. The little round 
 opening in the roof of the tent was hardly ever unoccupied 
 now, and woe to me did ever the General and the Captain, 
 as it sometimes happened, approach the vicinity of our tent. 
 It was / who had called them there; they were spying out 
 the best way to cut into the canvas of the tent, to let the 
 sheriff in on him; but I should be made to die a thousand 
 deaths, he said, before they should take him away. 
 
 I sat by, silent, trembling, and hopeless. I had given up 
 all thought of escape, and was fast sinking into a state of 
 utter helplessness. Pinkow was allowed to come into the 
 tent to assist me in cooking, though he had originally been 
 our orderly, and Richard our cook. But the Lieutenant 
 grew so morose that the men all feared him, and Richard, 
 who with Pinkow had built their little tent close beside ours, 
 much to the lieutenant's disgust, was allowed to attend to the 
 lieutenant's horse, while Pinkow attended to our commissary 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 143 
 
 supplies, and brought the mail to our quarters when the 
 mail-rider came in. The letters I wrote to my friends were 
 short and unsatisfactory, to me, at least; for I could write 
 only under my prison-keeper's eye. He read every word 
 of what I wrote, and then sometimes tore the letters up be- 
 fore my face, saying he had detected a hidden meaning in 
 the lines; and sometimes following Pinkow to the door of 
 the tent and destroying them, without my knowledge. Nor 
 did I receive all the letters intended for me; but I knew that 
 my friends were now all in California with the exception of 
 one brother. 
 
 Before the inspector had left, the lieutenant had been noti- 
 fied of the convening of the court-martial at Fort Bayard, 
 during the early part of the following week; and with it 
 another fruitful source of excitement for the lieutenant, of 
 threats and violence for myself, was established. His time 
 was now spent between watching the arrival of the convey- 
 ances bringing in the officers from the different posts, and 
 heaping choice and various curses on their heads. I knew 
 that the sitting of the court-martial would be as much, and 
 more, of a trial for me than for the lieutenant; for at the 
 very worst his judges could not and would not take his life, 
 while the preservation of mine would be highly problem- 
 atical. 
 
 The very first session proved that my theory was correct. 
 The fact alone of his being led to the tent where the officers 
 held their sittings, under guard, was sufficient to arouse his 
 ire; but there was another circumstance which enraged him 
 far more than this. With his characteristic cunning he had 
 
144 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 closely watched the proceedings, in order to find the least 
 loop-hole by which he could escape his sentence, and he 
 was just exulting because an oversight in the initial steps 
 gave him the hope that he could overthrow the whole pro- 
 ceedings of the court, when Quinton Campbell, junior lieu- 
 tenant of the Fifth Infantry, called the attention of the 
 others to the error they were about to commit, or the form 
 they were about to omit. I think Lieutenant Campbell 
 must have seen in the crafty face of the man they were about 
 to try, the quick gleam of malice and satisfaction which an- 
 nounced that he had fastened on something of which he 
 could take advantage. The oaths he heaped on the devoted 
 head of the junior lieutenant when he returned to the tent 
 were fearful, and the threats of vengeance he uttered against 
 one and all of the officers assembled, showed him to be 
 either a fiend or a coward. I think he was both. That I 
 did not sleep on roses that night, I need hardly say; for with 
 all his rage there was mingled that fear that now, since he 
 could not constantly guard me in the tent, I might pluck up 
 courage enough some day to make another attempt at es- 
 cape: and I did but not until I had been frightened and 
 tortured almost into madness. 
 
 The session of the court generally lasted from ten or eleven 
 till three or four o'clock in the afternoon. Pinkow, as I 
 said, was my aid and assistant in house-keeping; and after 
 the lieutenant and I had taken dinner, Pinkow always had 
 his dinner in the tent, and then proceeded to clear off the 
 table, wash dishes, and restore order in the kitchen depart- 
 ment generally. One day the lieutenant returned home 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 145 
 
 earlier than usual, and more frantically mad than ever. 
 Since he could not watch me while he was at the trial, I 
 sometimes ventured to the door of the tent but never out- 
 side; I did not dare to disobey orders so far. This day I 
 had stood at the door full two minutes, looking up at the 
 clear sky, and drinking in the beauty of God's creation. 
 After dinner was over the lieutenant ordered Pinkow to 
 "pack all the stuff over to his own tent, or throw it away; 
 he wanted it no more." Pinkow' s eyes flew over to me 
 involuntarily; he knew the signs of a coming storm as well 
 as I. Then the tent was closed at once, and to my horror 
 the lieutenant drew a hatchet out from under the mattress 
 of the bed, where he must have concealed it while Pinkow 
 was ' ' packing out the stuff. ' ' 
 
 " Kneel down," he commanded, "and fold your hands. 
 I am going to cut your head open." 
 
 I knelt down, but in that short moment my whole life 
 passed before me, and mother's face and the picture of the 
 blue sky and the bright land I had seen only that morning 
 rose up before me with strange vividness. Why had I not 
 escaped that very morning ? Why had I not fled from the 
 camp alone and unobserved, and run till I had reached a 
 hiding-place or dropped dead in my tracks ? I would, if I 
 ever again should see the light of day, I vowed in my heart; 
 no fear, no pride should ever deter me again. All this time 
 I was kneeling before him, my own hands folded, while one 
 of his spanned my throat and the other held the hatchet 
 above me. I knew there was no use resisting, so I fell at 
 last into a stony indifference. I think this saved my life, for 
 
146 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 he thought I was not feeling keenly enough the horrors of 
 my position. Never speaking above a whisper, and moving 
 with the utmost caution, for fear of arousing the suspicion 
 of Pinkow or the guard, he approached the bed, on which 
 lay a piece of sewing upon which I had been engaged in the 
 morning. Lifting it with the helve of the hatchet he flung 
 it into the fire-place, where the coals were still bright. 
 
 ' ' There! ' ' he said, chuckling" let that go first. You'll 
 not need it any more you're going the same way." 
 
 Then he snatched the cover off the table, a note-book 
 lying on it, a little shawl I wore, and an apron all went the 
 same way. Next he reached out for a heavy blanket under 
 which I had hidden the little two-gallon keg, which I knew 
 still contained above a quart of whisky. I had been afraid 
 to empty it out, but had hoped he might forget it in his ex- 
 citement over other affairs. Now it suddenly rolled out, and 
 the hollow noise it made seemed like a death-knell to me. 
 He sprang upon it with ferocious exultation, snatched a 
 tumbler from the chimney-board and filled it with the liquid 
 fire. It was but a short respite for me; the shades of night 
 were falling around the tent, and long, dark hours lay black 
 and death-boding before me. Contrary to all expectation, 
 however, the whisky seemed to lull him to sleep; and, after 
 emptying one glass after the other, he stretched himself on 
 the bed, bidding me lie where he could touch me with his 
 hand, lest I should open the 'tent during his sleep and let the 
 soldiers in to murder him. 
 
 I, too, slept at last, after I had seen the guard-fire blazing 
 up brightly outside, and heard the sentinel relieved at nine 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Tofy." 147 
 
 o'clock at night. What woke me up I never knew, but as 
 I opened my eyes they fell directly on the sharp edge of the 
 hatchet, and the maniac face of my husband grinning fiend- 
 ishly behind it. In a moment it flashed on me that he was 
 taking deliberate aim so as to kill me at the first blow, fear- 
 ing, doubtless, that in my death-agony I should scream for 
 help, if the blow were not planted full in my brain. Before 
 I could move my head, his other hand was grasping my 
 throat and pressing my head back on the pillow; but the 
 struggle, faint as it had been, had changed the position of 
 the weapon in his hand. Then I saw that not only was he 
 trying to get in the most telling blow, but he was also calcu- 
 lating the exact position in which the shadow was thrown on 
 the roof and wall of the tent. He had evidently replenished 
 the fire, as the night was cool, to convince Pinkow and the 
 guard that serenity and harmony prevailed in our tent, and 
 the glitter in the drunken fiend's eye was hardly less cruel 
 than the glint of the cold steel of the hatchet. I raised my 
 hand imploringly, and tried to speak. 
 
 " Not a word out of you," he hissed into my ear with an 
 oath. ' ' I can cut you into little pieces before the guard can 
 get into the tent, and I'm going to do it. So much you get 
 for asking for a guard to protect you. Then I am going to 
 roast you alive, for telling the Judge- Advocate all about 
 me." 
 
 And he pressed my head back, and again took aim. 
 Presently he laughed, shifted his position and declared he 
 didn' t want my brains spattered all over his hands, like the 
 dog's, and putting his heavy hand. on my forehead he 
 
148 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 brought the hatchet within an inch of my throat, making 
 the motion of drawing it across and across. 
 
 " Steady," I heard him mutter, "steady." 
 
 Wheather he meant the admonition for himself or for me, 
 I never knew; but after a moment's balancing he rolled 
 over, the hatchet fell from his nerveless hand on my breast, 
 and in a moment more he slept the heavy, sottish sleep of 
 the drunkard. Hardly daring to breathe, I lay with my 
 eyes wide open, praying for daylight to come, and for some 
 helpful hand to lead me from this dark, dreadful tent, and 
 out of the dreary, desolate graveyard of a country. 
 
 At last the day dawned; Pinkow called to the lieutenant 
 what hour it was, and when he saw from the lieutenant's 
 looks that this gentleman had slept all night with his clothes 
 on, he knew that the remnant of whisky had been found. 
 Coming in to light the fire, he started back when his eyes 
 fell upon me; and well he might, for when I approached the 
 little mirror over the chimney-board, I saw that there were 
 white hairs among the brown on my head. Without a word 
 Pinkow placed breakfast on the table, carried the two chairs 
 from the back part of the tent to the front, where the table 
 was laid, and started to go, taking up a tin dish with a great 
 deal of racket, I thought. 
 
 ' ' Fresh beef at the commissary this morning, ' ' he ex- 
 plained, ' ' and I mean to cook a real nice broth for the lieu- 
 tenant to-day." 
 
 I thought the remark a little ambiguous, but the lieuten- 
 ant seemed to take it in good faith. 
 
 Pinkow had not returned when the guard came to lead 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby," 149 
 
 the lieutenant to the court session. Glad of an excuse to 
 get, if only a few feet distant, away from my tormentor, I 
 busied myself with the preparations for dinner, leaving the 
 table laid for Pinkow' s breakfast. When the guard tapped 
 at the tent-door I turned to call the lieutenant's attention to 
 the summons, and he had just time enough to shake his 
 clenched fist in my face and vow to " have my heart's blood 
 to-night, ' ' before leaving the tent. Pinkow must have lain 
 in wait somewhere behind the tent, for he stood before me 
 as soon as the lieutenant's back was turned. 
 
 " I have summoned Mrs. Mack to come to you," he said. 
 ' ' To be sure, she is only the laundress, but she can tell you 
 how you look this morning, and what you are coming to. ' ' 
 
 " I can see it myself, Pinkow," I replied, "and I made a 
 vow to myself last night that I will go from here, on foot, if 
 necessary, into the mountains where the Indians can catch 
 me anything rather than stay here another night. ' ' 
 
 And I told him of what had taken place in that tent since 
 our late dinner of yesterday. 
 
 Mrs. Mack came into the tent while I was talking; she 
 cried out at my changed appearance it was weeks since I 
 had last seen the good woman and heaped curses, loud and 
 deep from her Irish heart, on the lieutenant's head. 
 
 "Let me go to the Captain," she urged "he'll come 
 the minute you send for him." 
 
 "No, no! " I cried, "not yet. Let us consider first what 
 we had better do. And Pinkow, ' ' I added, the fear of the 
 household tyrant still uppermost in my mind, ' ' put the beef- 
 soup on the fire; it is after eleven o'clock: he will scold if 
 
150 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 
 
 everything is not ready when he comes. ' ' I must add that 
 our cooking facilities were not ample, and one dish had to be 
 cooked after the other. 
 
 ' ' Curse the lieutenant, ' ' Pinkow blurted out. ' * I beg 
 your pardon, Madam, for my rudeness. But where is the 
 large knife, then, to take out this bone with? " 
 
 He searched the table for the knife without avail. He 
 went to his tent to hunt, without success. We looked in the 
 ashes of the cook-fire, but it was not there. Then a sudden 
 thought flashed through my brain. I raised the mattress of 
 the bed; there lay the knife, in all its hideous sharpness of 
 edge and breadth of blade. 
 
 Mrs. Mack screamed in fright, and Pinkow set his teeth. 
 
 1 'And now, madam ? ' ' 
 
 " I am going, Pinkow." 
 
 But how ? was the next question. I had no doubt the 
 captain would help me, and I was determined to leave the 
 camp before night; but I did not want the captain to call on 
 me at our quarters, nor would I go to the laundress' quarters 
 to meet him. I did not want even the sun above us to see 
 that any preparations were making for flight I had such a 
 dread of exciting the lieutenant's suspicion. But I was fully 
 roused at last, and would kill him before he should get me 
 into his power again. In the meantime, the precious mo- 
 ments were slipping by. Mrs. Mack combed out my long, 
 tangled hair, and bathed my face as she would have done a 
 child's, while Pinkow had gone to have the captain sum- 
 moned from the court-room, and hold council with him. 
 When he returned, the final steps were decided on, and, 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 151 
 
 with many parting adjurations not to abandon my resolve, 
 Mrs. Mack left the tent shortly before the lieutenant was 
 expected to return. 
 
 I saw his face darken as he approached. 
 
 " Seems to me you are keeping open house to-day; looks 
 very inviting," he snarled, pointing to the flaps of the tent, 
 which Pinkow had fastened away back, leaving the front of 
 the tent as open as possible. 
 
 ' ' Madam had a headache this morning, and the sun is so 
 pleasant that I fastened the canvas back like that," and al- 
 ready Pinkow was bustling around, placing dinner on the 
 table, and setting the chairs. 
 
 "I've cooked you a nice broth, lieutenant, as I prom- 
 ised," he continued, ladling out the soup, and then leaving 
 the tent as if he had forgotten something outside. 
 
 My heart beat with great heavy throbs as I sat opposite 
 to the lieutenant at the table, and as I scanned the haggard 
 face and drawn features before me, I almost felt the old pity 
 creep into my heart again. But he raised his eyes at that 
 moment, and all the pity went out of my heart, as he asked, 
 fiercely: 
 
 ' ' Why do you look at me ? They haven' t got me yet, 
 but I'll get you first." 
 
 The gleam in his eye was as cruel as the flash of the knife 
 I had discovered that morning, and my purpose became 
 more firm than ever. Just as we were about to leave the 
 table, Mrs. Mack tapped at the tent-pole punctual to the 
 second and innocently asked if she could speak a few 
 words to the lieutenant. 
 
152 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 "Come in, Mrs. Mack," I said; and really my voice did 
 not tremble, nor did I change color, though I knew that 
 now the time had come. 
 
 I had invited her to a seat on the bed, and while she was 
 addressing the lieutenant in regard to some little favor she 
 pretended to want shown her when he should be returned to 
 duty, I placed his chair facing her, and with his back to the 
 entrance or front of the tent. While she was still speaking, 
 Pinkow entered the tent, and rising from the chair I had 
 been occupying near the lieutenant's, I said, half aloud: 
 
 ' ' Why, poor Pinkow has no chair to sit at the table, ' ' 
 picking up my own chair as if to7place it at the table for 
 him. 
 
 And I did. I set the chair down quite noisily, whisper- 
 ing to Pinkow: 
 
 ' ' I am going now, ' ' and the next moment I had gathered 
 my skirts close around me, glided softly from the open tent, 
 and was flying swiftly down the lane which the tents of the 
 1 ' L " company soldiers formed to the left of our quarters. 
 
 At the very first tent stood Corporal Cook, who pointed 
 silently in the direction of Mrs. Mack's bell-shaped tent, for 
 I had been so confined and guarded that I knew only the 
 general direction of her tent. I had never yet seen it. In 
 an instant there were footsteps resounding on all sides of me. 
 At a signal from the corporal there were suddenly soldiers in 
 front of me to lead the way, soldiers beside me to guard my 
 steps, soldiers behind me to avert any possible pursuit. In 
 two minutes I had reached my harbor of refuge; a shout 
 went up on the outside of the tent as I sank down on a pile 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 153 
 
 of fresh-laundried clothes, and an answering shout came 
 from the direction from which I had just fled. Dennis Mack 
 sprang forward from the depths of the tent, and Mulhall, 
 the blacksmith, stood in the door. 
 
 "What is it, Mulhall?" I asked, wildly; "why do the 
 men shout so ? " 
 
 "It's because you are safe out of that tent," he replied, 
 and he threw back the flap of the tent. "See the men 
 have drawn a complete cordon around this tent, and twenty 
 of them are guarding the lieutenant from breaking through 
 his lines." 
 
 "For God's sake let them guard him well!" I panted; 
 and just then Mrs. Mack came speeding along almost as 
 swift of foot as I had come. 
 
 She, too, flung herself on a pile of clothes, gasping for 
 breath, and fanning herself vigorously with her apron. 
 Dennis stood helpless between us. 
 
 "Bridget," he asked in great concern, "Bridget dear, 
 sure you're not kilt? " 
 
 "It's kilt I am inthirely, Dinny," she replied. " Och! 
 the murtherin, black-hearted divil!" shaking her fist toward 
 the tent I had just deserted; "but it was me he wanted to 
 kill, too, whin he found his wife had got away." 
 
 And she proceeded to relate how the shout of the soldiers 
 had first called the lieutenant's attention away from her. 
 
 "Where's my wife?" he had asked, turning with quick 
 apprehension to the front of the tent. Then with a fearful 
 oath he had sprung upon her, accusing her of conspiring 
 against him, and helping me off; and only the timely 
 
154 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 interference of the guard outside had saved her from his 
 clutches. Once outside, she took time to relieve her feel- 
 ings by informing him that she had helped his wife to get 
 away from him, and then made for her tent, while the lieu- 
 tenant was checked by the guard, and reminded that he 
 must not leave his quarters. 
 
 "But I want my wife," he had insisted; to which the 
 guard replied that he thought he had seen me walking 
 toward the sutler-store. 
 
 "Then I'm going to follow her!" and he made the 
 attempt, but the clicking of the carbine in the sentinel's 
 hands, and his decided " Halt! or I fire!" had brought him 
 to his senses, while the threatening faces he saw all around 
 him proved that one more step would be fatal to him. 
 Then he turned at bay; and calling Pinkow, he ordered 
 him to bid me return at once, or suffer the consequences. 
 Giving the men a sign to take him inside, so that he should 
 not see the direction he took, Pinkow came straightway to 
 the tent of the laundress, and reported the proceedings. 
 He threw his cap high in air as he cried: 
 
 ' ' I promised to cook the lieutenant a fine broth to-day, 
 and, please the Lord, I've done it." 
 
 ' ' Shall we hang the lieutenant ? ' ' Mulhall asked earnestly, 
 "we'll do it in a minute. Or shoot him ? though shooting 
 is too good for him, and we'd prefer to hang him, and we'll 
 do it, whether or no, if he ever tries to approach you again. ' ' 
 
 I strove to quiet their ardor: but for the captain's approach 
 just then I don't know what might have been done. Those 
 in the tent fell back respectfully, and after a short interview 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 155 
 
 the captain left to consult with the other officers in regard 
 to the best course to pursue, as I had expressed my determi- 
 nation not to remain in the same place with that madman 
 overnight. I wanted, if possible, to set out with as many 
 men as could be spared toward Fort Bowie, (Apache Pass) 
 and so by way of Arizona into California, where most of my 
 friends were now living. After half an hour's deliberation, 
 the officers decided that I could not go that way. Fort 
 Bowie was something over a hundred miles from there, the 
 way lying through the worst part of the Indian-infested 
 country, and the highest number of men they could give me 
 would be only twenty-five partly infantry at that. So it 
 was decided that I should retrace the road I had once 
 before traveled toward Santa Fe. At Fort Union it was 
 thought that I might still find General Alexander and wife, 
 who were going in with a military train of which the 
 General had command. 
 
 The captain brought me kind messages from all his 
 brother- officers. I had their sympathy and their respect, 
 and had I been revengeful I might have triumphed over my 
 persecutor in advance, for I knew that he would be ulti- 
 mately expelled from their ranks. But there was no re- 
 vengeful feeling in my breast then, for when it was decided 
 that I should again have six men and a sergeant for escort, 
 with Pinkow to wait on me, I nearly broke the poor fellow's 
 heart by imploring him to stay behind and wait on the lieu- 
 tenant. I knew that he would fare badly among all these 
 hostile men, and I knew that Pinkow would keep his 
 promise, if I got it, to treat him well. 
 
156 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 A number of the commanding-officers of the posts 
 through which I should have to pass were assembled at the 
 court-martial, and therefore the letter which the captain 
 gave me was addressed to those whom they had left in com- 
 mand. Whatever request or instructions the letter con- 
 tained I never knew. It had been placed in my hand open, 
 but I had not been bidden to read it. It was returned to 
 me by each commanding officer on my road, and retained by 
 the last. It secured me new escort, fresh ambulance-mules, 
 and every possible kindness and attention I could wish for; 
 but I never read the magic words. 
 
 The sun was sinking when the ambulance drove up to Mrs. 
 Mack's tent. The captain had insisted on having at least 
 my trunk and side-saddle brought from the lieutenant's tent, 
 though I wanted to leave everything behind, and not let 
 him know I had left camp at all. 
 
 "He will follow me this very night, captain, I know he 
 will," I protested "you know how he did the last time." 
 
 The captain smiled his quiet smile. 
 
 " The lieutenant taught me a lesson then. He will not 
 follow you again; at least, not to-night. I will promise you 
 that." 
 
 And when Pinkow came with the men bearing the trunk, 
 he said that the lieutenant was lying on the bed, a guard 
 with drawn revolver sitting at the foot, a sentinel pacing up 
 and down in front of the tent, another at the back, and 
 ' ' L " Company men all around the tent waiting and hoping 
 for him to attempt an escape. 
 
 The trunk was lifted into the ambulance; the men kept 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 157 
 
 piling in stores of blankets, bread, tea, sugar, coffee though 
 the captain had had a mess-chest placed inside, and a lunch- 
 basket well filled besides, with a pair of his own blankets 
 spread on the seat. Richard instead of Pinkow sat beside 
 the driver; the captain came to bid me a last farewell and 
 "good-speed," and just as the first shadows of the 
 coming night fell on the earth, I passed slowly and for 
 ever from out the tents and soldiers' quarters of Fort 
 Bayard. 
 
 At the captain's quarters stood assembled the officers who 
 formed the court-martial, with uncovered heads, ready to bid 
 me farewell. But I knew that the rumbling of the ambu- 
 lance fell like the wheels of the juggernaut-car on the heart 
 of the wretched man in the tent close by, and bidding the 
 driver in half-stifled tones not to stop, I passed slowly along 
 the line of officers. The last I saw through my tears was a 
 cloud of waving handkerchiefs and hats raised aloft; then 
 the ambulance made a sharp turn, and I pressed my hands 
 to my face and cried bitterly. But I was not left long to my 
 grief; a rush of footsteps behind the ambulance caused the 
 driver to look back. It was Pinkow and Mulhall with more 
 blankets, more bread, more canned fruit and renewed in- 
 junctions to Richard to take good care of me. 
 
 "And, Madam," urged Mulhall, "suppose you let Ser- 
 geant Horine repeat his instructions to you, just to impress 
 it well on the minds of the men, you know." 
 
 "Very well," I said, willing to humor them all, for I 
 knew they wanted me to feel safe. The ambulance halted; 
 the sergeant rode up. 
 
158 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 
 
 "Sergeant," I said, "I should like to know what your 
 instructions are." 
 
 " My orders are to escort the ambulance to Fort Selden, 
 and shoot the first man who approaches madam against her 
 wish." 
 
 Mulhall was satisfied; Pinkow wiped the tears from his 
 face, and they both said good-by for the last time. 
 
 The grey dawn was breaking when we entered Fort Cum- 
 mings. The commanding officer was instantly aroused, and 
 he promised at my request to put on double guard while I 
 remained at the post. It was only to sleep for a few hours, 
 and the men, who declared that their horses were still quite 
 fresh, were ready to go on. They were to go only to Fort 
 Selden; for, since it was open flight this time, I could ask 
 without hesitation everywhere for the means to carry it out 
 successfully, and I was confident that Sergeant Horine's 
 orders would be reissued to the men at every post. 
 
 When we had emerged from Magdalena Pass, Richard 
 insisted on calling a halt. He wanted to cook a cup of 
 coffee for his madam for the last time, and the least I could 
 do for him was to gratify this very reasonable wish. I left 
 the ambulance, and the escort dismounted. A fire soon 
 blazed up, with the water hissing above it. I was seated on 
 a little knoll, watching the road we had come, almost invol- 
 untarily, when Richard came up; in his hand a large white 
 cup from the captain's mess-chest. The wind blew back his 
 bushy hair, revealing a long, badly- healed gash on his fore- 
 head a souvenir from the swamps of Richmond; and a 
 deep scar on his cheek, a memento of the Vicksburg 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 159 
 
 trenches, lost itself in the waves of his heavy beard. But 
 there were tears in the big man's eyes, and as they trickled 
 slowly into his mustache, he said in a broken voice: 
 
 ''It's the last cup of coffee I shall ever cook for my 
 madam. And and I'm so glad you're going away." 
 
 He laid the cup down and turned away; and while I drank 
 it, more than one tear fell into the coffee. 
 
 If her husband had suddenly been promoted brigadier- 
 general, my friend at Fort Selden could not have been more 
 delighted than when she discovered me in my ambulance. 
 That my new escort was fully instructed as to its duty by her 
 husband, I need hardly say. 
 
 I hurried through from post to post as fast as I could; for 
 though the guards were doubled wherever I stopped, and I 
 was assured everywhere that the lieutenant could not possi- 
 bly escape from Fort Bayard, I thought my own thoughts, 
 knowing the man better than any one else. My fears 
 grew when we left the chain of military posts behind, and, 
 nearing Albuquerque, we were sometimes compelled to stop 
 overnight at some Mexican village, or lonely adobe house, 
 along the Rio Grande. At such times my escort did guard 
 duty, patrolling in front of the door of the casa the whole 
 night through. Fortunately these casa possess only one 
 door, as a general thing; the window, if there is any, being 
 high up in the wall on the same side of the house with the 
 door. Only in one house there was a small window oppo- 
 site the door, and on this occasion both sides of the house 
 were guarded. Still I did not feel safe, and looked around 
 the room in search of something I could hurl at the 
 
160 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 lieutenant's head should it suddenly appear through the 
 little narrow window. 
 
 Now, if the window itself was rather an American feature 
 of this casa, the deposit of bottles I discovered in one corner, 
 under an old mat, added considerably to the coloring. 
 They seemed a perfect godsend to me, however, and on the 
 bench in front of my bed I set up a perfect battery of empty 
 bottles. I remember them very distinctly, for a bottle which 
 had once contained some sort of bitters, of stout glass in the 
 shape of a primitive cabin, seemed the most powerful weapon 
 of defence to me, and I patted it lovingly ere I stood it up in 
 front of me. Then came black bottles that might have 
 contained whiskey or wine in their day common bottles 
 enough, I dare say, and perhaps never before looked upon 
 with such satisfaction and affection. 
 
 Then we reached the crossing of the Rio Grande, seven 
 or eight miles before entering Albuquerque, and here we 
 found fresh trouble in store. The river had overflowed and 
 swept down stream the large scow that served for a ferry- 
 boat, leaving us helpless and unable to cross the stream. 
 
 There was no possibility of fording the stream at this 
 place and this season. To me this misfortune seemed 
 doubly great, as I knew that the overland stage was nearly 
 due here at the crossing, and nothing could shake my belief 
 that that miserable man had got away from Fort Bayard, 
 and was in the stage. 
 
 I descended from the ambulance, and mounted one of the 
 horses, and together with the sergeant rode up and down 
 the river-bank to see if we could discover any trace of boat, 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Tody." 161 
 
 skiff, or canoe. I would have encouraged the men to 
 "press" anything in this shape, without a moment's hesita- 
 tion. Away on the other side of the river we could discern 
 a hovel of some kind, the habitation of the ferry-man, 
 perhaps, when there was a ferry; and my men bethought 
 them of firing off pistols and carbines, and waving handker- 
 chiefs and blankets in order to make any one who might be 
 over there understand that we wanted to be helped across. 
 
 The moments flew. I feared that darkness would over- 
 take us there, and that dreaded stage-coach might come in 
 sight at any time. At last the sergeant consented to com- 
 ply with my wish, which was nothing more or less than I 
 should be allowed to mount one of the soldiers' horses, and, 
 accompanied by the sergeant, should swim the stream. 
 
 "It is as much as your life is worth, Madam," he re- 
 monstrated; "of course the horse will swim, but your head 
 will swim, too, and you can never hold yourself on the 
 horse. ' ' 
 
 * ' But I can slide off, ' ' I suggested, ' ' and hold on to his 
 tail, and he will drag me across in that manner." 
 
 I don't remember where I had picked up this piece of 
 wisdom, but I was determined to try this novel method 
 rather than stay on this side the river. 
 
 The sergeant had already advanced quite a distance from 
 the shore ahead of me, when a shout from the men called us 
 back, and they pointed to a black speck moving toward us 
 from the other side. It proved to be a tiny canoe, in which, 
 on nearer approach, were discovered a Mexican and an 
 Indian, both of whom sprang out of the craft when a few 
 
1 62 Flight: A Sequel to " 
 
 hundred yards from the shore, and hauled the vessel in after 
 them out of the current, which was very strong. Quickly 
 the soldiers helped them land the boat and clean it out, 
 after which I was helped into it, and cautioned not to stir. 
 There was barely room for the sergeant beside myself and 
 the two dark-faced Charons. For many yards both of them 
 waded in the water, the one guiding the boat, the other 
 pushing. 
 
 The current was strong, the river fully a mile across, and 
 there was water, water, everywhere around me. I closed 
 my eyes when the two ferry-men, after many shouts and re- 
 sponses, at last got into the canoe. As we approached the 
 middle of the stream I could feel the current drawing us 
 swiftly down the river, and when I felt the sergeant moving 
 in the boat, and heard his voice mingling loudly with that 
 of our pilot, I dropped my hands from my face and looked 
 fearlessly out over the water. I saw that the boat had 
 drifted far down the stream; but I saw the ambulance still in 
 the same place on the other shore, and the waving of handker- 
 chiefs proved that we were closely watched by the faithful 
 men we had left behind. With hands tightly clasped, I sat 
 perfectly still. No need to make the burden resting on the 
 sergeant's shoulders heavier than it was, by showing fear or 
 lack of courage. If he had risked his life to carry me safely 
 over, I would certainly show no fear for mine. 
 
 At last the other shore was reached. The low adobe hut 
 was barely discernible a mile above us, and to this we had to 
 retrace our steps, as it was the ferry-man's abode, and there 
 we should have landed. Inside we found his wife, (a dark 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 163 
 
 Mexican) and one child. Here I was to remain till the ser- 
 geant, mounted on an old mule belonging to the ferry-man, 
 should return from Albuquerque with an ambulance and es- 
 cort. There was no fear but what he would return in the 
 shortest possible time, and with everything he wanted, for 
 he carried the magic letter with him. What I dreaded was, 
 that the overland stage should come while the sergeant was 
 gone. In vain he explained to me that the high water 
 throughout would probably detain the stage from reaching 
 this crossing; that the stage could not float over; that the 
 soldiers on the other side would not let any of the passen- 
 gers cross; and that he had instructed the ferry-men not to 
 cross the river again until he, the sergeant, had returned. 
 As the military generally ruled supreme in the territory, the 
 ferry-men, I knew, would obey the sergeant. I knew, also, 
 that the soldiers would recognize the lieutenant even in dis- 
 guise, and would shoot him down with a great deal of pleas- 
 ure, should he try to get over before they had seen the Al- 
 buquerque ambulance depart with me in safety. 
 
 Still, I sat in fear and trembling in that low adobe room, 
 trying to speak pleasantly to the brown-faced woman and 
 the little child, but listening intently for splash of oars or 
 tramp of horses, and counting the minutes that must pass 
 before the sergeant could return. After all, he came sooner 
 than I expected. The ambulance was drawn by four mules, 
 panting and sweating from the violent run of an hour; and 
 out of the ambulance sprang Captain Cain, of the Third. 
 His wife was waiting for me, he said had been waiting for 
 me ever since the time I had passed through Albuquerque 
 
1 64 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 
 
 a prisoner in the hands of my own husband. In fact, he 
 said, they had all been looking for me; and at Fort Union, 
 from whence he had just returned after attending court- 
 martial there, they had been expecting for weeks to hear of 
 my death or my flight. 
 
 It is almost needless to say how kindly the captain and 
 his young wife cared for me, and how much they wanted 
 that I should stay and rest at least one day. The captain, 
 occupying the adobe house in town, had soldiers from the 
 barracks stationed in and about the place and sentinels 
 paced all night long in front of the room which Mrs. Cain 
 and I occupied. But I could not rest. 
 
 ' ' I know he will follow me let me go on, ' ' was my con- 
 stant refrain. 
 
 And on I went none too soon as it afterward proved. 
 
 Nearing Algadones the following day, the ambulance- 
 driver suddenly drew up in the road, pointing to a com- 
 fortable adobe with broad veranda in front. 
 
 ".The General," he said; and I ordered him at once to 
 drive up to the house. 
 
 General Carlton spoke so kindly to me, that the tears 
 sprang to my eyes, as he held my hand and looked into my 
 worn face. 
 
 "You are almost home now," he said. "Mrs. Alex- 
 ander is waiting for you at Fort Union, and you will find 
 everything ready provided for your journey in with her and 
 her husband." 
 
 " Mrs. Alexander! " I repeated; " waiting for me " 
 
 "Yes," he replied; "for when the general, on his return 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby." 165 
 
 from his tour of inspection, told her what he had heard and 
 seen at Fort Bayard, she insisted that the marching of the 
 general's command should be delayed, so sure was she that 
 you would make your escape and try to return to your 
 friends in the East. So go with God; I could not place 
 you in better hands than those of General Alexander and 
 wife; and I will see that you are not pursued or harassed 
 any more." 
 
 Santa Fe* was almost deserted when I got there. All the 
 officers of Fort Marcy, except Captain Hawly, were still at 
 Fort Union; and as I had the best of mules and swiftest of 
 horses, I reached Fort Union in an incredibly short time. 
 
 I shall never, while life lasts, forget the sensation of rest 
 and relief which I felt when my eyes fell for the first time on 
 Mrs. Alexander's face. It had so happened that I had 
 never met or become acquainted with the general and his 
 wife. They had not crossed the plains with our command, 
 coming into Fort Union long after we had left it for Fort 
 Bayard. But neither of us remembered that we had never 
 been introduced, when tired, worn, and sorrowful, I was 
 lifted from the ambulance in front of the general's quarters. 
 Mrs. Alexander came to meet me; and when she looked 
 into my face I don't know what expression she saw there, 
 but she laid her arm around my neck, and as I rested my 
 head for a moment on her shoulder, she whispered: 
 
 " I want you to think you have just come home to a sister 
 now. I will care for you and be to you as to one of my 
 own." 
 
 And she kept her word. If ever an angel descended 
 
1 66 Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 
 
 from heaven to live upon earth, it was that woman. Long 
 years have passed since then, but the memory of that hour 
 has never grown dim. 
 
 And now it only remains for me to tell you how, when 
 we reached Fort Lyons with the general's command, an ex- 
 press rider followed him to say that the lieutenant had 
 escaped from Fort Bayard the day after the court-martial 
 had adjourned; had been arrested at Fort Selden, and 
 placed under guard; had escaped to Albuquerque, been re- 
 arrested and placed in irons; had here called upon the civil 
 authorities, always at variance with the military powers, and 
 had been set free; had then proceeded to Fort Union where 
 he was now safe. He could follow us no farther; but later 
 I learned that a medical commission had been called, who 
 had pronounced him insane, and advised the authorities to 
 send him to a lunatic asylum. But again he called upon the 
 civil authorities; found some lawyer, with little else to do, to 
 " defend his case," and managed to go unharmed as usual. 
 
 Then the proceedings of the court-martial were returned 
 from Washington, unapproved, because of some flaw this 
 same lawyer had managed to pick in them with the lieuten- 
 ant's aid, and the other officers had still to tolerate him 
 until a second court-martial could be called. In the mean- 
 time, in the regular routine he had advanced one step on the 
 army register; but by the second court-martial he was sen- 
 tenced to be cashiered the service. The sentence was ap- 
 proved at Washington; the officers were but too glad to 
 expel him from their brotherhood, and I have never learned 
 in what corner of the earth he lives or lies buried. 
 
Flight: A Sequel to "Toby" 167 
 
 But to you, dear Delia, I had always intended giving the 
 satisfaction of an explanation ever since the time when you 
 were in danger of being looked upon as a keeper of a crazy 
 woman. Do you remember the incident ? It was shortly 
 after I had come to board at good Mrs. B.'s, and you were 
 kind enough to accompany me in some of my wanderings, 
 in quest of something to do. I had just been promised a 
 position as language teacher, at one of our public schools; 
 and though to me the thought of having to live between the 
 cold, white walls of a dreary school-room, day in and day 
 out, was anything but enticing, I still had reason to thank 
 my stars that I had found employment, and a means of in- 
 dependent livelihood so soon. 
 
 You remember that a troop of cavalry passed the door of 
 the building where the rooms of the Board of Education 
 were then situated soldiers being rather more plentiful, all 
 over the union, than they are now. But there was an officer 
 mounted on a white horse at the head of this column, and, 
 just as they passed the door, the bugle sounded the cavalry- 
 call, and the whole troop went off on a trot. 
 
 Soldiers! Cavalry! A white horse! A flood of memo- 
 ries swept through my heart bitter thoughts of the past, 
 and what might have been and while you stood by, dis- 
 tressed and uncertain what to do, I sat crouched down on 
 the lowest step of the hall-door, my shoulders swaying back 
 and forth, my hands pressed over my face, and, as the bugle 
 call grew fainter in the distance, I still sobbed aloud : 
 
 "Oh, Toby! Toby! Poor Toby! Poor Toby!" 
 
A MINER FROM ARIZONA. 
 
A MINER FROM ARIZONA. 
 
 SHE had met him in the hall twice before that day un- 
 mistakably a fresh arrival, dressed, from the hat to the boots, 
 in new store clothes, bought ready-made, without much 
 judgment or taste as to fit or material. When he walked it 
 was with a deliberate, rather shambling, but by no means 
 heavy step; when he stood still it was with feet wide apart, 
 and a general air of surveying a big stretch of country around 
 him, calmly expectant, half alert, half indifferent too dis- 
 creet to court danger, but conscious of the power to do it 
 battle. Not an old man, and a handsome man withal, his 
 beard blanched from exposure more than age, and the lines 
 in his face speaking of hardships and much solitary life. 
 
 He had planted himself with his back against the balus- 
 trade surrounding the stairway, and waited for her approach, 
 without the slightest tone of disrespect, but evidently with 
 the intention of addressing her. Such a heart-hungry, long- 
 ing look as there was in his large eyes of bluish-grey such 
 an expression of being lost and alone here, in the large, 
 strange city, more than ever he had been on his wildest, 
 most solitary prospecting trip. Uncovering his head, he 
 said: 
 
 "Excuse me, madam" (which proved him a Southerner 
 a Yankee would have said Miss), "but I have seen you 
 several times since I came here, and don' t know anyone else 
 
172 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 to ask : Is this really the Worthington House, or not ? I 
 can' t get any kind of satisfaction from the lady I rented my 
 room of." 
 
 "This is the Worthington House; yes, sir." 
 
 " How comes she to say, then, that she is not my old 
 pardner's wife ? Old Worthington told me, years ago, that 
 if I ever came to San Francisco, I must stop at his wife's 
 fine lodging house, on Kearny Street. The house is fine 
 enough; I haven't seen anything finer in Arizona" a 
 humorous smile lit up his face "but that" indicating the 
 parlor with a bend of his head " ain't old Worthington' s 
 wife, and I know it." 
 
 " You are right; the present landlady purchased the place 
 of Mrs. Smith, who bought out Mrs. Worthington several 
 years ago. Perhaps Mrs. Ward feared to lose you as a 
 roomer if she disclosed the fact at once that she was an utter 
 stranger to Mrs. Worthington, or anyone connected with 
 her. 
 
 "Reckon I'll stay here now," he decided, after meditat- 
 ing, "seeing that I've got comfortably fixed, and found 
 someone to talk to. You are the lady that paints the pic- 
 tures ? ' ' pointing to a door at the end of the hall, where a sign 
 announced that portraits were painted in oil and water- colors. 
 He moved slowly up to the door and contemplated a num- 
 ber of small portraits, mostly of actresses in elegant costumes, 
 which were displayed in one large frame. He regarded the 
 bright, graceful figures for a while, and then turned to his 
 amused companion. 
 
 "What's the reason," he asked, with blunt directness, 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 173 
 
 pointing with his finger to the frame, " that these women, 
 and most all the women I see on the street, have got such 
 bright, pretty dresses, and things on them, and you only 
 wear a black gown like that? I didn't hurt your feelings, 
 did I ? " he asked, apprehensively, as he saw the laughing, 
 hazel eyes suddenly droop, and tears gather on the long 
 lashes. "Indeed, I didn't mean to and you so kind to 
 me. Why, I'm not fit to be a white man," he continued in 
 self-abasement; " I' m worse than an Indian to go and do 
 such a thing as that." 
 
 " I know you did not mean to give me pain," she replied, 
 softly. ' ' How could you know ? It was my little sister 
 who died about eight months ago, and I am wearing mourn- 
 ing for her. Don't you understand ? " 
 
 ' ' Where is your mother ? " he asked presently. 
 
 "Dead," was the reply. 
 
 "And your father?" 
 
 ' ' He died two years ago in Napa. He failed in a quick- 
 silver mining enterprise, and died of a broken spirit, I think, 
 rather than a broken heart." 
 
 The hungry look in the man's face had changed to one of 
 intense curiosity. He was not yet satisfied; it was, perhaps, 
 the old prospector's instinct that urged him to push investi- 
 gations further. Perhaps, too, he had never struck just 
 such a ' ' lead ' ' before. 
 
 ' * Brothers ? " he continued the examination. 
 
 " None," she answered, smiling in spite of herself. "No 
 relatives in the world that I know of, and no friends at 
 least none in this part of the world. ' ' 
 
174 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 She had opened the door to enter her studio, but noting 
 the face of her new friend fall suddenly back into the old 
 dreary expression, a quick pain touched her heart that any 
 being should be more forlorn than she herself had been. 
 
 " Come into my studio," she said, "and I will show you 
 my little sister's picture painted by myself, from memory." 
 
 There were different pieces leaning against the wall in 
 various stages of progress and completion simpering faces 
 of fat old dowagers, toned down into something like human- 
 ity by the touch of a genial brush; faces of lovely women, 
 and handsome bearded men; but on an easel rested a flower- 
 piece, the creamy yellow and velvety red of the rose mingled 
 there with the sky-blue of the forget-me-not. A reflection 
 of the warm, rich coloring seemed to flash across the 
 stranger's features as he planted himself in front of the 
 picture. 
 
 "My stars, but that's fine!" he explained, with quite 
 unlooked for animation. A rapid, half contemptutous 
 glance swept the line of portraits. "I shouldn't bother 
 with those things if I could paint like that, ' ' pointing to the 
 flowers. 
 
 A weary sigh escaped the lady's lips. 
 
 " I paint those flowers only for recreation; the portraits 
 pay better, and are a surer source of income to me." 
 
 He cast a keen look around the room. It was plainly 
 furnished, though tastefully decorated. 
 
 " Must cost lots of money," he said, "although it's only 
 a back room." 
 
 " No doubt the landlady has made him sensible of the 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 175 
 
 value of a front room," she commented, inwardly. Then 
 she said: 
 
 " Not that so much; but I still have debts to pay, con- 
 tracted during the lingering illness of my poor little sister. 
 Afterward I can indulge my own taste more than at 
 present. ' ' 
 
 She pointed to a miniature suspended near the easel a 
 small body, but a head of ideal beauty. 
 
 " Was she a cripple ? " he asked, hastily. 
 
 ' ' Helplessly so. I lifted her from the bed to the lounge, 
 and back again, to the day of her death. ' ' 
 
 "And now mourning for her like that ! She must have 
 been no end of trouble and expense to you." 
 
 She looked at him a moment, with gentle pity in her eyes. 
 
 ' ' Have you never had any one to love any one whom 
 you had to care for? Don't you know that it is the purest 
 joy we can find on earth to know that we are all in all to 
 some one who is entirely dependent upon us " 
 
 She hesitated and blushed. What right had she to be 
 lecturing this man, a stranger to her? He had regarded 
 her silently, and with a new light breaking in his eyes. 
 
 " You're a mighty good woman," he said, with his usual 
 directness. " Seems to me you are like my mother." 
 
 " Where is she ?" 
 
 "Dead, I reckon." 
 
 "And allow me to return some of your own questions 
 have you no other relatives ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Yes, dozens. Brothers and sisters some in Arkansaw 
 and some in Texas, some in the 'nation,' and some back 
 
176 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 in Georgy, whar we were all bo'n." He had imperceptibly 
 fallen into his native dialect during the recount. Recover- 
 ing himself, he went on, as if in half apology, ' ' But I never 
 hear from them nowadays. The half of them may be dead 
 for all I know." 
 
 "And you are on your way now to hunt up as many of 
 them as you can still find ? ' ' 
 
 "Oh, Lord, no!" 
 
 It was said with such sincere horror that she repressed a 
 laugh with difficulty. 
 
 " I came in from Arizona to see what I could do here 
 with several mines I have in the Territory; some of them 
 terribly rich, too. If I can sell, or only bond, them before 
 I go back, I don't care if I buy half a dozen of your pic- 
 tures myself. Flower-pictures, I mean, ' ' he added, hastily. 
 " I don't want .any of the old women you've painted here." 
 
 There was no use struggling any longer; she must laugh, 
 in spite of herself the merriest, heartiest laugh she had 
 indulged in for many a long day while he stood by, calm 
 and unmoved, neither offended nor roused to join in her 
 merriment. 
 
 ' ' I mean what I say. My name is Calhoun Kendal, ' ' 
 was all he felt called upon to offer as voucher of his 
 honesty of intention," and if I sell only one or two of my 
 claims, I shall have money enough to buy stacks of such 
 things." 
 
 "Which will be very fortunate for me," she replied, 
 gayly. "And as you are to be a patron of mine, I cannot 
 do less than invite you to visit my studio whenever you feel 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 177 
 
 inclined. I shall always be glad to see you," she added, 
 with sweet sincerity. 
 
 Then he made her a short bow, and left her to work on 
 her portraits with what relish she might. One thing is cer- 
 tain the lady with the most pugnacious nose had that 
 aggressive feature of her face softened into comparative 
 loveliness in the course of the afternoon; the artist seemed 
 to paint something of her own beauty into the picture. 
 
 Margaret Benson's sitting-room adjoined her studio; and 
 she belonged to that large class of much-to-be-pitied San 
 Franciscans who go, day after day, to eat their solitary 
 meals at a restaurant. Not but that San Francisco restau- 
 rants are good. Let him who dares find fault with any of 
 our "peculiar institutions" but it does seem a very undo- 
 mestic manner of living. Flushed with triumph at having 
 accomplished that much dreaded and dreadful nose, Miss 
 Benson took up her hat and wrap and started in search of 
 her unsociable dinner. On the stairs she overtook her new 
 friend, who stood still, to give her the opportunity of pass- 
 ing by or addressing him, as she might choose. 
 
 ' ' One more unfortunate, going in quest of dinner ? ' ' she 
 asked, laughing. ( ' Come with me, if you have not yet 
 established yourself permanently at any one place. I know 
 they make you pay three times as much as you ought to at 
 the place where you have been in the habit of going. ' ' 
 
 * ' How do you know where I have been in the habit of 
 going? " he asked, with a quick, suspicious look, which one 
 would have hardly sought for in his face. 
 
 She did not notice it. "I have not the remotest idea 
 
178 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 where your haunts may have been, Mr. Arizona," she 
 answered, with comical gravity. " I only hazarded that 
 opinion on the strength of the general appearance of things, 
 and as the result of my own keen observation." And 
 when they had finished their very comfortable dinner, he 
 was free to own that her * ( keen observation ' ' had not mis- 
 led her. 
 
 Mr. Calhoun Kendal was not an idle man, by any means. 
 Of the different mining properties which he owned, some 
 alone and some in partnership with others, a number were 
 almost sure to find a market in San Francisco, he thought, 
 though it was "mighty slow work," as he often complained. 
 It always seemed a relief to him to find an asylum in the 
 studio of Miss Benson, and the lady herself, as well as those 
 who happened to be sitting for portraits, were equally enter- 
 tained by the man who could tell of "hair-breadth 'scapes," 
 and incidents in which the romantic and horrible were 
 strangely blended. He soon came to be a well known 
 figure, and the wonder among her lady patrons was that 
 Miss Benson should not induce him to sit for his picture. 
 So much character in his face, they said, and altogether so 
 striking a head, with the flowing beard and the high, fur- 
 rowed brow. But he would not listen to any proposal 
 tending in that direction. He didn't want to be made a 
 figure-head, he told her in confidence, one day. She might 
 paint as many flower-pictures as she wanted to for him, and 
 he'd buy 'em all some day, when he had sold a mine; but 
 face-pictures! no, not for him. 
 
 Some days his hopes ran high in regard to these mines, 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 179 
 
 and other days he seemed discouraged and hopeless of 
 doing anything with them. 
 
 "You see," he explained to her, "those strikes that 
 were made by myself when out prospecting all alone I could 
 sell or bond at low figures and make something at it, but 
 places that three or four of us together took up have got to 
 be held at higher figures, or neither of us make a cent. 
 Now, these fellows, my pardners, have put this thing into 
 my hands, and, of course, I'm not going back on them. If 
 I can't sell or bond something for them, I'm not going to 
 bond or sell anything for myself alone and that's just how 
 matters stand." 
 
 "And did you go through the country alone all by 
 yourself? Where did you get anything to eat ? How did 
 you keep the Indians off? You could not fight them 
 single-handed, could you ? " 
 
 He answered her questions in rote and conscientiously: 
 
 " Yes, I went through the country alone frequently, and 
 sometimes, if I thought I had found a pretty good showing, 
 I rigged up a tent with blankets or branches, and stayed 
 while my provisions held out, if there was water and feed 
 for my mule, when I had one. Sometimes I footed it, and 
 then I carried what grub I could, and went back to some 
 settlement for more when it gave out. I never fought a 
 large number of Indians single-handed but once. I was 
 living in a shanty in the mountains, and discovered about 
 thirty Indians prowling around early one Sunday morning, 
 when I peeped through a chink in the wall. One of them 
 came up near enough for me to take aim at him through a 
 
180 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 small opening by the fire-place, and he jumped into the air 
 with a yell, and fell down dead. The rest seemed to think 
 there was a whole garrison concealed in the shanty, and 
 they made off, leaving the dead one behind. Then I went 
 out, dug a hole, tied a rope around the Indian's neck, and 
 dragged him into it. After that I saddled my mule, went 
 to Tucson to get my grub for the week and looked around 
 to see if I could discover more of them skulking among 
 the timber." 
 
 She had clasped her hands in horror. The thought of 
 the dead Indian, dragged along by the rope around his 
 neck, made her shudder with terror. 
 
 ' * But were you all alone no other human being near ? ' ' 
 she persisted. 
 
 ' ' There was a cat as smart a cat as ever I saw. She 
 liked fresh meat best, but as the supply was short, I used to 
 shoot game for her, and she knew whenever I took up my 
 gun early in the morning, before going out to work, that 
 the game was for her. You should have seen her watch, 
 and bring in the rabbit, or squirrel, or birds I shot! It was 
 just fun." 
 
 "And the Indian did you stay there, where you had put 
 him into the ground ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Certainly. It is much safer prospecting near a dead 
 Indian than a live one." 
 
 A horrible prosaic being, she called him, with a little shiver, 
 and so utterly devoid of sentiment or romance, but with such 
 uncompromising honesty of purpose that all his faults and 
 peculiarities vanished, in her eyes, before his good qualities. 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 181 
 
 He seemed best satisfied when they were alone, and she 
 worked at the flower-pictures. He followed every move of 
 her hand, and wondered how human fingers could perform 
 such deft and delicate work. His own hands were singu- 
 larly awkward. There was nothing they touched or lifted 
 but was set down awry or bent, and whatever could possibly 
 be broken by contact with the ground was sure to find its 
 way there out of his hands. In fact, he liked best to hold 
 quiet possession of a comfortable corner of the lounge, to 
 which she was in the habit of bringing him the paper he 
 wanted to read, the glass he wanted to drink from, or the 
 fruit she always had ready for him to eat. To her it 
 seemed so much less lonesome since she had some one to 
 provide for again, while he followed with his eyes her every 
 step and motion when attending to his comfort, as though 
 he meant to paint her from memory some day, as she had 
 painted her dead sister. 
 
 They went out together sometimes, though he said that 
 an hour's sight-seeing made him more tired than a month's 
 prospecting, but if any show were brought to him, he said, 
 he didn't object to looking on. It was the procession in 
 celebration of the national holiday he was speaking of, and 
 he was not a little proud of his front room on this occasion, 
 as it looked out on Kearny Street, and he could solemnly 
 invite Miss Benson to see the "show" from his windows. 
 But if the sun of the Arizona deserts had never caused him 
 discomfort or a headache, the sun of San Francisco, glitter- 
 ing on the polished steel of the unstained arms of the war- 
 like militiamen, caused him great discomfort and a most 
 
1 82 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 distressing headache. Without the slightest regret at losing 
 so fine a sight, Miss Benson instantly drew the blinds, and 
 made the patient recline on a lounge. Then she went to 
 her landlady's kitchen prepared a cup of strong tea, and, 
 between keeping ice-water on his head, and compelling him 
 to drink his tea black and without sugar, she restored him 
 to his usual health in an hour or two. While he lay on the 
 lounge his eyes followed her, as usual, in spite of all she 
 could say to the effect that the eyes must be closed to drive 
 off a headache. 
 
 " But I can't see you, then," he protested; and as she was 
 about to change the wet cloth on his forehead, he suddenly 
 seized her hand, and pressed it to his lips. 
 
 11 You are a mighty good woman," he said, simply. Our 
 friend was not the man to lift his fancy to the height of "an 
 angel. " "I can' t think why you should be so kind to me. 
 Nobody ever has been before." 
 
 " Just for that reason," she replied, with a pitying look 
 at the hard, weather-tanned hands. 
 
 " I am going to work now in earnest," he said the next 
 morning, stopping to look in on her before he left the house. 
 " I want to know whether I'm going to be a rich man for the 
 rest of my life, or a poor one, and act according. If these 
 capitalists here want any of my mines, they will have to say 
 it pretty quick, or I'll go on to New York with them." 
 
 Margaret wished him the best of luck for his day's work, 
 and could not prevent the rich blood from showing clear and 
 rosy in her delicate face. 
 
 For a week or two it seemed doubtful whether he would 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 183 
 
 retire on a hundred thousand dollars or go back to Arizona 
 1 ' dead broke. ' ' Then he came home one day to pack his 
 valise (he had never owned a trunk in his life), and start 
 back for Arizona to consult his different "pardners" in 
 regard to their willingness to consolidate some half dozen of 
 the mines, as he had just "struck" a number of moneyed 
 men who would incorporate as the ' ' Kendal Consolidate ' ' 
 under certain conditions, and give stock equal to $50,000 to 
 each partner for his share and claim. 
 
 ' ' Shall you be gone long ? ' ' Margaret asked, with a slight 
 tremor in her voice. 
 
 " From six weeks to three months. Shall you be here 
 when I return ? ' ' 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "I'll buy those pictures if I come back with money," he 
 said, taking a last look around the room, and he turned to go. 
 
 For two months she heard nothing from him ; then a slow 
 step came up the stairs one day and approached her room. 
 She sprang to open the door to a mixture of dust, sun-burn, 
 and flowing beard, her face flushed and her eyes sparkling. 
 
 " Welcome home! " she exclaimed, with a thrill of delight 
 in her voice. 
 
 "Powerful hot down there," he said; and he quietly 
 dropped into his old corner of the lounge. ' * Looks like 
 home here," he continued, after a pause; "and you are 
 certainly the best woman in the world, ' ' as she approached 
 him with a glass of cool water and took his hat from his 
 hands. 
 
 Mrs. Ward had already heard of his arrival, and hastened 
 
i&4 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 to inform him that his old room would be vacated and ready 
 for him in half an hour. And before a full hour had passed 
 it seemed to them all that he had been gone only since yes- 
 terday. 
 
 His trip had been successful, he told Margaret, and the 
 Kendal Consolidated had been incorporated during his ab- 
 sence. He could have returned in a month's time, if it had 
 not been that he wanted to re-locate, for himself, a very good 
 prospect he had come across years ago, and which would be 
 valuable now in view of the railroad to be built through 
 Arizona. 
 
 Early the next morning he visited the office of the Kendal 
 Consolidated, and seemed to have grown an inch or two 
 while there. He had met so many people at the office who 
 were eager and anxious to see the Mr. Kendal who had dis- 
 covered the great Kendal mine. It chimed in well with the 
 interests of the directors that the name and fame of Mr. 
 Kendal should not be hidden under a bushel; and the secre- 
 tary had not only told him that the stock already sold higher 
 than they had expected it to go, but had undertaken to 
 bring him together with parties who would take his last loca- 
 tion off his hands without once looking at it. 
 
 " Fm a rich man now, sure; and as big a man as any in 
 the city." 
 
 Margaret laughed, as she had laughed at all his oddities 
 since she had known him. The next day, however, when 
 he returned from ' ' our office, ' ' and told her of a fine young 
 man to whom he had been introduced, and who was to take 
 him to his father's house, she did not laugh. 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 185 
 
 ' ' Has a sister, he says a nice young gal that he wants to 
 introduce me to." 
 
 She looked at him in an odd, startled sort of way. Not 
 that any eccentricity of orthography or grammar in his 
 speech could have surprised her, however; she had grown 
 accustomed to that. When he really left the house that 
 evening to pay the visit, she was a thousand times more 
 lonesome than she had been during all his stay in Arizona. 
 Long after ten, when she heard his step on the stairs, she 
 hastily turned off the gas, but listened at the door. Yes, his 
 step halted there before he passed on to his own room. 
 
 In the morning she was at work on a portrait, but laid it 
 aside for a ' ' flower-picture ' ' when Mr. Kendal came in to 
 sit with her a little while. 
 
 " Fine gal, that sister of young Briscoe's," he broke out, 
 as enthusiastically as was possible for Calhoun Kendal. 
 ' ' Our Secretary said he would introduce me to some high- 
 toned people, and he kept his word. Highly respectable 
 family. The mother wears a real point-lace cap and tucker 
 or whatever you call it, and the young lady was dressed 
 the prettiest I ever saw. Very stylish, and the last mode, 
 Dick says that's the boy's name. Live in good style, too 
 very genteel house and elegant bricky-brack furniture, 
 and all that." 
 
 Margaret listened in surprise to words which she knew 
 had not belonged to her friend's vocabulary till within a day 
 or two; but Mr. Kendal talked on, regardless of the girl's 
 silence. 
 
 "We're all going to the theater the old lady, Dick, 
 
1 86 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 Sadie and the father, too, I reckon. I didn't see much of 
 him, though; guess he hasn't got much to say. Wanted to 
 go to-night, but Dick says we must go respectable, and I 
 must get a black dress-suit first. He's going to take me to 
 his own tailor; guess he'll fix me up pretty fine. Of course, 
 I want to look respectable when I escort a stylish young 
 lady. I just wish you could see her she's a mighty pretty 
 gal. But, here I'm doing all the talking. Have you 
 nothing to say ? ' ' 
 
 Mr. Kendal, of the Kendal Consolidated, was not very 
 quick of perception, or he would have observed that the 
 hand holding the brush had trembled so that that little im- 
 plement of art had to be laid aside, and a pair of wax-white 
 hands lay idly folded in the girl's lap. But suddenly he was 
 struck with the stillness pervading the whole form, and he 
 bent forward to look into her ashy face. 
 
 ''What's the matter?" he asked, in alarm. "Are you 
 sick, or in pain ? You look fit to die." 
 
 ' ' What difference would it make to any one ? ' ' The 
 words were uttered below her breath; yet Mr. Kendal' s 
 somewhat dull ears had caught their import. 
 
 " Why, Margaret," he stammered, shocked at the sudden 
 change in her being, ' ' how can you talk like that ? You 
 know I would give half the money I've got, and run a 
 hundred miles without stopping, to see you relieved or 
 cured if you were sick. Shall I go for a doctor, or call Mrs. 
 Ward?" 
 
 * ' No, no. ' ' She looked full into the large, honest eyes, 
 bent upon her with such a genuine expression of concern. 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 187 
 
 "It was only a sudden faintness, and will pass in a little 
 while. Go to your office now, and I will rest a little." 
 
 But if Margaret had hoped for an hour to herself, she had 
 made a miscalculation. Mrs. Ward said she had orders not 
 to leave Miss Benson alone, as she came in. "And I'm to 
 send for the best physician, and he is to prescribe the most 
 costly drugs; and I'm to take Miss Benson out in a carriage, 
 and I'm to hire a nurse, a parson, a circus-band, and a bar- 
 rel-organ all to restore the health and cheer the spirits of 
 Miss Benson. Precious Miss Benson! She will be wrapped 
 with gold-cloth and hung with diamonds pretty soon," Mrs. 
 Ward added, laughing heartily at the recollection of Mr. 
 Kendal's concern. 
 
 Margaret smiled, but with pale lips. "An excellent man 
 is Mr. Kendal, and a true friend." 
 
 He would not even go to look after his black suit in the 
 evening, he was so glad to find Margaret better, an I was 
 overjoyed to find her at her easel again early the next morn- 
 ing. She had left the door open for him purposely, and 
 now, while they were both commenting on the form just 
 springing into life on the canvas, a voice outside, inquiring 
 for Mr. Kendal, attracted their attention. The servant dust- 
 ing and brushing in the hall approached the door, followed 
 by a young man, who very unceremoniously looked into the 
 roo'm over the domestic's shoulder, and did not even wait 
 for Mr. Kendal to invite him to enter. 
 
 "These your rooms, old fellow?" he asked, without 
 seeming to notice the other inmate. 
 
 " This is Miss Benson's studee-o. Miss Benson, allow me 
 
1 88 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 to introduce Mr. Briscoe. Miss Benson is my oldest San 
 Francisco friend, and a great artist. I consider it a favor to 
 be admitted here, and am sensible of the privilege granted 
 me to watch so highly gifted a lady practicing her art." 
 
 If the lance was somewhat unwieldy which the knight of 
 the sun-browned hands was breaking in the cause of chiv- 
 alry, his friend understood that it was meant to rebuke the 
 lack of courtesy and deference shown a lady, and Dick Bris- 
 coe was quick to take the cue. 
 
 "Ah! beg pardon," contracting his eyebrows, as though 
 the light from the one window might have blinded him. 
 1 ' Happy to meet Miss Benson a friend of yours and an 
 artist. Beautiful ! " he exclaimed, standing before the flower 
 panels on the wall. " How Sadie would admire those! We 
 must ask permission of Miss Benson to bring my sister in to 
 see them some time," he said, alert as usual, turning to the 
 honest Arizonian, whose face was relaxing at the praise be- 
 stowed on his friend. 
 
 The new black suit was sent home to Mr. Kendal in due 
 time, and he presented himself to Margaret in his fine array 
 on the night of his visit to the theater with the Briscoe 
 family. 
 
 " Do I look respectable in my new clothes? " he asked. 
 
 " Eminently so," was the truthful reply, " but I liked you 
 far better in the more unconventional dress you wore when 
 I first saw you. ' ' 
 
 "These don't feel so comfortable, either," he admitted. 
 
 Mr. Kendal was charmed with his glimpse of what he 
 considered fashionable life, and he went in pursuit of it to 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 189 
 
 the church or the theater with equal gusto. As a crowning 
 piece to his stylish outfit, he had purchased a black cylinder 
 hat, to the amazement of Dick Briscoe himself, who came 
 to conduct him to the church where the Briscoe family rented 
 a pew. 
 
 "Ain't it rather a bore, though?" he asked, consider- 
 ately. 
 
 "Well, yes," Mr. Kendal admitted, cheerfully; "but 
 then, you know, a black silk hat is the most respectable 
 kind of a hat to go to church in, after all. ' ' 
 
 "That's so," assented the accommodating youth, and 
 moving his own tile a little to one side, he stepped to the 
 window to conceal a smile. He himself had put the ' ' re- 
 spectable " wrinkle into his friend's head, but this was out- 
 H eroding Herod. However, if his Arizona friend was 
 pleased, why should he object ? 
 
 "I've done it," exclaimed Mr. Kendal, rushing into the 
 studio one morning, sinking into a chair, dropping his tile, 
 and wiping his heated brow on a scented pocket-handker- 
 chief. "I've talked to her father she said I might last 
 night, at the theater. I am going up to see her this after- 
 noon, to tell her that he's willing." 
 
 Margaret wished him joy, and the happy man started on 
 his visit at the earliest proper moment. Dick Brisco him- 
 self opened the door for him, and led him into the parlor, 
 where Miss Sadie received her elderly lover without any at- 
 tempt at coyness. He was bewildered a moment by her 
 beauty and seductive smile, but after the first confusion he 
 timidly approached, and laid his hand on one of the long 
 
I go A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 braids of yellow hair that fell gracefully across her shoulder. 
 "My stars," he gave word to his admiration, "I never 
 before knew that you had such a beautiful head of hair." 
 
 " No, by Jove, nor I," chimed in Dick, who had posted 
 himself on a sofa opposite to the lounge on which his sister 
 was airily seated, evidently for the purpose of enjoying 
 Sadie's first reception of an accepted lover. 
 
 "You, Dick!" 
 
 With a single cat-like spring she was beside her brother, 
 shaking him by the arm, and threatening him with her 
 pretty little hand. 
 
 "Let me alone," he protested, choking with laughter. 
 "Mr. Kendal call her off. She hates me for being in the 
 room. I'll go now," and he rushed out, leaving Sadie to 
 her adorer. 
 
 Of course Miss Bricoe was pretty, very pretty, with bright 
 black eyes, and a full suit of fashionable yellow hair, bewil- 
 deringly arranged, and a form as lithe and swift in its mo- 
 tions as that of a panther or a cat. There was something 
 audacious about her, that had at first astonished and at- 
 tracted the unsophisticated man, while the petted-child air 
 she could assume had made him long to stretch out his hand 
 and caress her as he would a playful little kitten. That the 
 young lady had been christened ' ' Sarah ' ' in her infancy 
 detracted nothing from her good looks, but she hated all 
 who ventured to be familiar with her original name. 
 
 If there was any change in Margaret Benson, Mr. Kendal 
 did not notice it; he still came into the "studee-o," but it 
 was generally only to tell of some new excellence or beauty 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 191 
 
 he had discovered in hisjftancee, or to draw comparisons be- 
 tween the female portraits there and Miss Sadie Briscoe 
 always, of course awarding the palm to that young lady. 
 
 ' ' How old are you ? " he asked of Margaret one day, 
 after he had been confiding to her his discovery of some 
 new merit in his betrothed. 
 
 ' ' Twenty-five nearly twenty six," was the composed 
 reply. 
 
 "My stars! Why, that's what we call an old maid in 
 my country." 
 
 " I am afraid it is called so here, too," she assented smil- 
 ingly. 
 
 ' ' Now Sadie is only seventeen and she says she has 
 always wanted to find in the man she loved one who would 
 be companion, husband, and father to her at the same time. ' ' 
 (The truth of the matter was that Miss Sadie had passed 
 her second decade; "but," as she said to brother Dick in 
 confidence," the old fellow wants a young wife for his 
 money, and I think I'll fill the bill.") 
 
 One morning shortly after breakfast Mr. Kendal was 
 seized with one of his sudden headaches, and remembering 
 Margaret's former kindness he saw no reason why he 
 should not again appeal to her Samaritan qualities. She 
 darkened the room, bathed his head in ice- water, and was 
 making all preparations she thought necessary, when Dick 
 Briscoe, not having found the Arizonian at the Kendal Con. 
 office, came to inquire into the cause of his absence. 
 
 "You can't think how good that woman has been to 
 me," said the patient, when Margaret had left the room, 
 
1 92 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 " and she knows just what is good for me when I get sick." 
 
 ' ' But how do you think Sadie would like it if she knew 
 of Miss Benson's coming into your room when you are 
 sick?" 
 
 " I should think very poorly of any woman who was too 
 nice to take compassion on a fellow-being when sick," Mr. 
 Kendal declared. 
 
 Mr. Dick made a note of it. * ' But she might be jeal- 
 ous," he suggested, insinuatingly. 
 
 ' ' Sadie jealous of me ? " A pleased smile broke over the 
 Arizonian's face. " But she need not be jealous of Miss 
 Benson, I'm sure." 
 
 Dick seemed so concerned for Mr. Kendal' s health that 
 he made him promise not to leave the house till he should 
 call for him ; and though the patient had recovered within an 
 hour or two, he kept his word scrupulously and to the 
 letter, and did not leave the house. 
 
 Early in the afternoon there was a faint rustle of silk along 
 the hall by Margaret's room, and directly the door of Mr. 
 Kendal' s room dew open, and a dazzling array of wavy 
 yellow hair, fleecy lace, and glittering jewelry rushed into 
 the outstretched arms of the happy man. 
 
 " Oh, what a dear little puss you are," he said, after she 
 had breathlessly related how pa and ma [it was ' ' the old 
 man" and "the old woman" between Sadie and her 
 brother in private] both believed her gone to the matinee, 
 and how shocked and grieved they would be if they knew 
 that dear brother Dick had consented to her prayers, and 
 had brought her to see her dear suffering darling. 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 1 93 
 
 " How can I ever show dear brother Dick my gratitude?" 
 and he held out his hand to that noble young man, who 
 had discreetly turned to the window till the first transport 
 should have subsided. 
 
 "Ah! but you wicked, naughty man had a strange lady 
 tending you, when you knew that I would gladly have 
 braved everything to come to you if you were sick. Where 
 is the wretched woman that dared to take my place ? Let 
 me see her at once." 
 
 More delighted than he wanted to own, her lover assured 
 her that she should not only visit the " studee-o " of the 
 lady, but that he had a surprise in store for her there; and 
 he marshaled the brother and sister across the hall. With 
 due pride he introduced his betrothed to the tall, self- 
 possessed woman at the easel, who received her visitors 
 pleasantly, inquiring of Mr. Kendal about the pain in his 
 head. 
 
 ' ' And now for my surprise, ' ' said Mr. Kendal, as Sadie 
 was complimenting Miss Benson on the different flower- 
 pieces by her hand. " Them's all mine " waving his hand 
 toward the pictures, and forgetting his grammar in his 
 anxiety to give his beloved pleasure. " Miss Benson has 
 been a long while painting them for me, and the price is no 
 object, as they are to be a present to you, my dear." 
 
 Miss Briscoe quickly raised her eyes to Miss Benson's 
 face. Had this handsome woman really never fascinated 
 her husband in spe f And had Miss Benson never tried to 
 secure the prize for which she herself had so eagerly striven? 
 There was a flush on Margaret's face, and Miss Sadie eyed 
 
1 94 A Miner from Arizond. 
 
 her keenly; but after a moment the glittering black orbs 
 drooped involuntarily before Margaret's clear hazel eyes. 
 
 " I shall prize them so highly," Miss Sadie said, sweetly, 
 ' ' both as a gift of Mr. Kendal and as the work of a true 
 artist." 
 
 But once in Mr. Kendal' s room again, she stamped her 
 pretty little foot in uncontrollable passion. 
 
 11 You shan't have that old maid come into your room 
 any more I won't have it do you hear ? I am jealous, 
 you know," she continued softly, when she saw the look of 
 displeased surprise in his face. ' ' If I didn' t love you I 
 wouldn't be jealous of you would I ? 
 
 He answered the argument with a kiss, and Miss Sadie 
 returned to the attack. "Who is your friend, anyhow? 
 You say she has no relatives, no friends, earns her own sup- 
 port, and lives here all alone? H'm I don't think that is 
 strictly respectable, and I don't know that pa would ap- 
 prove of my marrying a man who was intimately acquainted 
 with such a person. ' ' 
 
 " I am sure," her lover cried, in alarm, " I mean to do 
 nothing to hurt your feelings, but Miss Benson is really the 
 best woman " 
 
 Miss Sadie made the spring at him which she often made 
 at her brother, and which Mr. Kendal thought so charming. 
 
 " But I tell you I'm jealous, and never want to hear the 
 woman's name again." 
 
 She stood on tip- toe before him, and made playful at- 
 tempts at choking him. 
 
 After a while they passed out through the hall together, 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 195 
 
 and Margaret, lonesome and forgotten in her room, came to 
 her door as the party began descending the stairs to the 
 street. Just then a gentleman met and passed them, look- 
 ing around in the corridor to read the different signs. With- 
 out a glance at him, Margaret drew back into the room, but 
 the gentleman had caught sight of her, and hastened to her 
 door before she could close it. 
 
 "Margaret Miss Benson!" he exclaimed, extending 
 both hands, while Margaret, opening wide the door, 
 looked searchingly into his face. 
 
 "Philip!" 
 
 Her surprise brought the red blood to her face, leaving it 
 all the more pale the next moment. 
 
 "And is this your your home?" he asked, looking 
 around the room he had entered. 
 
 ' ' My studio, home what you will, ' ' she answered, with 
 an attempt at firmness and cheerfulness. 
 
 "Oh, Margaret, poor child," he cried, pitingly, "don't 
 try to make me believe you are happy and contented. I 
 saw the pain and heartache in your face before you knew 
 who I was." 
 
 She had dropped her head on her arm, which rested on 
 the table beside her, and sobbed like a tired child. He laid 
 his hand on her soft hair a moment. 
 
 ' ' Could you find no way of communicating with us ? 
 Only two months ago I heard of your father's death and and 
 misfortune. We were losing ourselves among the pyramids 
 of Egypt when Providence sent a fellow Californian in our 
 way, who spoke of it. We started home at once, I by the 
 
1 96 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 most direct route, but my mother was compelled to return 
 by way of Paris. The Lord only knows what extravagances 
 she has been indulging in spangled dresses and red shoes 
 for aught I know. ' ' 
 
 Margaret smiled as the image of Mrs. Dufresne, grand 
 and calmly dignified, arose before her. 
 
 "As well Semiramis or Zenobia in frizzled hair and a 
 Dolly Varden." 
 
 ' ' Well, whatever she brings you may depend there will 
 be something to replace this black gown of yours." 
 
 * ' A terribly ugly dress this, is it not ? ' ' she asked bit- 
 terly. " It has cost me many a pang." 
 
 ' ' You have had great trials, but your friends should not 
 have allowed you to remain alone here, brooding over the 
 past and its irrecoverable losses. ' ' 
 
 A harsh word arose to her lips. 
 
 " I could find no friend after poor papa was dead. I 
 doubt that I would have had the courage to write to your 
 mother, if I had known where to address you. ' ' 
 
 "So hard has the world dealt with you? Ah, well, 
 mother will be here soon now, and you shall forget all cold- 
 ness and unkindness. I am to put mother's own house in 
 order for her, and I will have to go to Oakland to-morrow, 
 and talk my prettiest to the Elliots, to induce them to give 
 up the next two years' lease. You know we were to have 
 been absent for five years. Then we must re-furnish the 
 house. I shall depend a good deal on your assistance, and 
 altogether on your taste. And, by the way, there you have four 
 pretty flower-pieces to decorate the walls of your boudoir. ' ' 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 197 
 
 "They are not mine anymore. They are sold." Her 
 lips trembled, and he looked compassionately into her white 
 face. 
 
 ' ' Yes, it must be hard to part with, for money, what has 
 grown dear to us and a part of us in its very creation. ' ' 
 
 She hid her face in her hands, and he looked on in dis- 
 tress a moment, till he gently tried to remove them. 
 
 "Why, Margaret, girl, is there any other sorrow in your 
 heart than what I know of? Tell me of it. You know you 
 may confide in me." 
 
 She brushed the tears from her lashes. 
 
 ' ' There, I am better now, and shall never again be lone- 
 some and forsaken. I know you will always be to me a true 
 friend a kind brother. ' ' 
 
 Philip Dufresne started. 
 
 " Yes," he said, after a pause, "your best friend, I hope, 
 always." 
 
 Mr. Kendal had parted with the brother and sister Briscoe 
 at the next street corner, and they pursued their way home. 
 
 ' ' I say, Sal ' ' began the graceless brother. 
 
 "Shut up, you imp. My name is Sadie," interrupted 
 the sister. 
 
 " Oh, bother ! I say, I had a great mind to try this after- 
 noon how far the gratitude of my prospective brother-in-law 
 would bear stretching. I'm in a tight place, and the old 
 man can't be stirred a peg. What's a fellow to do ? " 
 
 ' ' At any rate, not to blackmail Mr. Kendal, ' ' returned 
 Miss Sadie, indignantly. 
 
 "Not, at least, till you are fairly married to him, you 
 
1 98 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 mean, Sis. I am certainly entitled to some acknowledg- 
 ment for the way I fished him up for you ? ' ' 
 
 He spoke with the most injured air, as if his claims to hav- 
 ing captured some highly valued, but dangerous, wild ani- 
 mal, had been disputed. 
 
 " Don't I tell you you shall have all the money you want 
 as soon as I am married? Don't you go and break up this 
 whole thing now by your greediness." 
 
 ''Greediness!" he repeated, more injured than ever. 
 " If I had had as many rings and bracelets and watches 
 given me as you, I wouldn't talk of greediness in others." 
 
 But they made peace before reaching home, each recog- 
 nizing the necessity of keeping up amicable relations with the 
 other. The peace was of short duration, however. Miss 
 Sadie, dressing for a drive with her lover the next day, 
 missed a pair of heavy gold bracelets, his gift, from her 
 toilet table. She stormed down stairs to the sitting-room, 
 where young Dick held sole possession. 
 
 " My bracelets! " she gasped. 
 
 " What's the matter with them? " he asked, with ill-as- 
 sumed indifference. 
 
 ' ' They' re gone stolen. ' ' 
 
 "Chinaman took 'em ? " the brother suggested. 
 
 "No, he didn't," she protested. "I'll not stand this, 
 Dick. I want my bracelets back. ' ' 
 
 "Oh, bother your bracelets! Tell the old codger the 
 Chinaman took them, and make him bring you some more." 
 And picking up his hat, he left the house. 
 
 Philip Dufresne, having settled matters with the lessees of 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 199 
 
 his mother's house, had insisted on Margaret's active assist- 
 ance in putting the same in order. Upon Mrs. Dufresne's 
 arrival she took Margaret away from her lodgings at once, 
 much to the surprise of Miss Sadie Briscoe, who heard of it 
 through brother Dick. This young gentleman had been 
 assiduous in his attentions to the Arizonian of late, and, vis- 
 iting him almost daily, had seen and heard of the friend who 
 had attended so constantly on Margaret. 
 
 "The Dufresnes?" Miss Sadie asked between surprise 
 and envy. "Miss Benson's friends? Why, you said she 
 had no friends. The Dufresne's are immensely wealthy, 
 and the Philip Dufresne of whom I know is a tall, handsome, 
 dark-eyed man. But that old maid need not try for him. 
 He could marry the handsomest girl in San Francisco. ' ' 
 
 ' ' Miss Benson is not the woman to ' try for ' any man, ' ' 
 Mr. Kendal protested, so sharply that Miss Sadie fell from 
 one surprise into another. Altogether this had been an un- 
 comfortable interview. The Chinaman had been accused of 
 stealing the bracelets, and duly discharged from service; but 
 the lover had failed to bring her a new pair since. 
 
 In her new-found home, all that tender kindness could 
 suggest was done to make Margaret forget the past few 
 years of her life. In her solicitude, Mrs. Dufresne spared 
 herself neither fatigue nor trouble, insisting on visiting 
 theaters, concerts, opera places of amusement to which 
 Margaret had long been a stranger. Philip's eyes always 
 lighted up with a strange flash when she declared, however, 
 that to her no place seemed so pleasant as her present home 
 - that she was never quite happy away from it. The place 
 
2oo A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 was worthy her admiration grand old trees shutting it in 
 from the street, while a terrace, bright with conservatory and 
 gay-blooming flowers, overlooked the blue lake, and a 
 smooth lawn sloped down to the water's edge. 
 
 Mrs. Dufresne had always had a mother's fondness for 
 Margaret, and her affection had not changed. But Philip 
 Dufresne would not be satisfied with a sister's love from the 
 girl. Margaret's nature was too transparently truthful to 
 conceal from Philip's eye the sore spot in her heart; but 
 Philip knew that time would heal what he hoped had been 
 only a bruise never a wound. 
 
 Fourth of July, 187-, was to be celebrated with unwonted 
 splendor; and Mrs. Dufresne was not too fashionable to in- 
 sist that they celebrate the day by viewing the procession to 
 take place in San Francisco. Philip was instructed to secure 
 a front room en the line of march, their plan being to cross 
 the bay in the morning, watch the procession, take lunch, 
 and return to Oakland some time in the afternoon. To 
 Mrs. Dufresne' s chagrin, Margaret wore a sombre black 
 dress on the morning of the Fourth, though, as Philip had 
 predicted, there had been divers dresses for her among those 
 sent from Paris. Margaret's face was paler than it had been 
 for some time. 
 
 ' * Are you sick, child ? ' ' she asked Margaret, in great 
 alarm. " Had we better stay at home ? " 
 
 But Margaret insisted that she wore the black dress only 
 because it would surely be cold in San Francisco on the 
 Fourth of July; and they set out for the boat, where they 
 were joined by more friends. It was a merry party that 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 201 
 
 proceeded to the city together, and just enough to fill both 
 windows in the room. Philip left the ladies to themselves, 
 when he had seen them all comfortably seated Margaret 
 alone insisting that she wanted no seat by the window, but 
 preferred standing behind Mrs. Dufresne's chair, and look- 
 ing over her shoulder. Perhaps it was as well that Philip 
 had left the room Margaret could not have hidden from 
 his keen eyes the tears that coursed slowly down her cheeks 
 and fell on the bouquet of white roses she held in her hand. 
 Shout after shout went up from the street as the long, showy 
 train passed by; band after band clashed out its music 
 loud martial strains, or gay rollicking airs. To Margaret 
 alone the music was playing only dead-marches and funeral 
 hymns; for she was burying her dead to-day deep out of 
 sight for ever and for aye. And as her tears fell faster, the 
 white roses in her hand drooped and withered, as her head 
 was bent over them, for she had decreed that the sorrow 
 and the tears should be buried with them to-day, where eye 
 nor memory could ever rest on them again. 
 
 Strangely enough, on the boat homeward bound, Philip's 
 eye fell first of all on the white roses in her hand. They 
 were out on the guards together, and he was trying to 
 shelter her from the cold wind that blew on the bay. 
 
 "What a sorry bouquet to carry to Oakland," he sug- 
 gested. 
 
 " It is not going there. I was only waiting to reach the 
 middle of the bay, so that it would not drift back to San 
 Francisco." And, turning, she flung the flowers into the 
 water. 
 
202 A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 11 Let us go in," she said; and she laid her hand on his 
 arm, with a touch that thrilled him strangely, when he 
 looked hastily into her smiling face. 
 
 The cold wind that blew on the bay did not reach the 
 shore. The closing day was warm and balmy in beautiful 
 Oakland, and Margaret came to the dinner-table in white, 
 with scarlet flowers at her throat and in her hair. Mrs. 
 Dufresne was delighted with this change from her morning's 
 costume, and Philip's eyes spoke volumes of thanks. After 
 dinner, when she had sung Mrs. Dufresne' s favorite airs, 
 Margaret passed quietly out to the moonlit veranda, and 
 Philip was soon by her side. 
 
 ' ' Will you walk with me ? " he asked. And she silently 
 laid her hand on his arm. 
 
 The lake beneath them glittered in the moonlight, the air 
 was heavy with the odor of jasmine and heliotrope; from 
 the open windows floated the soft strains that Mrs. Dufresne 
 was calling forth from the grand piano, and all around 
 seemed harmony and peace. 
 
 Philip's step grew slower. 
 
 ' ' Margaret, you will give me my answer now this 
 night." 
 
 She bent her head, but the moonlight betrayed the flush 
 on her face: 
 
 1 'And it is yes!" 
 
 She did not release the trembling hand he had seized, and 
 he drew her to his bosom and held her in a close embrace. 
 
 " My darling," he murmured, " it was so long to wait." 
 
 ' ' You knew my heart, Philip, ' ' she answered softly. 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 203 
 
 "As true and faithful a heart as ever beat in woman's 
 breast," he said, earnestly. Then he drew her into the 
 house. He knew how his mother longed to clasp her to her 
 breast as her daughter. 
 
 Days of busy preparation followed for Mrs. Dufresne, who 
 often declared, in comic despair, that she must apprentice 
 her son to some trade in San Francisco to keep him away 
 from under her feet in Oakland. 
 
 Margaret did not forget her old friend, Mrs. Ward; many 
 a lovely bouquet of Oakland flowers graced her center-table. 
 Mr. Kendal was married, and young Mrs. Kendal, in answer 
 to a protest against her extravagance, had said that, 4 ' as 
 she had married the old fellow for his money, she wanted 
 the pleasure of spending it. ' ' 
 
 Philip Dufresne had always liked the honest- hearted miner, 
 and did not lose sight of him altogether. Soon after his 
 own quiet wedding he brought distressing news to Margaret 
 about their old friend. He was greatly harassed in mind 
 and pocket by the pranks of his worthless brother-in-law, 
 for the young gentleman had carried his operations into 
 strange territory after appropriating as much of his father's 
 funds as he could lay hands on. Strangers were not as 
 lenient as his father and his brother-in-law, and it required 
 large sums to cover the boy's criminal acts and save the 
 family -from disgrace. Mr. Kendal looked disheartened, 
 Philip said, and had declared that a hundred such mines as 
 the Kendal Con. could not keep his wife and her brother in 
 pocket-money. 
 
 Sitting by the window one bright summer morning gazing 
 
204 <A Miner from Arizona. 
 
 idly down the well-kept walk, Margaret was startled to see 
 their old friend enter the gate. She hastened out to meet 
 him, extending both her hands. He looked so forlorn and 
 wretched that it made her heart ache. 
 
 ' ' Welcome, Mr. Kendal ! ' ' she cried cordially, and at the 
 sound of her voice he looked wistfully up into her face. 
 
 "Oh, Margaret Miss Benson Mrs. Dufresne what a 
 blind fool I have been! I deserve all my trials. I am not 
 fit to be a white man I'm worse than an Indian." 
 
 She smiled in spite of herself at his favorite form of self- 
 revilement; but she brought him into the parlor and seated 
 him by the window, speaking to him cheerfully to dispel his 
 gloom. 
 
 "It's no use," he said; " I have come to bid you good- 
 bye. You are the only friends I ever had here you and 
 your husband." 
 
 He was going back to Arizona, he went on to say, for he 
 was almost beggared, and was of no more use to himself or 
 his young wife. With empty hands he would never return 
 to her, for there were only slights and reproaches for him in 
 his own home, though his fortune had been sacrificed to 
 gratify his wife's whims and save her brother from prison. 
 His fingers strayed nervously through his grizzled hair, 
 while he spoke, and idly plucked at the tangled beard, and 
 altogether he was the picture of a man who saw only desola- 
 tion and a waste before him, where he had spent his life's 
 best strength to build him up a blooming Eden. 
 
 Looking upon him, a great pity flooded all the woman's 
 heart, and she knelt beside him and held the poor awkward 
 
A Miner from Arizona. 205 
 
 hands in her own, speaking words of comfort and sympathy 
 that filled the man's soul with peace, made him feel fresh 
 hope, and called back something of his old energy. 
 
 Margaret would fain have detained him till her husband 
 came, but Mr. Kendal said he would bid him good-bye at 
 his office, and, softened and cheered, he went out from her 
 presence. 
 
 Months later, Philip laid his arm tenderly around his wife's 
 shoulder, and bade her read a paragraph he had marked in 
 the paper. 
 
 " The body of a man supposed to be the once famous Mr. Kendal, 
 the discoverer of the mine known by his name, was found on the 
 Gila Desert, some ten days after a severe sand-storm had been 
 raging there. The theory is that he had been laboring under an 
 aberration of the brain, consequent upon great disappointment in 
 finding mines he had meant to re-locate taken up by other parties 
 otherwise he would not have started across the desert without other 
 water supply than a small canteen, which was found by his side 
 empty." 
 
 Margaret's head sank on her husband's shoulder, and he 
 turned to kiss away the tears that hung on her dark lashes. 
 
 "O faithful heart!" he said; "most tender of women 
 and truest of wives I thank God that you are mine." 
 
THAT RANCH OF His. 
 
THAT RANCH OF HIS. 
 
 SHE sat in the open door, her folded hands resting 
 idly in her lap, her eyes fixed absently on the distant 
 mountains. It was the kitchen door, and it led directly out 
 on the wide, desolate plain. No garden surrounded the 
 little house; no tree was there to throw its lengthened 
 shadow in the evening's sun. But the purple lights and 
 crimson tints on the mountain's side filled the heart of the 
 lonely woman with pure delight. These mountains are so 
 beautiful, more particularly to those who see them first in 
 spring-time, and when their own hearts are rich in hope and 
 happiness. To such they will always be fair, even when the 
 summer's sun has scorched the verdure that clothed them 
 with beauty, and hope has died in the slow-beating heart. 
 
 The silent woman in the doorway turned her eyes at last 
 from the deepening shadows, and bent her head over her 
 clasped hands. There was no use denying the fact that they 
 ached ached with hard, unaccustomed work; and when 
 she raised her face again, a harsh look had crept into it, for 
 in those few moments she had once more lived through the 
 last months of her young existence. Not that any dread 
 tragedy had suddenly laid waste her young life, or a great 
 disappointment had crushed her heart at one fell blow. 
 Everything had come in so natural a manner; and perhaps, 
 she thought, it was the doom of all women to find less of 
 
210 That Ranch of His. 
 
 happiness in married life than they had anticipated; though 
 months ago when she had first seen John Marston in the 
 fire-lit parlors of her uncle's house, he had seemed to her the 
 perfection of all that was handsome, noble, and desirable in 
 man. He was seated among a number of older men, who 
 were attentively listening to stories about California. 
 
 ' ' And how large might your ranch be, Mr. Marston ? ' ' 
 one of them had asked him. 
 
 ' ' I have two hundred acres in wheat, ' ' was the reply. 
 
 " Do you keep much stock ? " was further asked. 
 
 "No; it is not a stock-ranch. Four horses can readily 
 do the plowing, and I do not want to choke up the place 
 with barns and stables. ' ' 
 
 The young girl had listened in surprise. 
 
 ' ' Why, Mr. Marston, you talk as though you allowed 
 yourself hardly room enough for a dwelling-house," she 
 said. 
 
 ' * Indeed, there is only a very small house on it, built of 
 wood, as most houses in the country are, in California." 
 
 "Ah! I see," she laughed "' a little vine-clad hut'; 
 true-love- in-a-cottage style." 
 
 "Well" he hesitated a moment, stroking his flowing 
 beard, then continued boldly, fixing his gray eyes full on the 
 girl's sparkling face " the vines are not grown yet, but can 
 soon be planted." 
 
 Those present considered this the conventional Califor- 
 nian style of asking for a lady's hand in marriage: he ob- 
 tained it, at least, and they were married in less than three 
 months from that date. Then came their journey to 
 
That Ranch of His. 211 
 
 California and through California, till their own home was 
 reached. In May California wears her bridal robes, and 
 Selma's soul was filled with joy as they passed through 
 towns where every house was surrounded by its own choicely 
 planted grounds; and villas and country seats literally hid- 
 den in masses of gleaming flowers and graceful foliage, while 
 the strawberries in the field vied in brilliancy of color and 
 abundance with the cherries on the trees. Then came their 
 own distant home. 
 
 It was true, there was no vine yet to cover the naked little 
 house; there was no garden, no orchard to be seen. But 
 the wild flowers grew close to the kitchen door, and when 
 Selma crossed the threshold the little blue fairy-cups seemed 
 to look up into her face, pleading and consoling at once. 
 In the first half-hour she had filled every glass and tumbler 
 in the house with bunches of the many-hued, fragrant wild- 
 flowers, and when she complained to John: 
 
 "Now, I have no more to discover," he pointed out 
 through the window. 
 
 " Those pond lilies you had not discovered them," he 
 said. 
 
 She gave a little scream of delight. " O, quick, quick! 
 How shall I get there?" she asked, in sudden surprise. 
 This was certainly their best room; and all at once she saw 
 that there was no door except the one that led into the 
 kitchen. 
 
 "Go through the kitchen, and then around the house." 
 It was the most natural advice in the world, but she followed 
 it with lowered head. Her eyes were bent toward the 
 
212 That Ranch of His. 
 
 ground, and she saw the tender wheat-shafts crushed beneath 
 her feet; but she did not see how rich of promise the broad 
 acres lay before her, the deep orange of the California poppy 
 flaming out from the tender green. 
 
 The wheat grew close up to the edge of the water, and 
 when its glitter flashed into her eyes, and compelled her to 
 raise them, she found that John had not been gallant enough 
 to follow her; and she plucked the flowers as far as she could 
 reach them, till her feet were wet through; then she turned 
 slowly toward the house. 
 
 " What good will those foolish things do you ? " he asked, 
 looking up from his trunk, in which he was hunting for his 
 meerschaum pipe, the only article of luxury he had brought 
 out with him from ' ' the States. " " Your shoes are quite 
 wet, and to-morrow you will have a bad cold." 
 
 She bit her lips, and her head drooped a moment; but 
 shaking back her curls quickly, she said, laughing: 
 
 "That's true. You Californians are practical people 
 and here comes the man with his horses, so I'll get supper 
 now, and you shall see that I can do something useful, too. 
 Will you show me the hen-house ? I shall want some eggs 
 for cooking." 
 
 "Hen-house!" repeated John: "I am not keeping a 
 chicken-ranch; you know that I raise wheat." 
 
 She studied a moment. 
 
 1 ' Very well, but we have strawberries, I suppose. I can 
 do wonderful things with strawberries." 
 
 "Strawberries!" there was contempt in the repitition. 
 
 " How should I waste my time on such stuff? Mr. Smith 
 
That Ranch of His. 213 
 
 has a strawberry ranch about four miles from here; I will 
 speak to him about a supply to-morrow." 
 
 "But, John," she persisted, ''have you not always told 
 me that California is the land of flowers and fruit ? and is our 
 ranch alone so bare of everything that is generally found on 
 a farm ? ' ' 
 
 John was spared the answer by the man's coming to the 
 door to call him out; and Selma looked around disconso- 
 lately a moment in the little house about which the vines 
 were not yet growing. 
 
 At night, when they sat silently together, Selma asked 
 suddenly: " Do you know what I miss? The barking of a 
 dog. It gives one such a pleasant feeling of safety, out in 
 the country, where everything is so still at night. Don't 
 you remember old Tiger, on Uncle James's farm ? When 
 he struck up his deep bark it always seemed to me he was 
 saying, ' Take your comfort in your cozy room, good folks, 
 I am here to see that no danger comes near you.' And we 
 have none, you say ? I shall miss a dog very much. ' ' 
 
 ' * There are many things you will miss here, ' ' said matter- 
 of-fact John, yawning; " but what should I do with a dog? 
 When the wheat is cut there will be sheep driven onto the 
 stubble, and then the dog .vould either worry the sheep or 
 fight with the herder's dogs." 
 
 And now the wheat had been cut, the stubble field lay 
 bleak and bare, but the sheep had not yet come. 
 
 The sun had gone down, the wind had risen, and it made 
 Selma shiver; but she could not make up her mind to enter 
 the dark little house and shut it out. There was something 
 
214 That Ranch of His. 
 
 peculiar about the wind here; it swept along swiftly, close 
 above the surface of the ground, but never rising to any 
 great height above it. It was sure to come with the sinking 
 of the sun, if it did not set in before; and when Selma was 
 alone, as she mostly was, it sang such strange, weird lays 
 around the lonely place, that she often joined in, "to keep 
 from crying her eyes out." It was not a rude, boisterous 
 wind, to shake doors and rattle windows, or blow the smoke 
 down the chimney; but it " keened " at every window, and 
 begged and moaned for admission at the single door; and 
 when its prayer was not granted, it rushed suddenly away, 
 and the place grew so still then that Selma often wished she 
 had opened both door and window to let it in. 
 
 Selma had closed her eyes wearily a moment. 
 
 ' * How many years longer of this weary life ? ' ' she asked ; 
 "and then comes death death on a pale horse ah! there 
 he comes already." Selma had been brought up a Presby- 
 terian, and while she strained her eyes to enjoy the unusual 
 spectacle of a handsome vehicle drawn by two superb horses, 
 she murmured with a faint smile, * ' Death on a pale horse, 
 and and something or other and eternal punishment fol- 
 lowing in its train. Poor Aunt Sally! The bible is still in 
 the bottom of my trunk. ' ' 
 
 The team stopped at the distant fence, the occupant de- 
 scended to let down the bars that served for a gate, and then 
 drove straight across the field toward the house. Selma had 
 risen, and the gentleman sprung quickly to the ground when 
 he saw the lithe, graceful figure standing by the doorway. 
 
 "Mr. Marston is not at home?" He spoke with the 
 
That Ranch of His. 215 
 
 slight accent which Spaniards seldom banish from their 
 English. 
 
 ' ' He will not return until late, I fear. If I can deliver 
 any message you may choose to leave, I shall do so with 
 much pleasure. ' ' It was so long since she had spoken to a 
 stranger that she viewed this one with some interest; more 
 so because he was the first Spaniard she had seen who was 
 not a vaquero or a sheep-herder. 
 
 But the gentleman extended his hand deprecatingly. 
 
 "O no, Senora; how could I trouble a lady so? I will 
 come some other time. If you would kindly tell me where 
 I could find a vaquero ? I cannot stop to put up the bars 
 again ; my horses will not stand on the way home. ' ' 
 
 And to corroborate his statement the black horse snorted 
 impatiently, while the white one stamped the ground. 
 Selma had quite lost herself a moment the horses were 
 splendid; and she repeated absently, " Vaquero? There is 
 none. We keep no servant about the place. ' ' 
 
 "How?" asked the Spaniard, quickly. "All alone? 
 Ah! I beg pardon, Senora, a thousand times." 
 
 Selma had recovered herself, and returned his adieux with 
 a haughty bow; but his last look rested on a face flushed 
 with anger or emotion. 
 
 When John came home, earlier than she had looked for 
 him, she met him more affectionately than for some time 
 past; she had spent the interim wondering whether it had 
 sounded like a complaint: "There is no servant on the 
 place." 
 
 " We have had a visitor, John a tall Spaniard, with pale 
 
216 That Ranch of His. 
 
 green face and dark green eyes; and oh, such magnificent 
 horses as he had! one coal black, the other snow white. 
 He wanted to see you; who can he be ? " 
 
 " Well, I must say," laughed John, " for a man who has 
 such an opinion of his good looks as Don Ramon Aliso, that 
 is not a very flattering description. But I recognize him by 
 his horses. He is our proprietor. He has another ranch 
 at San Diego, where he has been for some time; that is the 
 reason you had not yet seen him. I suppose he came to see 
 about the sheep that are to come on the stubble here. ' ' 
 
 "What did you say?" Selma questioned, with pardon- 
 able curiosity. ' ' Don Ramon who ? our proprietor ? Has 
 he bought us ? " she laughed; ' ' and does he own us now ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' At least, the land we live on, ' ' he answered, in his cool, 
 deliberate way, ' * and all the other land as far as you can see 
 from here." 
 
 Selma had turned pale to the very lips. 
 
 "I don't understand you, John Marston"; a sudden 
 hoarse tone in her voice would have struck anyone but her 
 somewhat phlegmatic husband. ' f Speak plainly. Are you 
 bankrupt ? Have I made a poor man of you so soon by my 
 ignorance of household management and ranch affairs ? 
 Have you been obliged to sell your ranch ? ' ' 
 
 ' ' Obliged to sell ? " he repeated as he turned slowly 
 towards her. "Why, what stuff you talk. It never be- 
 longed to me. I should have to be a man of considerable 
 means to buy land at seventy-five and a hundred dollars an 
 acre, as they hold it here. Later, if I have good crops for 
 two or three years longer, we will go further south, where 
 
That Ranch of His. 217 
 
 they don't ask a man's whole fortune for an acre of land. 
 Or it may be that I can buy some of this, after a while; Don 
 Ramon is head and ears in debt, like all Spaniards. His 
 American friends will take good care that he shall not re- 
 main a wealthy Spaniard long; and if the land ever goes at 
 sheriff's sale, I may get a piece cheap. And it is good 
 land," he went on, musing to himself, ' * particularly for 
 wheat. ' ' With that he lighted his pipe, and made himself 
 comfortable in the large rocking-chair. 
 
 On Selma's cheeks there flamed a dark red spot, that 
 contrasted ominously with the pallor just now covering her 
 face. 
 
 Before John left the house next morning, he wanted to 
 charge her with a message for Don Ramon, in case he 
 should return. 
 
 ' ' I beg of you to hunt him up yourself, ' ' she interrupted 
 him impatiently, " I cannot bear the man." 
 
 ' ' But, Selma, how unreasonable you are. Don Ramon 
 is the best fellow in the world, and all his tenants will tell you so. 
 If ever the crops fail, he does not stand on his share of 
 wheat, but lets us have the whole harvest for seed, and never 
 presses for his money. I tell you there are not many land- 
 lords like him to be found." 
 
 Selma was silent, pressing her lips together till they were 
 white, and seemed hardly to hear what John said. 
 
 Again, in the course of the day, she had a visitor the 
 pastor of the Presbyterian flock of the neighboring town. A 
 slim figure, delicate face, faultless dress, and gold eye-glasses 
 had earned for the Rev. Mr. McBetts the name of the 
 
2i8 That Ranch of His. 
 
 "dandy minister." He was a well-meaning man, however; 
 in point of education far in advance of most of his church 
 members, and never tired of gathering new sheep to his fold. 
 Perhaps Selma had not succeeded in fixing a meek and pa- 
 tient expression on her face after a sleepless night, during 
 which a thousand hard, indignant thoughts had chased each 
 other through her brain; and perhaps her demeanor was not 
 as lamb-like as a minister might have thought proper. At 
 all events, on returning home, Mr. McBetts called straight- 
 way for his sister Almira. She was something of an old 
 maid, but loved her brother with her whole heart, and the 
 rest of mankind as much as she could. 
 
 "I need your assistance," he said to her. "That man 
 Marston has brought home a jewel of a wife, and she must 
 join our congregation. It is just what we need; she plays 
 both piano and organ, sings like an angel I can tell from 
 her face and has the air of a duchess; but that has nothing 
 to do with it, ' ' he corrected himself. * ' There is something, 
 however, I cannot fathom; you must come with me and find 
 out for yourself. The woman is unhappy about something, 
 I know." 
 
 Almira propped her pointed chin with her pointed index 
 finger. " H'm I don't quite like that; it sounds too much 
 like the beginning of a romance, and we have had enough 
 of that sort of thing, the Lord knows. It isn't quite a month 
 since the graceless Greenwich went off with that worthless 
 fellow, leaving her helpless child to the tender mercies of 
 her husband. You used to think, too, that the poor woman 
 was unhappy the minx, with her silly airs and graces! " 
 
That Ranch of His. 219 
 
 " Well, well, wait till you have seen Mrs. Marston." A 
 light flush had suffused the young man's face; but he knew 
 that a serious word from him would silence his sister' s sharp 
 tongue. 
 
 She saw Mrs. Marston the very next day; and when the 
 horse's head had hardly been turned away from Marston' s 
 door, Almira broke out with ill-concealed triumph: 
 
 " I know it all; I knew I should if I could see her myself 
 for just five minutes. But you are right, she is not that kind 
 of a woman, at all." 
 
 ' ' Well ? ' ' asked her brother, with more of interest than 
 curiosity. 
 
 "Well," she repeated, " cannot you see that she is ter- 
 ribly disappointed ? Whether he deceived her, or whether 
 she deceived herself, I have not yet determined, but she is 
 terribly unhappy. You see what a haughty piece she is; 
 see her taper fingers and her dainty ways; fancy that she 
 came to California as. the mistress of a large ranch, well fixed, 
 and instead she sits helpless and alone on that cheerless piece 
 of land. O, she need not try to fool me; she thinks she told 
 me nothing; she would suffer "the rack before she'd com- 
 plain, but I can look right through her pride." 
 
 " Poor woman! " said the brother compassionately. 
 
 "Yes," assented the sister, carelessly; "but she's coming 
 to church next Sunday, and she'll play the organ, she says. 
 I am going to take her home from church with us to dinner, 
 just to show that stupid Mrs. Henderson that her reign is 
 over. She'll turn yellow with envy." 
 
 Her brother hardly heard the words; she was not so bad 
 
220 That Ranch of His. 
 
 on the whole; her charity reached as far as her tongue, he 
 used to say in her vindication; no living thing within her 
 circle suffered hunger or cold, but she had a chronic dislike 
 for young, pretty women. 
 
 The following Sunday was perfect, and Selma, after hav- 
 ing played the organ and sung 'Mike an angel," to the sat- 
 isfaction and pleasure of both brother and sister, was assisted 
 into the minister's carriage by Almira, while that lady her- 
 self afterwards clambered into John Marston's less elegant 
 vehicle. 
 
 The home of the McBetts, Casa Laguna, lay at a short 
 distance from the hastily built-up little town; and the waving 
 of trees groups of silver-shafted birch, the spreading syca- 
 more, and somber cypress and the sight of green lawn were 
 balm to Selmar's spirit and drink to her thirsty soul; it 
 soothed and calmed her more than the sermon or the hymns 
 had been able to do. She drew a deep breath as they en- 
 tered the gateway. 
 
 11 How like entering Paradise this seems to me," she said, 
 ' ' after living these long months on that wretchedly bare, dry 
 stretch of land. It was not so bad in the spring, but now it 
 is horrible; I shall go mad, I believe"; her face was aflame; 
 the blue eyes flashed and her clear voice trembled, but she 
 recovered herself when she saw the young man's eyes rest 
 with tender pity on her face. 
 
 A hoarse cry far above them gave him the welcome 
 means of turning the conversation. 
 
 "Look at it," he said; "that is the bird of prey from 
 which these mountains take their name Gabilan Range. 
 
That Ranch of His. 221 
 
 You may travel the mountain the whole day through, and 
 its monotonous cry will fall on your ears just like that al- 
 ways far off, never changing or coming nearer, no matter 
 how long you follow it. The man, an American, to whom 
 the land on that mountain belongs is never called anything 
 but "Senor Gabilan" by the Spanish people. Perhaps 
 they think him of rather a grasping disposition I don't 
 know. But I am told that no Spaniard shakes hands with 
 him; they open and shut their own hand quickly, like this, 
 while addressing him, just as the hawk is known to fasten 
 his talons on his prey." 
 
 We must presume that the reverend gentleman told the 
 story merely to draw Selma's thoughts away from herself; 
 otherwise it would hardly have been fair in him to speak of 
 Americans with grasping disposition without mentioning his 
 own honored progenitor. He had said to Selma, when she 
 went into raptures at the first distant glimpse of Casa Lag- 
 una, that their place seemed so much more home-like, be- 
 cause it had been under cultivation longer than any other 
 American residence in the valley, as his father had come in 
 possession of it, by a lucky chance, at quite an early day. 
 
 Perhaps the dear old gentleman had never told his son 
 what that ' ' lucky chance ' ' was. 
 
 More than ten years before, and when all the land from 
 the Salinas valley to the coast was still in the possession of a 
 few Spaniards, a party of Americans passed through the 
 country to see what could be made of it. * ' A party of 
 Americans traveling through the country," they were 
 warmly welcomed and hospitably entertained at the different 
 
222 That Ranch of His. 
 
 ranches which lay thinly scattered, extending for leagues to- 
 gether over hill and plain. One old Spaniard, who boasted 
 of his descent from the Hidalgos, thought his establishment 
 an ancient adobe in which his fathers had lived before him 
 not luxurious enough for the comfort of hs Americanos, 
 and rode across country to Monterey, to procure the means 
 of furnishing entertainment for his guests that would not dis- 
 honor his ancient name. Even at that time there were 
 Americans in Monterey who knew well the value of the lands 
 so loosely held by these ' ' greasers, ' ' whose trusting nature, 
 improvident ways, and childlike simplicity in business mat- 
 ters, were alike taken advantage of by the keen Yankee. It 
 was an old story, how, after a few paltry sums of money re- 
 ceived from his American friend, the poor greaser would 
 suddenly find himself a beggar before his own door, and his 
 leagues of land transferred with all the formalities which 
 the American law (a sealed book to him) requires to the 
 man who had so kindly advanced him money. So in the 
 case of poor old Don Domingo Sanchez. One of the party 
 whom he had so lavishly entertained, the good Mr. McBetts, 
 had bought the mortgage of the man who had furnished the 
 money to the Don for his entertainment; and with the great- 
 est equanimity he took possession of the entire ranch, the 
 memorable old adobe house included. Senor Domingo 
 Sanchez died later, in Monterey, the gray old city by the 
 sea, which so much resembled these poor old Dons fallen 
 in state and fortune, but unbroken, both, in their pride. 
 
 The day after this pleasant visit to Casa Laguna, Selma 
 had all her good humor destroyed at one stroke when she 
 
That Ranch of His. 
 
 saw the Spaniard with the pale green face and dark green 
 eyes enter the house. Her face grew more flushed than it 
 had become from the kitchen fire over which she was bend- 
 ing, when it darted through her brain that again he saw how 
 she was without a servant on the place. She shook her 
 curls back quickly from her face, and met him haughtily on 
 the threshold. 
 
 * ' I beg a thousand pardons, ' ' he said humbly, when he 
 saw the peculiar flash in her dark blue eyes, ' * but this has 
 always been a favorite spot of the ranch with me, and before 
 Mr. Marston had a wife I often came here." 
 
 " Which you had an unquestioned right to do," was the 
 ungracious reply. " So far as I understand, this land and 
 all the rest belongs to you, pretty much. 
 
 He had stepped back to the open door. " All of it," he 
 affirmed; "from the mountains to the group of trees you 
 see yonder; and from the end of the mountain chain to the 
 south as far as you can see. ' ' 
 
 He had lifted his hand and the noonday rays were caught 
 in the glittering ruby on his finger, and as he moved his 
 hand hither and thither, drops of transparent blood seemed 
 trickling over Selma's light cotton dress. She laid her 
 hand over her eyes a moment. 
 
 "It dazzles one so," she said; and when she removed 
 her hand, she saw the devouring gaze of the Spaniard 
 fastened on her face; and the sun that painted golden rings 
 on her hair seemed to kindle a flickering fire in his deep-set 
 eyes. 
 
 When the Rev. Mr. McBetts with his sister came, later in 
 
224 That Ranch of His. 
 
 the day, Selma had an insane idea of imploring Almira to 
 take her away with her. She felt as if she had been exposed 
 to a scorching fire, and that safety and relief could only be 
 found in the atmosphere of this cold, practical nature. She 
 grew irritable at the thought that the hated name of the 
 Spaniard must again be mentioned between John and her- 
 self, and the impulse was strong on her to leave the lone 
 little house forever. 
 
 4 ' I wish we could have taken her with us, ' ' said the 
 brother, as he cast a lingering look back from the buggy to 
 the kitchen door, where Selma stood wistfully looking after 
 them. " She needed comfort and companionship to-day, if 
 ever in her life, I know. ' ' 
 
 " And who should have gotten Mr. Marston's supper? " 
 asked the sister. * * They don' t even keep a Chinaman to 
 do the housework. It's a lonesome place, to be sure; but 
 there is work enough to do to make her forget it." 
 
 Soon after, the oft-announced sheep were at last driven on 
 the stubble; and then it was less lonesome; for Selma 
 watched the herd and herders many an idle hour. She had 
 never in her life seen so many sheep, though her Uncle 
 James was called a large farmer in Missouri, and had owned 
 some fifty field-hands before the war. 
 
 The vaqueros claimed her attention above all things. 
 "It's as good as a circus," she said, laughing, to John, "to 
 watch them. And I'm not a bit afraid of them, though 
 they might stand models for Italian banditti." 
 
 It is said of the Spaniards the Mexicans, rather that 
 they excel in the management and care of sheep; and it 
 
That Ranch of His. 225 
 
 seemed almost superfluous that Don Ramon should give 
 such close attention to this band. Yet hardly a day passed 
 that he did not visit them, though he did not always leave 
 his buggy or dismount from his horse; and he seldom ap- 
 proached John Marston's door. 
 
 One night when the wind had been sobbing louder than 
 ever at door and window, Selma was startled by a knock 
 and the unexpected appearance of Don Ramon on the 
 threshold. There was no invitation extended him to enter; 
 she only said curtly, ' c Mr. Marston is not at home. ' ' 
 
 "I know it," he answered; but added hastily, when he 
 saw the sudden flash he so dreaded in her eyes, ' ' it is he 
 who sent me." 
 
 "You are welcome," she said more gently. She read in 
 his eyes that he wanted to say, ' ' Pobrecita! It is wrong to 
 leave a delicate woman alone in this wilderness." But aloud 
 he said: 
 
 ' ' The wind that you hear howling without heralds the 
 rain ; and Mr. Marston, with more of my tenants, has repaired 
 to the river, where the water dammed itself last year. They 
 have taken a number of my laborers with them; and Mr. 
 Marston has requested me to say that it might be late before 
 he could return. I shall stay here till he comes; but can seat 
 myself on the bench outside if I am in your way here. ' ' 
 
 Her generous heart smote her as though she had accused 
 a fellow-being of wrong. 
 
 1 ' No, certainly not, ' ' she said, " I am very glad of your 
 company." 
 
 She offered him refreshment, knowing that he must have 
 
226 That Ranch of His. 
 
 been out in the saddle a long time, but he declined as usual; 
 Don Ramon had never tasted meat nor drink in John Mars- 
 ton's house. But when he found her thus tractable and in 
 good humor, he ventured one step farther. Would she not 
 sing for him, as she often did when she was all alone? 
 
 A quick glance from the haughty eyes cautioned him, and 
 he added in explanation: 
 
 " I know of your singing from my vaqueros; the rascals 
 have really aesthetic tastes, though their rough looks may 
 detract from my assertion." 
 
 Without more ado Selma sang not for him or to him 
 though, for she had soon forgotten that any one was listen- 
 ing to her. She sang song after song, her eyes straying out 
 through the uncurtained window, where the fire of the 
 vaqueros was burning, and the Gabilan Mountains, rose in 
 dim outlines against the dark sky when the fire grew low. 
 And when she sang of the woman who had forfeited honor 
 and home to follow her false lover, the door was suddenly 
 opened and John Marston stood on the threshold, wet 
 through and shaking the water off his hat for the first rain 
 of the season had set in, and the two people in the narrow 
 little room had known nothing of it. 
 
 Selma sprang to meet him. 
 
 " How long you have been, John! it has been so still and 
 lonesome. ' ' 
 
 4 'What! has Don Ramon entertained you so poorly?" 
 he asked. 
 
 "Don Ramon!" she repeated; "ah! yes; I had forgot- 
 
That Ranch of His. 227 
 
 ' ' That he was here ? ' ' laughed John. ' ' My dear friend, ' ' 
 he turned to the Spaniard, "what conquests you may make 
 among the rest of the sex I don't know. This lady has 
 never been smitten. First she describes you as a tall Span- 
 iard with light green face and dark green eyes; next she de- 
 clares she can't bear the sight of you; and now she has even 
 forgotten that you are in the same room with her." 
 
 His own boisterous mirth prevented him from noting that 
 the others did not join in his merriment. The Spaniard had 
 risen and stood stiff and rigid, his olive face blanched, his 
 lips compressed; while Selma so busied herself in getting 
 supper for her husband that she did not even take time to 
 shake back from her face the heavy curls that almost con- 
 cealed it. 
 
 The next was the first rainy day of the season, and the 
 herders and vaqueros were much in the neighborhood of the 
 house; for though the sheep were scattered over many hun- 
 dred acres outside of John Marston's place, the herders' 
 headquarters had always been near his house. John Mar- 
 ston himself was standing in his door, looking idly on, when 
 a vaqaero dashed up to tell him that the water had again 
 dammed itself in the river, and that Don Ramon requested 
 Mr. Marston to engineer the clearing away of the obstruc- 
 tion. Drawing on his rubber boots and throwing his water- 
 proof over his shoulders, he started out at once. 
 
 Shortly after, Selma came to the door, water-bucket in 
 hand, and looked disconsolately into the rain. The artesian 
 well was two hundred yards away, and the black mud ankle- 
 deep. There was not a splinter of dry wood in the house, 
 
228 That Ranch of His. 
 
 either, and bread to bake and shirts to iron. She was just 
 debating within herself the propriety of throwing the bucket 
 as far as she could send it, and herself on the floor for a good 
 cry, when she heard the heavy splash of a horse's feet from 
 behind the house. 
 
 "Ah! John has thought of his delinquencies and has come 
 back. Good John ' ' mentally patting his broad shoulders. 
 
 She was giving John too much credit, however: it was 
 Pedro, the fiercest-looking brigand of them all, who made a 
 sudden dash around the corner. In her trepidation she had 
 commenced the journey to the well, and now stood helpless, 
 one slipper on her foot, the other imbedded in the tough 
 black loam. In the twinkling of an eye Pedro had sprung 
 from his horse, lifted her light as a feather back into the 
 kitchen, and placed the bucket, filled, beside her. Before 
 she could express her thanks, half a dozen other vaqueros 
 had made their appearance in answer to his shrill call, and 
 after a brief consultation they all galloped to the fence where 
 it was nearest the house. Without dismounting, they each 
 fastened their lariat around the top board of the fence, gave 
 a long pull, a strong pull, a pull altogether, and off came 
 the board with a crash. The maneuver was repeated till 
 they had sufficient planking, which they hauled to the house 
 by winding the lariat around each separate load, and fasten- 
 ing the end to the saddle-horn. Then they made a pave- 
 ment of it in front of the "kitchen door, and laid a dry walk 
 to the well much to Selma's astonishment and fright; what 
 would John and Don Ramon say to see expensive fencing 
 destroyed in that way ? She expressed this fear when she 
 
That Ranch of His. 229 
 
 thanked Pedro for his attention; but the vaquero, lifting his 
 shabby hat with the grandezza that the most ragged of them 
 can assume, said courteously: 
 
 " O, Senora, the Padrone would tear down the entire fenc- 
 ing of the whole Sandia Rancho before he would allow the 
 Senora to place her foot on the cold, wet ground." 
 
 And never did Selma have to set her foot on the cold, wet 
 ground again. To Mr. John Marston's great joy, this fero- 
 cious Indian-faced fellow suddenly developed all the best 
 traits of a well-trained house servant; and not a drop of 
 water or stick of kindling-wood did John have to provide 
 while the sheep were on the stubble. 
 
 Selma' s church attendance had ceased with the setting in 
 of the rain, for there was only a little open wagon on the 
 ranch. Sister Almira was subject to neuralgia, and would 
 not venture across country in wet weather, so that the young 
 minister had to make his visits alone. Selma had not yet 
 joined the church; and after meeting the Spaniard at the 
 Marstons' house once or twice he expressed his apprehension 
 lest Selma should join the Catholics. 
 
 "It would jnot be for your husband's best interests, my 
 dear Mrs. Marston," he advised her. " The Catholics have 
 no influence whatever in this part of the country, and the 
 congregation is composed almost entirely of the Spanish 
 and low Irish population. And besides, what lady would 
 want to be seen of a Sunday entering the old barn which 
 they had turned into a church ? ' ' 
 
 He did not understand, as did the Spaniard, the sudden 
 flash in Selma' s eye, and he heard only a very pardonable 
 
230 That Ranch of His. 
 
 affectation of Christian humility in the answer that came a 
 few moments later: 
 
 11 God knows that I think the lowliest place devoted to His 
 worship too good for a poor erring mortal like myself to 
 enter; and my conscience tells me that I am not fit to be- 
 come a member of any religious congregation." 
 
 Satisfied that Selma did not mean to become a Catholic, 
 he trusted to luck "God's own good time," he said for 
 the rest. 
 
 Whenever the Spaniard met the young man at John Mar- 
 ston's, his eyes followed him as the eyes of the panther fol- 
 low his prey; and he always maintained on such occasions 
 that he neither spoke nor understood a word of English. 
 
 For John Marston these were busy times. Down by the 
 river Don Ramon had leased to him one hundred acres 
 more, at a really trifling rate. The land lay in rather an in- 
 convenient location, and so far from the house that he had 
 built himself a little shanty on it to shelter him through the 
 night: when the rain was incessant, roads were too heavy to 
 travel in the dark. But the prospects were fair for a good 
 crop. "And then," he said, knocking the ashes out of his 
 pipe, ' ' we will go farther south, where they raise olives and 
 oranges, and all the fancy things that cost so much money, 
 and that you women so hanker after. ' ' 
 
 Selma' s pale face grew still whiter as he said it, and her 
 voice was broke by a sob as she answered, " Yes, John, cer- 
 tainly." 
 
 John's natural phlegm must have grown into positive ob- 
 tuseness of late, or he most certainly would have noticed the 
 
That Ranch of His. 231 
 
 change in Selma's manner and appearance. There was a 
 restlessness in her eyes that made them gleam out darkly 
 from the slender white face, and her voice was harsh and 
 tender by turns, as though she were never in the same frame 
 of mind two minutes together. Perhaps that she felt more 
 lonesome than ever; for the sheep had been driven back into 
 the mountains, and when she looked from the window now 
 at night she saw only impenetrable darkness, where the fire 
 of the vaqueros had lately been shining. Since the rains 
 had ceased, the wind had found its way back to the lone 
 little house, and came rushing up to the door again, where 
 it cried and moaned to be let in. The new grass had clothed 
 mountain and plain with robes of hopeful green, and the 
 meadow-lark climbed upward on its waves of song. 
 
 But in Selma's heart there was neither hope nor spring 
 nor sunshine. It was as if the storms of winter, that had 
 raged and torn through the mountain- clefts, had found an 
 abiding echo in her breast. And often, when at the close of 
 day a pale shadow moved by like a phantom where those 
 brigand vaqueros had broken away the fence of the ranch, 
 she clasped her hands to her heart and implored wildly and 
 incoherently, "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us 
 from evil; for Death comes riding on a pale horse, and hell 
 and eternal punishment follow in his wake." 
 
 And one night the phantom moved close up to the lone 
 little house lying all unguarded on the open plain, and the 
 shadow grew dark on the threshold of John Marston's 
 home. With a fainting heart Selma passed across it. " It 
 has been no home to me," she said with a shiver; "the 
 
232 That Ranch of His. 
 
 dreary, desolate place where no living being gave me love 
 or sympathy save one." 
 
 Before her stood Don Ramon's light carriage the same 
 in which she had seen him first, many months ago and the 
 horses she had so admired stamped and pawed the ground, 
 as though counseling dispatch. The Spaniard's arms were 
 outstretched to lift her into the vehicle, but with sudden pas- 
 sion he motioned her back. 
 
 " Not with that shawl on you the wedding-gift of John 
 Marston! Throw back hat and shawl, and all your finery, 
 into the house. I bade you wear your meanest dress; 
 Ramon Aliso can himself afford to dress you." 
 
 As in a dream, she turned back to the house to fling from 
 her the offending shawl; but the long silken fringe twined 
 stubbornly around her fingers, the door escaped her grasp, 
 and the wind hurled itself wildly into the room, filling all the 
 house with sobs and wailing. 
 
 "Hasten, love, hasten," came in dulcet tones from the 
 carriage, and with compressed lips Selma turned forever 
 from John Marston' s dishonored home. 
 
 "Let the dark night and the wild winds take possession," 
 she muttered; " he will not suffer as I have suffered, for he 
 has never loved me, and has no heart to break." 
 
 The next moment soft furs were wrapped about her, and 
 strong arms held her in a close embrace, while the horses 
 dashed on, as if conscious that they must bear to a place of 
 safety a costly stolen treasure. She struggled to free her- 
 self, moaning bitterly: 
 
 " Oh, the sin and the shame of it all! Had I a mother 
 
That Ranch of His. 233 
 
 with whom to take refuge, or a brother to give me a home, 
 it would never have come to this. But now lost! lost! 
 lost!" 
 
 He spoke to her soothingly, as one speaks a child to 
 rest. " Do not speak so wildly. You are my only love, 
 and in a year's time you shall be my wife, for divorces can 
 be obtained for money among los Americanos; and if all 
 should fail you would still be my only love, and mistress of 
 all my estate your whole life long." 
 
 She uttered a scream, and pressed closer to him. 
 
 ' ' We are pursued ! I will never live through the dis- 
 grace and the scandal ' ' 
 
 Again he spoke soothingly: 
 
 "It is only Pedro, the vaquero who so admires you, 
 and who would stab that clumsy gringo to death before he 
 would let him get possession of you again. Be tranquil, 
 love, we are not pursued. ' ' 
 
 Who, then, is the man with set, white face, on sweat- 
 reeking horse, following in dread silence the carriage tracks 
 that lead from his very door ? Hour after hour passes by, 
 and when the Spaniard, accompanied by his grim body- 
 guard, draws up in his elegant vehicle before the door of the 
 little hotel in a distant town, the worn-out horse of the 
 pursuing rider breaks down beneath him; and as Don 
 Ramon is about to lift his half-fainting companion out of the 
 buggy, a heavy hand is laid on his shoulder. 
 
 " Draw your pistol, accursed villain," said John Marston, 
 in a low voice still as death, " and let that woman find her 
 way into the house alone. ' ' 
 
234 That Ranch of His. 
 
 The face that the Spaniard turned to him was pale and 
 unmoved as his own; only a slight quiver of the thin nostril 
 spoke of the passion raging within him. Pedro had quickly 
 approached his master; he let Selma's inanimate form glide 
 into his arms, and turned with flaming eyes to his enemy. 
 
 * ' You have no pistol ? Then I will throw away mine 
 too!" John Marston flung his heavy weapon across the 
 street. "Now come on, with your fists! Ha! Put that 
 knife away, cowardly Spanish dog " He threw himself 
 forward to wrest it from his antagonist's grasp; but he was 
 blind with fury, and the next moment he fell back a deep 
 gash in his forehead, running upward till it made its way 
 into the heavy masses of his tawny hair. 
 
 A dozen men sprang from the bar-room of the hotel, 
 each more anxious than the other to see who and how 
 many had been killed. Among them was the sheriff of the 
 county a Spaniard and to him Don Ramon explained, in 
 a few whispered words, the state of affairs. Then that 
 official turned indignantly to the waiting crowd. 
 
 "Just to think, amigos, what a dangerous man that 
 gringo is; he actually attacked my friend Don Ramon with 
 a pistol here is the weapon now. Fortunately Don 
 Ramon managed to strike it out of his hand; and in falling, 
 during the tussle, the man must have hurt himself. It is 
 my duty, at all events, to place him in safe custody, where 
 he can do no more harm." 
 
 So John Marston, wounded, bleeding and insensible, was 
 placed in safe custody where he could do no more harm; 
 while within the next half-hour Don Ramon Aliso, with 
 
That Ranch of His. 235 
 
 fresh horses, was speeding toward the nearest railroad 
 depot, bearing with him his stolen treasure. 
 
 Charity covereth a multitude of sins; so do big dia- 
 monds; and plenty of both are to be found in San Fran- 
 cisco. At a charity ball they can be seen in perfection 
 both diamonds and charity; for all sorts of people are 
 admitted for sweet charity's sake, and to swell the receipts 
 for the night in dollars and cents. 
 
 We go late to such a ball, of course, and study with 
 wonder and delight the magnificent dresses there the 
 papers will tell us in the morning who was inside of them. 
 At this particular ball is a lady conspicuous for. dress and 
 diamonds. The heavy satin of her dress flames in the color 
 of the California poppy; and diamonds shake and glitter on 
 bosom, hair and fingers every time she moves. It is a 
 ponderous frame to display dry goods and jewelry on, and 
 to cover the frame so thoroughly must have cost large sums 
 of money. But that's what she has her money for, people 
 say; she has no one to leave it to when she dies. Poor, 
 wealthy, vulgar Mrs. Merritt! Ever since her immense 
 wealth realized from the opportune sale of swamp lands 
 mortgaged to her worthless, departed husband had fallen 
 into her enormous hands, it had been the one cry of her 
 really good heart "Alone in the world, with no one to 
 leave my money to! " 
 
 However, she was not alone at the ball to-night; beside 
 her was a figure the entire reverse and opposite of the 
 worthy matron. A delicate lavender silk fell gracefully 
 
236 That Ranch of His. 
 
 around the slender form, and a single rose was half hidden 
 among the heavy gold-brown curls. There was an expression 
 of weariness on the pale, oval face that was not well suited to 
 the gay scene; and the haughtily curved lips responded only 
 in monosyllables to the volubility of the mammoth woman. 
 
 A small circle had formed about Mrs. Merritt, and she is 
 discussing her domestic and financial affairs freely with the 
 five hundred friends. 
 
 " Yes; I have some one now to leave my money to, for I 
 have legally adopted her dear little chick and I'd like to 
 see the first one of you young scamps make love to her for her 
 money. She's had her own troubles, poor child, and she so 
 hates and despises men that I run no risk of having my money 
 squandered by a graceless, ne'er-do-well of a husband." 
 
 "You are perfectly right, Mrs. Merritt, to guard both 
 your treasures well;" it was a handsome, rakish-looking 
 individual who spoke. "But would you not introduce a 
 fellow if he vowed and declared he had no dark designs on 
 either? Come, now for old acquaintance sake let me 
 beg your fst&c protege for the next dance." 
 
 " She'll not dance to-night, Harry Underwood. My 
 little chick has a pretty hard head of her own, in spite of 
 her gentle eyes; and she has declared that she will not 
 dance. Perhaps, too, I have spoiled her just a little; but 
 she is the dearest child, for all that, and really loves me, for 
 all my rough ways. You may believe me that I cherish her 
 as the apple of my eye." 
 
 The loving look she cast over to her companion seemed 
 suddenly frozen in her eyes. 
 
That Ranch of His. 237 
 
 " What ails the child ?" she cried in alarm. "Are you 
 sick? Away from here, all of you; don't you see she can 
 not breathe here ? ' ' 
 
 With her stout fists she thrust back the throng of the 
 curious who had gathered at the cry of ' ' fainting woman. ' ' 
 The straining eyes of her companion were fixed on the 
 farther end of the room, and the pale lips breathed but a 
 single word into the woman's ear. 
 
 ' ' Nonsense, child ! ' ' she exclaimed impatiently, ' * you 
 are dreaming again. Do put that fickle Spaniard out of 
 your mind at last. Come, we will go to one of the sitting- 
 rooms and I will order champagne." 
 
 But the pale lips approached her ear again. 
 
 "No no, aunt, I am not mistaken. It is Ramon; see, 
 he is coming this way." 
 
 It was, perhaps, the uncommon stature of the woman 
 that drew the looks of the Spaniard toward her, as she 
 stood upright, with craned neck, to scrutinize him. From 
 her his glance glided to the form beside her, and with a few 
 quick strides he had reached them just in time to catch 
 the fainting woman in his arms. 
 
 "Make room there," he cried sharply; "this lady has 
 fainted from the heat stand aside, please." 
 
 The music striking up at this moment, there was no 
 difficulty in leaving the hall unobserved; the Spaniard laid 
 his burden on the lounge in a small sitting-room, and bent 
 anxiously over her. The woman in orange satin could 
 bridle tongue and temper no longer. 
 
 "So you are the delectable Ramon, about whom the 
 
238 That Ranch of His. 
 
 poor thing has been breaking her heart and you hunting 
 fresh pastures in the meantime, no doubt. O, a fine set 
 you are Spaniards and Americans alike, don't I know you 
 ugh ! And that poor creature driven out of her house by 
 the avaricious landlord, and not a stitch of anything but 
 what she had on her. What should have become of the 
 unfortunate child if I had not found her that very day you 
 you heartless deceiver! " 
 
 Her feelings had gotten so much the better of her that 
 she overlooked entirely the possibility of "her chick's" 
 needing any assistance to recover from her swoon, and only 
 when Ramon had bathed her temples, and Selma had 
 opened her eyes, was she recalled to the needs of the 
 present. Ramon kneeled beside the lounge and chafed 
 the cold little hands as he asked, with trembling 
 voice: 
 
 "You do not believe what this woman says? Surely, 
 you knew that I had not willfully deserted you, my life, my 
 angel ? Those rascally Americans had me seized and 
 imprisoned suddenly and without warning, when it came 
 time to foreclose the mortgage on the Sandia Rancho, so 
 that I could make no effort to redeem it. The wounding of 
 John Marston furnished the pretext for my arrest though 
 John Marston has never been heard of since. From the 
 moment I regained my liberty I searched for you O, my 
 love, I need not tell you with what eagerness and anxiety. 
 My heart broke in the hopeless search; I neither slept "nor 
 rested I sought everywhere and have found you at last, 
 never to part with you again. For we start to San Diego 
 
That Ranch of His. 239 
 
 to-morrow, to my rancho there. I am still a wealthy man, 
 though half my land is lost." 
 
 "Start to San Diego to-morrow, indeed!" mocked Mrs. 
 Merritt, her broad face flushed, her arms akimbo, "and take 
 my child without so much as saying, ' By your leave.' Do 
 you know that I have adopted her, and left her all my 
 money ' ' 
 
 In the ball-room, meanwhile, there was a commotion of a 
 different kind. At the entrance door appeared a fresh 
 arrival, viewed rather critically by the smiling ushers. By 
 the widest stretch of charity, his corduroys and heavy boots 
 could not be construed into full-dress, though the man was 
 a gentleman, and handsome enough, in spite of a fiery scar 
 that crossed his forehead and buried itself under the masses 
 of his tawny hair. He had evidently been sold an admis- 
 sion ticket, so what could they do but admit him ? espe- 
 cially as the quantity of wine he had already taken augured 
 that he would, take a good deal more. A titter ran through 
 the crowd near the door, as he turned apologetically to one 
 of the gentlemen in regulation dress. 
 
 "So much light here," he said, "and so many handsome 
 ladies it's bewildering to a fellow. Could you not intro- 
 duce me ? Came in from San Joaquin yesterday, and sold 
 my wheat this morning. Would not some of the ladies 
 take a glass of wine with me ? No offense I am a 
 stranger, you see, and don't know the rules of the place." 
 
 The ushers had one after the other edged themselves 
 away, and one of ' ' the many handsome ladies ' ' turned to 
 her companion. 
 
240 That Ranch of His. 
 
 " It's the Hoosier from San Joaquin; my husband once 
 pointed him out to me. He burrows in the San Joaquin 
 Valley all the year round, comes to town only when the 
 harvest is in, spends the money he gets in a week's time, 
 and never goes back till he has had at least one broken 
 head to pay for. Watch now, and you will see him pick a 
 quarrel with some one in a very short time. But I do think 
 the managers ought to have taken his pistol from him." 
 
 Very likely they had not seen it; they were not watching 
 him as closely as these ladies, who discovered the little 
 weapon only as, passing through the crowd, his coat was 
 for an instant displaced by some one jostling against him. 
 
 Pushing on, he came directly in front of one of the little 
 sitting-rooms, which are so cozy to enjoy a quiet supper and 
 harmonious conversation in. In this room, however, there 
 was loud talking, and the occupants seemed engaged in 
 anything but harmonious conversation. A woman's sharp, 
 vixenish voice attracted him. 
 
 "What's going on here?" he asked, recklessly peering 
 in. ' 'Anything I can take a hand in ? " He was still at 
 the gaming table with his thoughts. "God's Death!" he 
 shouted suddenly, his eyes clear, and his senses sobered in 
 a moment. " That accursed greaser again ? I'll give you 
 no odds against me this time, you damned Spaniard. I 
 know I'm going to hell, but you shall go there first " and 
 before the man could rise from his kneeling position, John 
 Marston's hand had sent a bullet crashing through his 
 brain. The sight of blood maddened him all the more. 
 
 "That woman there!" he screamed, turning fiercely to 
 
That Ranch of His. 241 
 
 the prostrate figure on the lounge; but the arms of the 
 gigantic woman were clasped about him, he could neither 
 shake her off nor use his pistol, and the weapon was 
 wrested from him before the strong arms freed him from 
 their unwelcome embrace. 
 
 Policemen were on the spot; again, as on that night so 
 many months ago, John Marston was taken into safe 
 custody, to prevent him from doing more harm, and to be 
 held till the Spaniard should appear against him at the bar. 
 It was a vain precaution. Don Ramon Aliso had gone 
 before a higher bar, and poor Mrs. Merritt, with her kind 
 heart and her vulgar ways, had to find some one else to 
 leave her money to; for Selma did not survive the shock of 
 that dreadful night. 
 
THE STORY OF A GARDEN. 
 
THE STORY OF A GARDEN. 
 
 NEVER was garden more unintentionally started, and 
 never did one prove greater source of pleasure. One of the 
 row of detached cottages, which my elder brother had built 
 for the purpose of letting to tenants, was occupied during 
 one summer by a younger brother with his family, who pur- 
 posed returning to the States at the close of the following 
 winter. The town lies in the midst of the Salinas plains, 
 and as these cottages were pretty much on the outskirts, the 
 surroundings were flat and dreary enough. George, how- 
 ever, had the foresight to plant trees little snips of eucalyp- 
 tus, about six inches high one row along the outer edge of 
 the sidewalk, another row inside the white paling fence. 
 
 To make the glaringly new place a little more homelike 
 during my sister-in-law's sojourn in California, I had a dozen 
 or two of plants sent up by a San Francisco florist, and set 
 out in the little front yard of the cottage fuchsias, a few 
 double geraniums, pelargonias, pansies common enough 
 flowers, which would entail but small loss by their death or 
 destruction, after having served their purpose. 
 
 It so chanced, one day about Christmas time, while on 
 a visit there with mother, that my little nephew brought me 
 two small twigs of honeysuckle little sprigs about four 
 inches long, broken off a neighbor's vine at haphazard not 
 slips or shoots. It was a wet, rainy day, and I stuck them 
 
246 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 in the ground by the front porch, as children do when they 
 play at making gardens. I went back to the city, mother 
 remaining in Salinas till the time should come for my State- 
 brother's departure for his old home; then I went up for a 
 last visit, and was surprised when mother pointed out two 
 nicely growing honeysuckle vines, and said they were the 
 little sticks I had planted. By this time, as the winter was 
 a wet one, the little eucalyptus had more than doubled their 
 height; the geraniums looked as if they did not intend to 
 die, by any means, after their brief period of usefulness; and 
 the fuchsias were covered with the merriest, gayest bells of 
 royal purple, deep red, and starry white. Mother had, in 
 the meantime, set out a verbena slip here, a bunch of violets 
 there, in the little front yard, and began to cast longing 
 glances at the much larger space in the rear of the house, 
 which stood covered with weeds a foot or two high. I, too, 
 found myself often on the front porch, watching the almost 
 visible growth of the scant collection of plants; and finally, 
 before the day came on which we were all to leave the little 
 cottage, and my bachelor brother to his solitary fate, we 
 had concluded not to abandon either, but to refurnish the 
 cottage and install mother as housekeeper for brother, while 
 I was to spend there such brief periods of my existence as I 
 could pass without breathing the air of San Francisco. 
 
 And now we commenced growing a garden. I haunted 
 the florists' shops and fancy nurseries in and about the city, 
 brought and sent home all the flowers I could see or think 
 of had many a batch of worn-out, gnarled old plants 
 palmed off on me as "sturdy growers," and many a 
 
The Story of a Garden. 247 
 
 ' ' goose ' ' flung at my devoted head by my big brother, be- 
 because I could not tell a healthy, thrifty flower from one 
 that had been forced into temporary bloom and beauty by 
 the gardener's art. To my unspeakable joy I was one day 
 presented with a bundle of a hundred rose cuttings, and on 
 carrying these to Salinas in person, my brother's interest in 
 the garden was at last fully aroused. The ground back of 
 the house had ceased to be a wilderness; the soil had been 
 turned, beds laid off and all sorts of seeds sown. On a 
 piece of ground next our garden proper, and in the immedi- 
 ate vicinity of an artesian well, George laid all the rose cut- 
 tings in rows, close together, the object being to give them 
 as much water as possible through the summer, to make 
 roots, so that they could be transplanted in the fall. A little, 
 rude paling fence was built around the patch, and, as it had 
 just about the right dimensions for a grave, the neighbors' 
 children got to calling it our graveyard. As it was still 
 early in the year, we continued to plant, mother and I, all 
 the slips, seeds, and flowers we could buy, beg, or borrow. 
 I dare say the seeding and planting was not always done 
 strictly according to rule; and my brother, who understands 
 something of gardening, no doubt often had his patience 
 sorely tried by the lack of system and knowledge we dis- 
 played. But what matter, so long as everything grew and 
 thrived and flourished ? Every small bit of geranium that 
 was broken by accident was stuck in the ground and grew 
 to be a bush. Every little twig of fuchsia, every fragment 
 of petunia, heliotrope, pink, showed the same accommodat- 
 ing disposition. No soil but that of California can boast of 
 
248 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 such clinging love as its children bear it. Fling away the 
 bit of heliotrope in your hand, drop the spray of fuchsia on 
 the ground at your feet, throw but a cup of water upon it, 
 and you will be surprised, some odd morning, to find a 
 blooming bush at your door. The sand of San Francisco, 
 or the black adobe of Salinas, will make the same generous 
 return for the smallest amount of labor. 
 
 When June came I thought our garden was splendid. 
 There had been a sollya planted by the front porch on one 
 side of the hall door, and a climbing-rose (cloth-of-gold) on 
 the other; the bases of the pillars at the outer ends of the 
 porch were already covered by the honeysuckle. I had 
 found at a nursery two aquilegias, dark brown and dark 
 blue, with buds on them, and had transplanted them into the 
 front yard; and never did flowers look so lovely as these 
 simple, graceful plants, old-fashioned, but handsomer far 
 than many of the costlier, newer kinds. The roses in the 
 "graveyard" would bloom, no matter how often we broke 
 off the bud's';' and the stock (gilliflowers) which we had 
 sown early in the year, blossomed out in the richest colors 
 and most delightful fragrance, and Continued so to bloom for 
 the next three years. A little slip of heliotrope had been 
 set out by the steps at the front door, no one thinking that 
 the hop-o'-my-thumb would ever do more than fill out its 
 little corner. By fall, it had grown to be two feet, was cov- 
 ered with flowers all that winter, and the next spring shaded, 
 under its then stately height, countless little plants sprung up 
 from the seed. These were transplanted to different parts of 
 the garden, and some of them proved really choice varieties, 
 
The Story of a Garden. 249 
 
 with clusters larger and finer than the parent flower could 
 ever boast of. The roses in the "graveyard," which had 
 been marked whenever they had shown their color by their 
 buds, were transplanted after the first rains in the fall, and 
 commenced blooming almost immediately; and a tiny slip of 
 a passion-vine, set out about the same time, a calla lily of 
 three small, delicate leaves, and a diminutive yellow jasmine, 
 entered on a race for the championship in speed and endur- 
 ance. How their strength held out, all through the winter, 
 is a marvel to me. With what pride I picked my daily 
 bouquet in the year-old garden, I need not say; and some 
 of the railroad officials can testify to the huge bunches of 
 flowers I used to bring with me to San Francisco. 
 
 If I had thought the garden splendid in June, when it was 
 only six months old, how much more so did it seem to me 
 the June following, when it was just eighteen months old. 
 I had been absent for some time, and when I neared the 
 well-known cottages, I was surprised by a dark-green shim- 
 mer along the whole road. The eucalyptus trees had made 
 good use of their leisure, and had grown a full head taller 
 than my big brother. As the whole length of the block be- 
 longed to him, he had had the double row of trees extended 
 all the way down and around the corner, though there was 
 no building on the lower half of the block, only the white 
 picket fence enclosing the lot. I could hardly realize that 
 this was the bare, bald -looking place I had once so detested, 
 as I stopped before our own particular cottage. Honey- 
 suckle vines were twining tenderly about the corner pillars 
 of the porch, and drawing their network across to the next 
 
250 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 support; they were covered with bunches of white, creamy 
 tubes, and the air was heavy with their perfume. The climb- 
 ing-rose had reached the height of the lattice- work on its up- 
 ward journey, and its yellowish flowers formed a most effec- 
 tive contrast to the sky-blue of the sollya blossoms, trained 
 up on the other side of the porch. The beds were edged 
 variously with dark-blue violets and pink daisies, above 
 which bloomed salvias, euphorbias, lantanas, tube-roses, for- 
 get-me-nots, carnations, white lilies, Japan lilies, iris, prim- 
 roses, ranunculus, lilies-of-the-valley, pansies, anemones, 
 dahlias, and roses white, red, pink, yellow, crimson, cream 
 in the wildest profusion. On the porch, on either side of 
 the hall door, stood a Turk's-head cactus, with large, trum- 
 pet-shaped, rose-clored blossoms; and above, on the door- 
 posts, hung two cages, " Yakob's " on one side, "Jimmy's " 
 on the other. At the corner of the house I could get a look 
 into the garden at the back, and was fairly dazzled by the 
 bright colors in the sun. But the sun had destroyed quite a 
 number of plants, mother said, particularly her hydrangeas, 
 and she was going to have trees in the garden to shade her 
 plants. As she is quite an independent old lady, she had 
 determined to trouble no one, but raise her own trees. A 
 little box filled with earth, and two bits' worth of eucalyptus- 
 tree seed, was all she wanted, and in an incredibly short time 
 she had a miniature forest on hand, which she distributed to 
 suit herself. 
 
 Every well-regulated garden has its own toad, I believe; 
 and I discovered ours, one day, in the ' ' wood-house. ' ' This 
 is an institution where garden implements, kindling-wood, 
 
The Story of a Garden. 251 
 
 disabled chairs, broken-nosed pitchers, and the like 
 are kept; and, while rummaging here for something, my 
 hand suddenly touched some alarmingly cold object. A 
 bound and a scream was the natural result, and when mother 
 came and threw open the door, we beheld for the first time 
 our toad a tender little thing, not over an inch or two long 
 or broad. He looked gravely into my face, surprised and 
 displeased at the fuss I had made about it, and then de- 
 murely hopped away. After this we saw him frequently, 
 generally seated behind the yellow jasmine on the * ' half 
 round " bed, but just as often perched on the top of an old 
 stone jug in the wood-house. But he croaked when he felt 
 like it, and it meant neither sunshine or rain, so far as I could 
 discover. 
 
 About this time I visited San Jose", and there, at a pot- 
 tery, saw a garden urn which I knew would look perfectly 
 lovely in our garden. It stood about a yard high from the 
 ground, could be taken in two pieces, and was to cost five 
 dollars. I had it sent home; but, somehow, George never 
 liked the thing, though he had it painted a bronze-green at 
 my request. I lugged it .into the front yard, underneath a 
 eucalyptus tree, with an immediate background of pink- 
 blooming double geranium. In it I planted a heliotrope 
 (they grew like weeds all over the garden), surrounded by a 
 wreath of some drooping little vines, which hung over the 
 rim of the urn. This whole arrangement I mounted on an 
 empty candle-box, around which I planted the periwinkle 
 with its far-reaching arms, to hide the box and make believe 
 it was a pedestal. Placed at the head of the broa4 walk or 
 
252 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 alley formed by the two houses, and viewed from the bot- 
 tom of the garden, I thought the effect was charming. But 
 my brother thought differently; and when I came to Salinas 
 again, the box pedestal had been chopped into kindling- 
 wood, and the urn, in two pieces, was idly rolling around 
 the yard. The heliotrope had died, George said, and the 
 periwinkle would not grow. I quietly gathered up the urn, 
 dragged it to the front porch, filled it with earth, and 
 planted a beautiful pink pelargonium in it, surrounded by a 
 wreath of blue lobelias. I watched it and tended it, and 
 when I left, it was under the impression that this was the 
 prettiest piece of furniture in the whole establishment. On 
 my return I could see neither the urn nor the plants in it, 
 and immediately commenced a " still hunt" for both. I 
 found the urn at last, drew it out of its hiding-place, rolled 
 it to the front porch once more, and commenced operations. 
 I took the largest of the Turk's-head cactus, and, as I 
 could not handle the thing on account of the long thorns, 
 broke the pot to pieces and managed to slide the plant into 
 the urn. Then I carefully gathered up the fragments of the 
 big flower-pot, put them where I had found the urn, and 
 considered a good day's work done. I had beaten my 
 brother the cactus was too much for him, and, as far as I 
 know, the urn stands on the front porch to this day. 
 
 Soon after, another equally bitter but equally wordless 
 war was waged between us. The garden was now so 
 grown up so choked up, in fact that many things which 
 had been planted in the first place to make a quick growth, 
 could be well spared. Among these, first and foremost, a 
 
The Story of a Garden. 253 
 
 vine called water-ivy by some, German ivy by others. It 
 grows rapidly, has a pretty, glossy, dark -green leaf, and is 
 the favorite resort of a large, hairy, black caterpillar. 
 Partly on this account, and partly because it dies down in 
 winter and leaves a mass of tough, black, string-like lines 
 clinging to the trellis, I had always hated it, and wanted 
 George to root it out, as there were so many prettier vines 
 in the garden English ivy, woodbine, passion vine, ivy 
 geranium, smilax, clyanthus and running roses. George, 
 on the other hand, hated my beautiful sollya, because the 
 resinous matter, which exudes from it with the sun, always 
 caught the dust and adhered as a black mass to the flooring 
 of the porch. But the plant was graceful and the flower 
 lovely, and I would not pull it up. Neither would he pull 
 up the water- ivy. At last I commenced on this myself; 
 but it was so tough, and so spread out and rooted in, that I 
 made but little headway, and went to San Francisco before I 
 could fairly finish the task. When I came back my sollya 
 had disappeared, root and branch, and that horrid water-ivy 
 was still in its place. The porch was so thickly covered 
 with vines now that the sollya was really not missed; but I 
 had to get even with my flint-headed brother. After much 
 labor, I succeeded in dragging the objectionable ivy out of 
 the ground, threw the whole thing over the fence, and took 
 my departure for the city, well satisfied with my efforts at 
 ridding the garden of a nuisance. Returning within a week 
 or two, behold! the water-ivy, replanted in its old corner. 
 Without a word I dug it up, and threw it over the fence on 
 the other side and felt quite triumphant when its former 
 
254 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 place was vacant on my next visit. Months later, I chanced 
 into the vacant lot below, which had been set out with roses 
 and evergreens, when what should I see but that detestable 
 water-ivy, growing as if nothing had happened it, in a far 
 corner of the lot. I ran back to the house, found a hatchet, 
 pulled up the plant, hacked it into little pieces, and 
 threw it, by bits, into the street. That was the last of 
 the water-ivy. 
 
 Amid these "wars, and rumors of wars," fair June had 
 come once more two years and six months, to a day, since 
 I had unintentionally started a garden by sticking a little 
 twig of honeysuckle into the ground. Verily, a goodly 
 showing was here, for a garden that had been neither 
 planned, nor laid out, nor sub-drained, sub-soiled, nor any- 
 thing else that Eastern people think indispensable for grow- 
 ing a garden. George met me at the depot, after several 
 month's absence; and long before I could see the row of 
 cottages, I saw the trees waving high above them. Turn- 
 ing into the street, we entered an avenue of tall, stately 
 trees, swayed by the noonday breeze, and shading garden, 
 sidewalk, street and cottages. The skimp little things that 
 had been objects of my scorn two years before, now com- 
 manded my respect and veneration, for there is nothing so 
 impressive and solemn to me as the rustling of the wind in 
 the trees. From out between the paling-fence, and above 
 it, great round clusters of double geranium pink, rose, 
 scarlet thrust themselves into the faces of the passers-by; 
 for all these plants, with the exception of a few white and 
 salmon-flowered ones, had been banished to the fence, on 
 
The Story of a Garden. 255 
 
 account of their impudently forward growth. Some of the 
 leaves were the size of a large palm-leaf fan, the stems were 
 as large round as my arm, and one of the scarlet double 
 kind was actually making its way from the fence to the roof 
 of the house. The cloth-of-gold climbing-rose at the front 
 porch was climbing over the roof, and the heliotrope the 
 old original one, in the corner by the steps was eight feet 
 high, though it had been wilted down by the unusually 
 severe weather of the past winter. The honeysuckle, which 
 we had once so cherished and protected, had taken poss- 
 ession of the better part of the porch and house, and mother 
 made daily attacks on it with carving-knife and garden- 
 shears, to keep it from forcing its way inside. The jasmine 
 was twelve feet high, the passion-vine an impenetrable wall, 
 and the calla lily grew all over the garden; it had been sep- 
 arated into fifty different bushes, and they bloomed from 
 the first of January to the last of December. A dozen 
 gladiola bulbs which had been placed in the ground, 
 made the garden look like a dry goods store show-win- 
 dow; and when it came time to take up the bulbs we 
 filled baskets with them, and then had to pull up as 
 weeds the blades that sprang from the countless small 
 ones left in the earth. Hyacinth, tulip and other bulbs 
 increase in the same proportion; and the flowers seem 
 to retain their bloom longer here than they do in the 
 Eastern States. 
 
 One of the homely German proverbs says that c ' our 
 appetite grows with the eating. ' ' The more garden we had 
 the more we wanted. The only free space left in the yard, 
 
256 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 about twenty feet square, on which fronted the wood-house 
 and the back porch, was now traversed by rude benches, 
 rising one above the other like steps, completely covered 
 with flowers growing in pots; and the bees of all Monterey 
 County gathered right there, as if they thought these 
 flowers, being in pots, must excel those in the ground. 
 The side-wall of the wood-house had been trellised all the 
 way up, and here a separate fuchsia-bed had been estab- 
 ished. It was sheltered from the hottest sun as well as 
 from the cold that sometimes nips them in the winter-time; 
 and I will engage to pick a bouquet of the most variously- 
 colored fuchsias from that bed, any time of the year, be it 
 January, May or October. 
 
 Still, I don't boast of our fuchsias; I do not think that 
 they thrive in Salinas as they do in this horrid San Fran- 
 cisco; we have no plant in the garden over eight feet high, 
 and there is no stem there more than one inch and a half in 
 diameter. But our lemon-verbena! That is something to 
 boast of. It may seem strange to Eastern folks to hear a 
 lemon-verbena spoken of as a shrub; this particular one, 
 however, is a tree. It was a slender shoot of two feet in 
 height when we set it out; it is fifteen feet now, and the stem 
 as large around as a stout man's arm. It is monstrous, but 
 has lost none of its fragrance by its vast proportions. It 
 is the home of a dozen humming-birds, who build their 
 nests in it, and are tame enough to visit the cages of 
 "Yakob" and "Jimmy" on the back porch; for there 
 are no children with prying eyes and climbing feet to 
 disturb them. 
 
The Story of a Garden. 257 
 
 "Yakob" and "Jimmy," poor fellows, had twice a very 
 narrow escape from those feathered Apaches, the king- 
 birds. In both cases " Yakob' s" vigorous lungs had 
 brought timely help; "Jimmy," a timid, oppressed-looking 
 little canary, had sat huddled up in a little heap, as far back 
 as possible in the cage, when rescued, with his head tucked 
 under his wing. After this, the cages were hung out on the 
 back porch, where they could be seen from the dining-room 
 and kitchen. The birds were really fond of flowers, and 
 enjoyed the garden as much as any other member of the 
 family. " Yakob," a splendid singer, was spoiled by 
 petting, and naturally grew headstrong and willful. Among 
 other things, he insisted on coming out of his cage when- 
 ever he felt inclined to roam through the house, and would 
 not sing unless he had his way. He always wanted 
 "Jimmy" for company, and together they wandered from 
 room to room "Yakob" leading the way, "Jimmy" 
 humbly bringing up the rear. But they were not ungrate- 
 ful, and "Yakob" would strike up a brisk, lively air, 
 hopping about the floor by mother's feet, "Jimmy" sing- 
 ing a feeble little second. We used to be very careful about 
 closing the doors and windows when first they were allowed 
 to leave their cages, more particularly the hall-door. This 
 opens into, the house from the front porch, and as you enter, 
 you have George's room on the left, the parlor to the right, 
 through which you pass into the dining-room, where the 
 cages hang by the window. 
 
 One day I happened in the dining-room just as the birds 
 were crossing the parlor floor and hopping up to the hall 
 
258 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 door, which stood wide open. I was afraid to startle them, 
 as they did not know me as well as mother, so all I could 
 do was to watch. Presently ' ' Yakob ' ' stood in the door- 
 way, craned his neck to look up at the sky, shook his 
 head, turned to "Jimmy" to say that it was not safe out 
 there, and led the way into George's room, where they both 
 perched, as usual, on the bouquet. After this, the door was 
 never closed on their account, and "Yakob" even made 
 short trips to the lemon-verbena, on different occasions, 
 leaving "Jimmy" behind on the porch. As I said, they 
 were really fond of flowers devouring their own weight in 
 mignonette, many times a day. George always brought 
 them a handful when he came in to his meals; and if he 
 ever neglected it, there was war in camp. ' ' Yakob ' ' 
 would flutter around, scold, and work himself into a great 
 fury; and if he happened to be shut up in his cage, I have 
 seen him clutch the door with his little claw, shake it, and 
 screech in the most vindictive manner, and I knew perfectly 
 well that he meant; " Ho let me at him! I want to peck 
 out his eyes!" "Yakob" was afraid of nothing; but 
 "Jimmy," as I said, was easily frightened, and had a 
 strange horror of George's black hat. He would flutter 
 wildly about, if the black hat approached his cage, and his 
 little heart would beat with fear for an hour after. One day, 
 as both cages were hanging on the back porch with the 
 doors open, George's hat came unexpectedly around the 
 corner, and "Jimmy," in his first fright, shot out of the 
 cage and made for the trees. George, never thinking of 
 the mischief he should work, started after him, tore off the 
 
The Story of a Garden. 259 
 
 fateful black hat and tried to catch "Jimmy" by throwing 
 it over him. The frantic bird flew over the top of the 
 house, got in among the trees on the street, and was never 
 heard of again. " Yakob " still lives a saddened life; he 
 has neither sung nor left his cage since "Jimmy's" flight. 
 
 The toad, however, is still on hand. Mother had called 
 my attention to the fact that his croaking could plainly and 
 frequently be heard, but that he was no more to be seen. 
 Looking around for a larger flower-pot, on one occasion, to 
 transplant a slip that had grown into a bush, she stooped to 
 pick up one that stood, inverted, among the flower-steps I 
 spoke of before. With a horrified scream she dropped the 
 crock, for under it appeared what she thought at first was a 
 curled-up snake, but which proved, in reality, to be our 
 little toad, grown in circumference to the size of a large 
 saucer, and fat as a pig. He stared at mother quite as fix- 
 edly as he had once regarded me, but uttered a gratified 
 croak as he hopped away. Can any one tell me whether he 
 had lain under that crock for weeks and months growing 
 fat? Surely, there was no possibility of his raising the 
 heavy flower-pot from the ground every time he wanted to 
 take temporary shelter under it. 
 
 Elsewhere I have spoken of the enormous size the stems 
 of some flowers here attain. When we have lived a number 
 of years in this state, we forget that there is anything 
 remarkable about these things. It is only when we note the 
 astonishment of strangers and tourists, who see them for the 
 first time, that we are reminded of its being something 
 extraordinary. A cousin of mine, who generally spends his 
 
260 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 furloughs in European travel, and who prides himself some- 
 what on the collection of rare and beautiful plants in the 
 conservatories on the ancestral estate in the Fatherland, 
 devoted his last furlough to a trip to this country. Driving 
 with him through the Golden Gate Park, I expected, of 
 course, to hear him say how much better and finer they had 
 "all that sort of thing in Europe." But he was honest 
 enough to express his surprise and admiration; and when I 
 remarked casually that the lupine had been found very 
 serviceable in keeping the sand from drifting, he looked in 
 bewilderment at the huge, grayish-green bushes I pointed 
 to. 
 
 "Lupines?" he said, "Do you call those lupines?" 
 And he sprang from the carnage to convince himself, cut off 
 one of the branches, stripped it of its leaves, and said he 
 would send that to Alt-Jessnitz to astonish his brother. 
 
 " Then why not cut down one of the bushes and send the 
 main stem ? " I suggested. 
 
 But he only laughed and shook his head, saying that 
 would never do this was bad enough. It reminded me of 
 Pat, who asked his employer to write a letter for him home 
 to his people in Ireland. "Tell them," says he, " that we 
 get meat three times a week in this country." 
 
 " But Pat," the man corrected him, " don't we give you 
 meat every day? " 
 
 " True for you," was the reply; "but divil a bit would 
 they believe it at all, at all; sure, three times a week is as 
 much as I dare tell them." 
 
 The one regret of my life clings about this same cousin. 
 
The Story of a Garden. 261 
 
 It so happened that I did not succeed in showing him a 
 single heliotrope more than five or six feet in height. The 
 previous winter had been severe; most of them had been 
 nipped by the cold, and had not yet attained their former 
 dimensions. We did not get time to cross the bay to 
 Oakland; and all I could do was to give him my word that 
 I knew of different places there where the heliotrope had 
 clambered up to the second story of the house. As a well- 
 bred man he could not doubt my word, but it was awful 
 hard to believe. 
 
 " You see," he said, " we have an orangerie at Alt-Jess- 
 nitz, too under glass, of course, in winter- time; and the 
 
 orange- trees there grow so high. But heliotropes " 
 
 and a surreptitious shake of the head told me that he was 
 not convinced. 
 
 Let me say it again; " Our appetite grows with the eat- 
 ing." Though a thousand blossoms flashed their brilliant 
 hues through the sun-lit garden, and filled the air with 
 perfume, I could not help but think of other flowers which 
 we could not grow in the grounds. Begonias, for instance, 
 in spite of all that florists may say to the contrary, will not 
 live in the garden through the winter. Then there are 
 camelias, rhododendrons, gloxinias, amaryllis; and none of 
 these were to be found in our garden. 
 
 We are all remote descendants of the monkey, I think; 
 at least our instinct to imitate is easiest accounted for in this 
 manner. Passing along the street one day, I saw a newly- 
 erected green-house, built entirely of glass, covered with a 
 coat of white paint; and the moment my eyes fell on it, I 
 
262 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 knew just what we wanted. I rushed home out of breath, 
 and proposed that George build a green-house. 
 
 "I've no more time or money to lay out on that garden," 
 he grumbled. 
 
 But I was not discouraged. I knew him to be passion- 
 ately fond of begonias, and I called to his mind how many 
 specimens of the begonia had passed in through the garden- 
 gate, and out over the fence dead. I represented to him 
 that he would keep on buying begonias, and throwing away 
 their corpses, till the expense would reach that of a good- 
 sized green-house, and he would curse his folly and short- 
 sightedness at last for not having built one in time. Feeling 
 that my speech had made a deep impression, I knew that I 
 could safely leave the rest to mother, and returned to San 
 Francisco. 
 
 A month later he wrote: "Come and see the green- 
 house; it is twelve by sixteen feet, and cost fifty dollars to 
 build." I went as soon as I could. A perfect beauty was 
 that little green-house. It stood against the fence at the 
 bottom of the garden; the board fence itself had been raised 
 to form the thirteen-feet high wall, and from there the roof 
 sloped toward the garden. Everything about it, except 
 this fence-wall, was window-glass, covered with a thin 
 coat of white paint. Thus it gleamed out magically from 
 among flowering shrubs of oleander, magnolia, lilac, bridal- 
 wreath and roses. Graceful, slender trees, the trees that 
 mother had raised in the little box, flung light, fitful shadows 
 over it; and, altogether, the effect of the little structure was 
 more than charming it was enchanting, fairylike. Inside, 
 
The Story of a Garden. 263 
 
 on either hand, and along the back wall, were shelves; and 
 George had already filled a great portion of them with 
 begonias but begonias in such endless variety that the one 
 name does not seem sufficient for all the different kinds. 
 Being no florist, I can not call the multitudinous members 
 of the family by name; but aside from the two principal 
 divisions (discernible to the unprofessional eye), the flower- 
 ing begonias and the foliage begonias, there must be some 
 fifty subdivisions. The different flowers were from the 
 deepest scarlet to the brightest coral pure white, salmon, 
 pearl-pink, faint red, bright red, pink, another red, another 
 salmon no two shades alike, but always playing in the 
 same colors. Then there was J:he Rex begonia, with its 
 grand, silver- tinted leaves; another with funny little leaves, 
 all hairy, and mottled like a toper's nose; round, glossy 
 leaves, and leaves with a bright rim running around them 
 all begonias, but no two just alike. 
 
 The floor of this grand conservatory was exactly what it 
 had been while it was still common garden; even the white 
 rose that climbed up the fence was still there, though capped 
 of its longest branches. Geraniums, pinks and heliotropes 
 that happened to stand in that part of the garden had 
 insisted on growing till their heads struck against the lowest 
 shelf, and they seemed stupidly staring at the changes 
 around them. Of course the place is not heated, either 
 winter or summer; there is no trace of fire, steam or any 
 other artificial heat within a hundred yards of it; but the 
 house contains all the exotics that grace the conservatories of 
 the Eastern States camelias, bouvardias, azaleas, gloxinias 
 
264 The Story of a Garden. 
 
 and a hundred more. Pretty as the glass-house looks 
 in the light of the sun, I think it is prettier still at night, 
 seen from the outside, when brilliantly lighted up within 
 and a two-tallow-candle-power is sufficient for this purpose. 
 To see it then, when every leaf and blossom seems delicately 
 traced on the illuminated glass when the trees above cast a 
 momentary mantle over its brightness, to let it beam out 
 softly again the next instant, while the wind whispers mys- 
 teriously among the slender leaves, and the night is made 
 fragrant by the breath of a thousand flowers no one would 
 ever think that the garden was purely a chance one, and the 
 conservatory merely an afterthought. 
 
 For the third and last time let me say that " our appetite 
 grows with the eating." Many a time when I stand, gar- 
 den hose in hand, draggled and wet to the waist, like a 
 mermaid, I measure with my eye the distance to the farther 
 fence that surrounds the next cottage. Our garden is not a 
 large one, and the flowers are actually crowded. Now, I 
 think and mother thinks so too that George ought to 
 have that cottage moved to some other lot, so that the fence 
 between our grounds and the neighbor' s yard could be torn 
 down, and the whole space turned into one large garden. 
 And what mother and I think will come to pass. 
 
ST. MARVS. 
 
ST. MARY'S. 
 
 LONG ago, during the first year of my residence in Cali- 
 fornia, I had the good fortune to find a home in the family 
 of dear Mrs. Bissel and long may she live in the land! It 
 never occurred to me that I was boarding there; we seemed 
 like one happy family, though there were sometimes as many 
 as twenty-four children in the house at once. It was not in 
 the heart of the city, and there were large grounds, with 
 shrubs, and an occasional oak tree, surrounding the house, 
 which gave one a charming illusion of being in the country, 
 and which mothers with run-about children fully appreciated. 
 
 When I look back upon the happy time now, and recall 
 the different personages who made up the household, I find 
 that the individual who commanded and received the great- 
 est amount of consideration was Bridget, our cook. We all 
 bowed to her tyranny and consulted her pleasure, particu- 
 larly when it was a " bad day " with her which it was very 
 often. On such days Mrs. Bissel herself entered the kitchen 
 with fear and trembling; and as for one of us invading 
 Bridget's dominion during a "spell of weather" we would 
 just as soon have thought of thrusting our heads into the 
 furnace at once. There was no possibility of denying 
 that she was an excellent cook ; but, considered purely as a 
 woman, she was a terror. At the children's dinner, which 
 took place at four o'clock, one or two of the ladies were 
 generally present; and if it so happened that none of the 
 
268 St. Mary's. 
 
 legitimate mothers could conveniently attend, one or the 
 other of the ladies would take the place. Now, a dozen or 
 two of average San Francisco children would not consume 
 their common dinner in unbroken silence; and whenever I 
 happened to be the de facto mother, the urchins always 
 seemed unusually animated. To see Bridget then, if it was 
 a "bad day" with her as it generally was make her sud- 
 den appearance at the dining-room door, when the hubbub 
 was greatest, the iron spoon with which she had just basted 
 the meat swung high in air, her black eye-brows contracted 
 to a thunder-cloud, and her eyes flashing fire, was not con- 
 ducive to a child's quiet sleep at night. 
 
 ' ' Will ye be shtill ye murtherin' young dhivils ye ? 
 Howly Moses! but I'll put yez in the oven and roast ye 
 alive!" And ere the shrill tones of her voice had died 
 away, the little ones, even the most courageous boy in the 
 crowd, would seem turned into stone with fear. Then, with- 
 out a feature of her face changing, she would pile up another 
 dish with flaky white biscuit, warm ginger-snaps, or any- 
 thing else that was tempting to a child's appetite, and send 
 it into the dining-room by the waiting-girl. As to the wait- 
 ing-girl, it was always strictly enjoined upon her never to 
 touch anything upon the stove, in the stove, anywhere about 
 the stove anything in the kitchen, in fact, except what 
 Bridget set down on the large table expressly for her. This 
 she carried into the dining-room; and woe betide her if ever 
 she discovered speck or spot on the edge of dish or platter, 
 which Bridget had overlooked. Truth to tell it happened 
 very seldom, for Bridget was neatness itself except in her 
 
S*. Mary's. 269 
 
 dress she said she had no time to waste on that. Mrs. 
 Bissel, to give her time, made the attempt once or twice to 
 furnish her with an assistant. But they all went the same 
 way, generally on the third day, flying through the kitchen 
 door, with a soup-ladle, or stove-lid, a toasting-fork, or any- 
 thing else that came handy to Bridget, flying after them. 
 
 Once, when she had a particularly "bad day," poor Mr. 
 Bissel, just returned from a journey during which, perhaps, 
 the recollection of these bad days had grown fainter inno- 
 cently brought out the blacking-brushes in the kitchen, and 
 started in to polish his boots. He didn't reach the polishing 
 point, however; for, while he turned for a drop of water to 
 moisten the paste with, brushes, boots, and all took a sud- 
 den spin out through the open door and across the porch 
 into the yard. His wife had always tried to inculcate lessons 
 of patience and forbearance; and there was merely a blank, 
 noncomprehensive expression on his face for a moment; but 
 then, turning with a sudden "Well, I never " he would 
 certainly have added something stronger, had it not been 
 that a glance at the well-filled range reminded him it was 
 nearly dinner-time, and that Bridget was ruling goddess of 
 the roast. Another instance of how men are slaves to their 
 appetites. 
 
 As there was a stable and carriage- house on the grounds, 
 one of the families boarding with us kept their coachman 
 there, John Hand; and to him we soon assigned the rdle of 
 liberator. Bridget was not bad looking, and could be ami- 
 able. John Hand seemed a hopeful subject, and we took 
 turns at dinning Bridget's perfections into his willing ears. 
 
270 St. Mary's. 
 
 Particularly on ' ' bad days ' ' did we follow this pursuit with 
 avidity, extolling her art and economy in cooking, the 
 spotless purity of her kitchen domain, her beauty, her thrifty 
 ways, and the swift retribution she had visited, in the shape 
 of a milk-and-water douche-bath, on the head of the milk- 
 man when he once tried to supply our numerous family with 
 diluted cream, and short measure at that. Such a wife must 
 make the fortune and happiness of any man, we argued to 
 John Hand. 
 
 Mrs. Bissel shook her head at our plottings and en- 
 deavors. One day, when Bridget was having an out- 
 rageously "bad day," and we were working up John's affec- 
 tion for her in a corresponding degree, she said, "You will 
 never succeed. Poor Bridget has her own troubles, and it 
 is not all temper with her." She hinted at something that 
 Bridget had once confided to her, in regard to "a foine 
 young man back ill Ireland," who was poor like herself, 
 which was the reason that "the two of them couldn't get 
 married." After Bridget's departure from the old soil, her 
 mother had written something about the transfer of the 
 "foine" young man's affections to the daughter of a wealthy 
 farmer, and Bridget, receiving no assurance from him to the 
 contrary, was trying to school herself to the belief that 
 Tommy was faithless. It was hard, of course, that we 
 should have to suffer for the perfidy of this 'man; but we 
 tried hard enough to make another man pay the penalty, to 
 little avail, as the sequel will show. In fact knowing Mrs. 
 Bissel as well as I did, I had often had a glimmer of an idea 
 that it was not altogether on account of Bridget's proficiency 
 
St. Mary's. 271 
 
 in the art of cooking that her mistress had so much patience 
 with her; and to myself I said, " Well, Bridget is certainly 
 more lenient with Mrs. Bissel than with the rest of us a sign 
 that she appreciates, at least." But the same evening, at 
 dinner, I touched Mrs. Bissel lightly on the arm and whis- 
 pered to her that the tomato salad had just a faint flavor of 
 coal-oil, and had better be removed from the table. 
 
 " For goodness sake," she whispered back, "don't say a 
 word, or Bridget will never let me come into the kitchen 
 again. I trimmed my lamp at the kitchen table, and she 
 told me then to clear out, but I would not do it" 
 
 The tomato salad was not pressed on the diners, and Mrs. 
 Bissel luckily escaped a reprimand from her cook. 
 
 One morning a most distressing circumstance occurred 
 distressing as unlocked for, as we all had a clear conscience 
 and knew that for the last month none of us had ventured 
 into the kitchen to ask Bridget's permission to heat a flat- 
 iron on the range, or draw a cup of hot water from the 
 boiler (we generally got more of that than we prayed for, 
 anyhow) a number of distressing circumstances I should 
 have said ; for not only were the biscuit streaked with yellow 
 and burnt to a crisp, but the steak was tough and cold, the 
 coffee resembled dish-water, and no muffins, buckwheat or 
 corn-cakes were visible to the eye or discernible to the sense 
 of smell. Had Mrs. Bissel not been a strong, vigorous 
 woman, she must have sunk beneath the cross-fire of injured 
 looks and impatient questions directed to her or against 
 her, rather. Had she dared to disobey Bridget, or talked 
 back to her ? Had she spoken a single rash, cross word to 
 
272 .SV. Mary's. 
 
 her, and brought disaster on the whole household ? She 
 held up her hands to stay our imprecations. She vowed 
 she had behaved in the most exemplary manner; but Bridget 
 had had a letter from home last night, a very disturbing 
 or rather, important letter and it had unsettled her nerves. 
 There was no more said on the subject, as we saw the uneasy 
 glance Mrs. Bissel directed toward the kitchen-door. The 
 gentlemen were quickly through with their breakfast and 
 hurried down town, while the ladies were feeding on the 
 anticipation of ' ' hearing all about it. ' ' 
 
 With one accord we all assembled in a small room, well 
 out of Bridget's way, after breakfast, and there we heard all 
 about it, sure enough. The mother had written that a 
 brother of her deceased husband had died and left them all 
 his money " sh tacks and poiles of it," Bridget said as 
 much as two or three thousand dollars. At the same time 
 Tommy had written, after a long, long silence, to say that 
 his heart was breaking to see his beloved Bridget once more, 
 and that she might expect him now, at an early day. That 
 the girl would marry him as soon as he set foot on land and 
 chose to have her, he seemed to have no doubt no more 
 than Bridget had herself. John Hand was desperate, and 
 went so far as to hint that if the accommodating uncle had 
 not died at so opportune a time, Tommy would never have 
 allowed his heart to break for Bridget. But he got a fine 
 dressing-down for his pains, and Bridget would never speak 
 a word to him after. 
 
 Tommy came; Bridget invested all her savings in a black 
 silk dress, a black velvet hat (with a feather, of course), and 
 
St. Mary's. 273 
 
 a gay cashmere shawl. That she was supremely happy I 
 need not more particularly state; suffice it to say that we 
 got burnt saleratus biscuit more than once, instead of light 
 muffins, and that she went so far as to set a flatiron on the 
 stove for me with her own hands one day. They were to be 
 married in church, as a matter of course; and the Sunday 
 just before, when the last bans were to be published, I went 
 to St. Mary's, and took my seat in a quiet nook, where I 
 had the whole church before me. 
 
 It was a day perfect and lovely, as days are only in Cali- 
 fornia. There was an added gleam of brightness in the sun 
 because it was Sunday morning, just as I fancy that there is 
 a peculiarly sad tone in Sunday afternoon's sun. The soft, 
 golden air floated in through the upper portion of the tall, 
 gothic windows, and the sombre dome of the church seemed 
 gradually to become filled with the warm light of the sweet 
 May morning. In low, thrilling cadences the notes of the 
 organ fluttered and wavered through the lofty building, the 
 priest sprinkled the cleansing water right and left, and "As- 
 perges me, Domine" came in beseeching tones from the 
 balconied organ-loft. 
 
 When I raised my head again, I saw John Hand's square 
 shoulders somewhere in front of me, and I wished honestly 
 that it might be his name that was to be coupled with 
 Bridget's, and not black-eyed, slender Tom's, for I could 
 not divest myself of the thought that only Bridget's little 
 fortune had drawn him to her side again. Soon the ' ' preach- 
 ing priest" of the day mounted the chancel, and among 
 those whose names were published as about to enter the state 
 
274 * St. Mary's. 
 
 of holy matrimony were Bridget O' Neil's and Thomas 
 Finly's. Next, our prayers were requested for the repose of 
 the souls of those who had died during the week, and whose 
 death was brought to the notice of the Reverend Father; 
 and then, after the preliminary cough and throat-clearing of 
 his congregation, he began his short sermon. I have for- 
 gotten the words of the text, or where it could be found in 
 the Bible, but it was a lesson on renunciation; and involun- 
 tarily, as the sermon proceeded, I let my eyes rove in search 
 of John Hand. He sat with his shoulders bent and his head 
 bowed, a homely picture of sadness; he really loved the vix- 
 enish thing who was so ready to marry her fickle . lover of 
 long ago, and the thought came to me then that we had been 
 guilty of cruel wrong to the honest- hearted fellow. 
 
 The sermon progressed; John's head drooped lower and 
 lower, and when the sermon was over and the officiating 
 priest had again approached the altar, I noticed that the poor 
 fellow was kneeling, his face covered with his hands, and 
 great, silent sobs shaking his broad shoulders. Poor John! 
 Not for you alone was that sermon preached; the pale young 
 priest at the altar, whose gentle voice echoes with subdued 
 yet sonorous ring through the church, has struggled, battled, 
 and renounced; the white-haired woman kneeling humbly at 
 the shrine of Mary has felt the sorrow and the triumphs of 
 the Christian soul; and the tall, fair girl in the balcony above, 
 whose pure notes are so clearly distinct above all other 
 voices, carries ' ' Renunciation ' ' traced on the white forehead 
 and written in the depths of her dark, sad eyes. And as the 
 organ peals through the arched space, and the full choir 
 
St. Mary's. 275 
 
 answers the chant of the priest, the lower wing of the window 
 beneath which John Hand kneels is blown gently open by 
 the summer wind, a narrow strip of sunshine falls across his 
 auburn hair, and the glint of something white and silver, 
 flashing in the light, is for an instant seen above his head. 
 It is a dove that has found its way in through the open win- 
 dow, and flies swiftly to the altar, where it rests among the 
 heavy shadows beneath the vaulted ceiling, folding its wings 
 peacefully, as though it had come to stay. 
 
 Bridget's marriage did not turn out well; it soon became 
 known that Tom, though not dissipated, was often away 
 from home, and that Bridget was fretting her life out. 
 Whether it was really this, or whether her more than human 
 " infirmity of temper" had been but the symptoms of dis- 
 ease lurking in her system, I can not say; but Mrs. Bissel 
 told us one day, with tears in her eyes, that she had been to 
 see Bridget, and that the poor thing could not long survive. 
 She regained all her old vigor of disposition, however, before 
 her death, and Tommy found that every cent Bridget could 
 claim had been transferred to her mother before her death. 
 
 It was a rainy, blustering day, when Father Gallagher, at 
 St. Mary's, requested our prayers for the repose of the soul 
 of Bridget Finly. Tom was in church, occupying almost 
 the same seat that John Hand had once filled; and I fancied 
 that the wretch had come there merely to have the pleasure 
 of hearing his wife's name read out among those of the dead. 
 But somehow, when the organ thundered through the spac- 
 ious church, poorly filled with people to-day, he seemed to 
 shrink within himself; and pretty soon I saw him on his 
 
276 St. Mary's. 
 
 knees, his head bowed, his face covered. Just then an angry 
 gust blew full against the tall window, and as the lightly 
 fastened shutter blew open, heavy drops of cold, bleak rain 
 fell on the bowed head, and the wind tugged viciously at the 
 black curls which had once been poor Bridget's pride and 
 delight. 
 
MODERN MONTEREY. 
 
MODERN MONTEREY. 
 
 RUSKIN recently spoke of the resemblance existing be- 
 tween a duck and a snake, implying, perhaps, relationship 
 at some long-passed day. Ducks and snakes are both 
 stupid animals, and have no souls. A bird, however, has a 
 soul, and 1 could easily believe it to be related to the human 
 family, if it were only for having in common the one trait 
 the irresistible desire to flit when the spring-time comes. 
 No matter how soberly and sincerely I say to myself all 
 through the winter, ' ' I shall not want to go anywhere next 
 summer; that will be a saving, and I can get me an elegant 
 summer suit." But when the spring-time comes, I find that 
 that part of my soul which is related to the bird grows very 
 restless, and before the summer is far in the land I have 
 forgotten all about the elegant suit, and am flitting some- 
 where. 
 
 This year it was to Monterey. It was not the first time 
 my steps had turned that way. I had been there many 
 times before, and I have learned to love the old place, which 
 holds so much of interest to the American people. Histor- 
 ical associations alone, however, have never yet made any 
 place pleasant or desirable to live in; but in Monterey 
 nature has done much, though art and improvement, until 
 quite recently, very little, to make the town and the sur- 
 rounding country attractive. 
 
 In regard to its earlier history the main difficulty is to 
 
280 Modern Monterey. 
 
 know where to begin to speak of it. That Juan Rodriguez 
 Cabrillo must have passed the harbor in his cruise of 1542; 
 that Viscayno landed here, and took possession for the 
 Spanish king in 1602; that Father Junipero Serra reached 
 Monterey in 1770, with the good ship San Antonio, and on 
 the second of June celebrated the first mass under the 
 trees we have all heard and read so often that I am afraid 
 of being "choked off" by the editor if I attempt to say it 
 again. Still, there is some excuse for lingering a moment 
 over the arrival of the good priest Junipero Serra, for he 
 built the beautiful Mission of San Carlos, in Carmel, the 
 lovely little valley with its stretch of shining white beach, 
 and its remnants of mission garden and old orchards. And, 
 besides, the very tree under which the altar was erected for 
 the serving of the mass is still spreading its broad shadow 
 over the earth, and the tree still standing there is proof that 
 the whole story is true, if even it had not passed into history 
 as a fact. He came ashore; upon first landing, brought 
 thirty-eight out of the fifty of the ship's crew, monks and 
 sailors, with him; and, after declaring the land the property 
 of the King of Spain, took spiritual possession of the realm 
 for his church. The ground must have undergone consider- 
 able change since then, for where the ugly wooden cross 
 stands to-day, marking the spot where this first mass was 
 said, a little run, or gulch, has washed its way deep into the 
 soil, and the slope by the tree, where the worshipers would 
 naturally have knelt, is so narrow that thirty-eight people 
 could not possibly have crowded around, unless some of 
 them had descended into this gulch, a proceeding neither 
 
Modern Monterey, 281 
 
 dignified nor practicable, either then or now. The tree 
 from which the bell was suspended that bright June morning 
 has toppled over, and the trunk is now lying prone in the 
 tiny stream it had so long overhung. 
 
 Monterey itself should be viewed afoot. This advice is 
 not an insinuation against the state of the streets, though 
 the truth is that every street has a gully running through 
 the center. The streets are wide enough, however, and one 
 can drive either to the right or the left of the ravine, and, as 
 my brother philosophically remarks, these gulches will be of 
 considerable help in building the sewers. Some of the 
 older streets run in any and every direction that happens to 
 suit; the newer ones run due east and west, north and south. 
 Monterey has grown of late, in both size and importance; 
 but the newly erected American residences, I am glad to 
 say, have nothing of the rectangular, hard-cornered look 
 about them which new American houses are apt to have. 
 A spirit of veneration for the traditional quaintness of the 
 old capital seems to have mercifully guided the hand of the 
 designing architect, and the result is that the modern feat- 
 ures of the town blend harmoniously with what was already 
 there when the Americans came. And surely, what they 
 found there could not have been so utterly despicable. 
 The place had been the residence of the Spanish governors 
 for fifty years, and of the Mexican governors for twenty-five. 
 To be sure, we know how far removed from the center of 
 civilization California was in, those days; still, there were 
 men of character and distinction among the long line of 
 governors, priests, generals, who once dwelt here men 
 
282 Modern Monterey. 
 
 whose mark it is neither easy nor altogether desirable to 
 efface. 
 
 Many of the adobe houses, solid two-storied buildings, lie 
 in the midst of large gardens, surrounded by high walls 
 built of adobe, or the chalk-stone found in the vicinity. 
 When built of chalk-stone, the upper portion is frequently 
 of hard-packed earth, overgrown and covered with shrubs 
 and weeds; when raised of adobes alone, they are always 
 finished with a layer or two of red tiles, and above, and out 
 from behind these gray walls, with their red edge, crowd 
 the green foliage of tree and bush, and the tender pink and 
 golden yellow of apple-blossom and the cloth-of-gold rose. 
 The gate is grated, permitting a broad view of the garden, 
 and a glimpse of the interior of the dwelling, if the hall- 
 door happens to be open, for the gate is always just opposite 
 the front door of the house. A number of houses are but 
 one story high, and they are the coziest of all, the generous 
 veranda promising shade and coolness for the summer-time, 
 the heavy walls and deep fireplaces insuring warmth and 
 comfort for the winter months. Many of the less preten- 
 tious houses have no fireplace at all, except the apology 
 that serves for culinary purposes. The climate is so mild 
 that there is no suffering from actual cold it is only the 
 uncomfortable sensation creeping over one on a long, rainy 
 day that needs to be banished by looking at a cheerful fire. 
 
 Quite a number of the wealthy prominent Americans 
 lately removed to Monterey have bought some of the 
 better preserved of the old adobe structures and have con- 
 verted them into desirable- and attractive homesteads; for, 
 
Modern Monterey. 283 
 
 no matter how indolent and non-progressive the Spanish 
 population may have been, there is one element in this 
 sleepy old place which never stood still the plants and 
 flowers of field and garden. They took no holiday, sum- 
 mer or winter, these thousands of roses, lilies, vines and 
 trees; they kept right on growing, growing, growing, till 
 they have covered houses, fences, ruins, with a tangle of 
 scarlet, gold and* purple blossoms. In the garden of a 
 Madame Bonifacio (I beg pardon for growing personal I 
 do not know the lady, but I want other tourists to enjoy 
 what I saw), there is a trellis over the walk, from the hall- 
 door to the gate. The entire trellis is covered with a rose 
 crowded with blossoms, yellowish in color, the size of a 
 breakfast-saucer. The stem of this rose is a tree, as 
 large round as the neck of an ordinary-sized man. This 
 must be seen to be believed, I know; but it's there. 
 
 Pretty well back, on something of an eminence, stands 
 Colton Hall, named after the first American alcalde under 
 the military administration of General Riley. It was 
 originally designed as both a town-hall and a school-house, 
 and answers the latter purpose still. No one will ever go 
 into raptures over its architectural beauties, though the 
 building is quite large, built of the handsome light chalk- 
 stone, and well finished. Here the first California Constitu- 
 tion was framed, in September, 1849; it is really the cradle 
 of our State laws and a good sound cradle it looks to be, 
 even to this day. Beside it stands the jail (ominous juxta- 
 position), built of imported stone. The cause of the dis- 
 tinction enjoyed by the jail (to be erected of imported stone, 
 
284 Modern Monterey. 
 
 when native chalk-rock was good enough for the town-hall) 
 was in reality a bad augury for Monterey; for, during the 
 time the government had its seat here, these stones were 
 sent for to build a dry-dock with. As soon as it was 
 decided that the Legislature and the State Government 
 should be removed to San Jos6, this project was abandoned, 
 the stones were used to build the jail with, and, soon after, 
 Monterey entered upon the long sleep from which it is only 
 just awaking. 
 
 Closer in is a long, two-story, shaky adobe building, 
 bearing every mark of old age about it, without having yet 
 advanced to the dignity of a ruin. This is the Presidio of 
 Spanish times, the cuartel of the Mexican regime, and the 
 soldiers' quarters of the beginning of our own Government. 
 It lies in the heart of the town, abandoned and deserted, 
 save for a room or two in the lower story, where otherwise 
 homeless wanderers at intervals take up their abode. The 
 fort itself, and the casamata the place where the powder 
 and shot were stored, and the cannon were kept are out on 
 the hill, to the west of the town; and, as I had a great 
 curiosity to inspect these relics close by, we wended our 
 way through the busy streets, and were soon ascending the 
 hill. On the lower terrace, overlooking the Bay of Monte- 
 rey, stand the remains of thick adobe walls, with a heavy, 
 blackened log protruding here and there from the heaps of 
 debris. This is the casamata. No other traces of older 
 fortifications are visible on this plateau; but back of this, on 
 the summit of the hill, there is still a solitary cannon, point- 
 ing its warning finger at the bay. Steep as the climb was, 
 
Modern Monterey, 285 
 
 we mounted to the rampart and descended into the interior. 
 The earthworks had been star-shaped. From the main 
 road at the foot of the hill, I had often noticed a low roof, 
 barely visible above the outer walls. Now I had the grati- 
 fication of seeing it near by, at last, and found that it was 
 the block -house the last resort of the garrison, had the 
 outworks ever been taken. The sturdy old thing looked 
 defiant even now, with its notched loop-holes and impene- 
 trable timbers; but out of the low entrance-door hung wisps 
 of hay and bundles of straw, showing that it had degener- 
 ated into a mere storehouse for the abundant grain that now 
 grows around it. A little farther back, but well protected 
 by the cannon of the fort in former times, are the ruins of 
 the soldiers' barracks, with no signs of life about them, save 
 that a lizard glides swiftly by over fallen logs and decaying 
 timbers. The officers' quarters were in better condition, 
 and we mounted the stairs that led, on the outside, to the 
 upper story. Messieurs the officers had been comfortably 
 fixed, as usual, I'll warrant; large, well lighted rooms, fire- 
 places, and the most magnificent view imaginable. Stand- 
 ing on the rude balcony, which the landing of the stairs 
 forms in front of the house, one gets a wide look across bay 
 and city. Over these placid waters there the Savannah 
 came gliding, on the second of July, in 1846; and on the 
 seventh of the same month the stars and stripes were raised 
 by Commodore Sloat, right here in front of us, over the 
 old Mexican casamata, and yonder in the town, over that 
 rambling, two-story adobe house I spoke of before. The 
 Mexican people were well enough satisfied to accept the 
 
286 Modern Monterey. 
 
 Americans and their rule, so far as I could learn from Don 
 Rosario Duarte, who came with Commodore Dupont on the 
 Gyane, as an American marine, though a Spaniard by birth; 
 but their rulers were wide apart and divided in their opinions 
 on this point. Governor Pio Pico, in his little speech, 
 anathematizes the ' ' hordes of Yankee immigrants who 
 have already begun to flock into the country, and whose 
 progress cannot be arrested." 
 
 "Already," he exclaims, " the wagons of this perfidious 
 people have scaled the well-nigh inaccessible summit of the 
 Sierra Nevada, crossed the entire continent, and penetrated 
 to the fruitful valley of the Sacramento. What that as- 
 tounding people will next undertake, I cannot say; but in 
 whatever enterprise they do embark they will be sure to 
 prove successful." Thank you, friend Pio Pico, we have 
 endeavored to verify your kind predictions. Don Mariano 
 Guadaloupe Vallejo showed a great deal more ' ' savey ' ' on 
 this occasion. He said: "Why should we shrink from 
 incorporating ourselves with the freest and happiest nation in 
 the world, destined soon to be the most wealthy and 
 powerful ? Why should we go abroad for protection when 
 this great nation is our adjoining neighbor ? When we join 
 our fortunes to hers, we shall not become subjects, but 
 fellow-citizens, possessing all the rights of the people of the 
 United States, and choosing our own federal and local 
 rulers. ' ' 
 
 The only thing in the way of treasure that our soldiers 
 got in the city of Monterey at the time of its bloodless cap- 
 ture were one hundred and fifty pieces of ordnance 
 
Modern Monterey. 287 
 
 cannons, large and small which are at present decorating 
 street corners and serving as hitching-posts. They are 
 stuck in the ground, without much attention to "heads or 
 tails," and remind one I don't mean to cast reflections 
 of the bravado of most Mexican military: ferocious of 
 aspect, but utterly harmless and incapable of doing serious 
 injury. The heaviest two pieces are "planted " in front of 
 the Monterey Whaling Company's office, near the fort, as if 
 they had proved too heavy for further hauling. Next to 
 this house (the Whaling Company's) stands a red brick 
 building, of many memories. It was built, very early, by 
 Mr. Dickenson, one of the party who came in 1846, just 
 ahead of the Donners, and barely escaping their horrible 
 fate. He had with him his wife and two daughters, young 
 ladies who were greatly sought after, and much courted and 
 flattered. The boldest admirer they ever had, however, 
 was an enormous grizzly, who forced his way into their 
 room one night and insisted on making them a friendly call 
 anyhow, no matter how strongly they objected. Young 
 ladies had lungs in those days as well as now, and I can 
 imagine how their cries and screams rang through that old 
 brick house. One of the young ladies, married long since, 
 lately presented a brick from the wall of this building to the 
 Society of Pioneers. 
 
 The surroundings of Monterey could not well be more 
 beautiful if they had been gotten up to order. Hills, gently 
 rising, the chain broken here and there by a more abrupt 
 peak, environ the city, crowned with dark pines and the 
 more famous cypress of Monterey {Cupressus macrocarpa). 
 
288 Modern Monterey. 
 
 The Lomalto is a bald peak, with a lower peak, more 
 gently sloping, for its neighbor. The whole was formerly 
 called the Cerro San Carlos for to this Holy Charles seems 
 to have been assigned the guardianship of Monterey and the 
 Carmel Mission. To the right, or west of us, as we stand 
 facing the bay, is the hill bearing the remains of the old 
 fort, beyond which winds the road to Point Pinos and the 
 light-house; to the left of us, east, lies a forest of pine and 
 live-oak, and above the trees waves the flag from the tower 
 of the new Hotel del Monte. Before us the bay lies calm 
 and blue, and away across, on a light day, even without the 
 aid of a glass, can be seen the town of Santa Cruz, an 
 indistinct white gleam on the mountain side. 
 
 And now, having devoted the whole morning to historical 
 researches which led to the discovery of an owl, a mole 
 and several lizards among the ruins of the fort let us 
 follow the waving of the flag, which beckons us out of the 
 "dark forest-green." A short mile from the heart of the 
 town lies the new hotel, over which these crazy, sleepy old 
 Montereyans are fairly going wild. There are two roads by 
 which to reach the place, one along the sea-shore, while the 
 other, a longer drive, takes us by the handsome Catholic 
 church, across one or two -narrow lagoons, and past the 
 ancient, as well as modern, graveyard. Whichever way we 
 drive, we enter directly into the forest not ' ' grove, ' ' as 
 these horrid people call it, but veritable, venerable, old- 
 fashioned forest. Pines (Pinus insignis), trying their best 
 to reach the stars, are intermingled with live-oaks of 
 singularly tall, straight growth (Quercus agrifolia). There 
 
Modern Monterey. 289 
 
 is nothing gnarled or stunted about them ; no bleak wind 
 has ever crippled their growth, or distorted the solid trunk 
 into weird, repulsive shapes. Evenly the long, low-hanging 
 branches spread on every side, giving shade and protection 
 to hundreds of flowers and ferns. A thick carpet of native 
 grasses serves them for bed, and the poison-oak, the bane 
 and pest of most California country resorts, is conspicuous 
 only by its entire absence. 
 
 The horses seem to check their speed of their own accord 
 as they enter this solemn forest dome, and I am just about 
 to make myself ridiculous, by the suggestion that they are 
 listening to the peculiar, low, soothing whisper that the 
 wind breathes through the tree tops, when a cry of surprise 
 cuts off my brilliant remark. A fairy castle has just risen 
 out of the ground, or dropped from the skies, and rests 
 airily among the trees in the distance. I was afraid to 
 ' breathe when I saw it first, for fear of dispelling the vision ; 
 but, as we approach, the thing assumes more solid lines, a 
 more substantial shape, and I find that we are right in front 
 of the much-talked-of new hotel. O&ncroft LJhrmMu 
 
 Who planned the place, or laid it out, in the common 
 parlance of mortals, I don't know. I don't know what it 
 cost, and don't want to know. Don't, for pity's sake, let 
 us destroy the few aesthetically romantic impressions that 
 are graciously vouchsafed us in this land of dollars and 
 cents. Let us enjoy the rare pleasure of ranging around 
 and through the place without giving heed to the fact that 
 the architect's rule and the carpenter's square were employed 
 in its construction. For the information of those prosaic 
 
290 Modern Monterey, 
 
 beings who must have feet and inches, let me say that the 
 building is very nearly three hundred and seventy-five feet 
 long, three stories high in some parts, four in others. The 
 whole, on closer inspection, seems a happy mixture of forest 
 chateau, Italian villa, and old English country seat, though 
 they call it, I believe, Queen Anne or East-lake style. Out- 
 side are the spacious verandas of the Italian villla, inside are 
 the wide halls and generous fireplaces of the English manor- 
 house. Outside, the lofty forest, the blue waters of Lake 
 Como, vulgo Laguna Segunda, blinking through the dis- 
 tance, form incomparable scenery. Inside, the broad stair- 
 cases, the many-shaped windows, each framing in a sylvan 
 view, the variously arrayed rooms in the different towers, the 
 manifold entrances and exits, always leading into the forest- 
 green, make the house picturesque. Now, I don't really 
 know whether interiors can be picturesque I don't know 
 whether artists allow that term ; but I insist that ' ' pictur- 
 esque ' ' is the only correct word to apply to the inside of 
 that building. 
 
 A drive is to be constructed from the east of Monterey, 
 along the beach, by the whaling station, all the way around 
 Point Pinos and the light-house, along Moss Beach, to Cy- 
 press Point, to the old Mission, and across the country, back 
 again to the hotel. A Cliff House is to be built on the high- 
 est, most wildly romantic spot near Point Cypress a resort 
 for the people at the hotel and for * ' citizens at large. ' ' The 
 fact is, that if any one undertakes the entire drive in one day 
 they will want some kind of a resort on the way. There is 
 also a race-course near the hotel, and all the walks and 
 
Modern Monterey, 291 
 
 drives, near and far, are being constructed of gravel brought 
 from Soledad. Of this large tract of land, small tracts will 
 be sold to people who wish to establish a permanent sum- 
 mer residence in the country. Some of the land in the vi- 
 cinity of the hotel has been divided off for this purpose also, 
 and so near to it that people who are afraid of the drudgery 
 of housekeeping can take their meals at the hotel. 
 
 California enterprise, by the way, was never better illus- 
 trated than in the erection of this hotel. On the fifteenth of 
 January, of this year, the giants of the forest held undisputed 
 possession of the ground which the house now covers. On 
 the first of February the architect arrived with his force of 
 men. At the time of the present writing (May I5th) there 
 are over three hundred men still at work in the house and on 
 grounds; and on the third of June, before this paper is laid 
 before the reader, the hotel will be thrown open to the public. 
 
 It was a day of rare enjoyment that I spent there; and as 
 I, like the cook, Frederika, in Old Man? selle* s Secret, always 
 think of others, I gathered what I could of the many wild 
 flowers growing there, for the benefit of those who take an 
 interest in our California flora, and brought them home to 
 Dr. Behr, who has kindly given me the botanical names of 
 the different varieties my basket held. They are the Aquil- 
 egia, Viola aurea, Orthocarpus, Castilleja, Convolvulus ', 
 Collinsie, Eschscholtzia, and others, which I had carelessly 
 so mutilated as to be unrecognizable. The backward season 
 has been more severely felt by the butterflies than the 
 flowers, and there was not so great a variety as there should 
 be. But among those who have their home and being there 
 
292 Modern Monterey. 
 
 the Doctor mentions these: Anthocharis sara, the Melitoea, 
 Ccenongrepha Calif ornica. And apropos of the Doctor, he 
 is really heaping coals of fire on my head, for I once cut 
 very deeply into his scientist heart. When it came time for 
 my usual spring-flitting, several years ago, he said to me: 
 
 "Toward the south, where you are going now, there is a 
 blue butterfly which has not yet been classified. If you bring 
 me a specimen of this butterfly it shall be named after you> 
 I promise." 
 
 It must be admitted that the Doctor understands a 
 woman's nature at least as well as that of a rattle-snake or a 
 tarantula-hawk. He did not say, "Madame, I expect you 
 to devote a few spare moments to the advancement of science 
 in our new country. ' ' He simply stimulated my activity by 
 promising that my name should ride down to prosperity on 
 the back of a blue butterfly. Well, I stopped at San Luis 
 Obispo, climbed the height of the Santa Lucia Mountain, and 
 almost the first thing I saw was a magnificent blue butterfly. 
 My escort captured it, after some trouble. It was cruelly 
 impaled on a pin, which I stuck, for better security, into the 
 log upon which I had sat down for a rest. On my return to 
 the city I hastened to Dr. Behr, told him where I had found 
 the blue butterfly, and described it most minutely. The 
 Doctor rubbed his hands in high glee. 
 
 " The description is correct," he said, nodding; " it must 
 be the right thing. The whole tribe shall be called by 
 your name now. But where is the specimen ? Let me 
 have it." 
 
 "What, the butterfly ?" I asked. "Oh, that's on the 
 
Modern Monterey. 293 
 
 top of the Santa Lucia Mountain. I came away and forgot 
 it there." 
 
 You should have seen the Doctor's face! Out loud he 
 said nothing, but I'd give something pretty to know what 
 his private opinion was just then of women in general and 
 myself in particular. 
 
 No Monterey trip is complete without a visit to the old 
 Mission. A lovely spot, this narrow Carmelo Valley, leading 
 to the sea, or the bay rather, which takes its name, I sup- 
 pose, from the Carmel River emptying within it. It is a pity 
 that these old places are allowed to go to decay. This build- 
 ing here, at least, might be preserved, if not restored, as it 
 is built of stone the light-yellow chalk-stone of the country. 
 The roof has most all fallen, but the architecture and con- 
 struction of the old building would disgrace no builder of the 
 present day. It has the slightly Moorish tone which I im- 
 agine I can discover in all these places built by the Spanish 
 padres. 
 
 The bells are gone from out of the towers, but the deli- 
 cately wrought cross on one still points to heaven. Of the 
 twelve arches which originally spanned the nave, some are 
 quite solid, and could easily support a roof; and if the whole 
 were restored, it would be one of the grandest monuments 
 we could bequeath to grateful generations coming after us. 
 
 No wonder Father Junipero Serro loved the spot so well 
 that he wanted to be laid to rest here, where he had per- 
 formed so important a part of his life's labor. The land was 
 rich with the grain he had sown, and the docile Indians who 
 trimmed his vines in the Mission garden loved him, perhaps 
 
294 Modern Monterey. 
 
 more devotedly than their newly given God, for they could 
 not see Him, while the good padre provided for them as a 
 father does for his children. But now comes the knotty 
 point, over which there has been so much contention. That 
 the padre was buried inside of the old church, there seems 
 to be no doubt. The question is, what became of his bones ? 
 Long after the mission system "had outlived its usefulness," 
 the bishops of San Luis, Los Angeles, and San Juan 
 Bautista, came in solemn state to remove the sacred remains 
 to a place not so dilapidated as the Mission church had be- 
 come. To their consternation, they found nothing to re- 
 move; and, though the story was hushed up as much as 
 possible, all sorts of rumors went flying among the super- 
 stitious Catholics of Spanish and Indian blood, as to what 
 had become of the good father's bones. Having some curi- 
 osity on the subject myself, I once more sought my oracle, 
 Don Rosario Duarte, and asked what he thought had be- 
 come of this pious man's ashes. 
 
 "That," he said, "I can tell you. My mother-in-law, 
 who died ten years since, at an advanced age, has told me a 
 hundred times of the deputation of high officials and humble 
 monks who came all the way out from Spain to carry back 
 with them the bones and ashes of Father Junipero Serro. 
 There are still three of the old Mission Indians living here in 
 town. One of them, a woman named Yumesa, will corrobo- 
 rate my statement, for she claims that she can recollect how 
 every one of the caballeros and monjes comprising this dep- 
 utation looked." 
 
 I tried my best to find Yumesa, not because I doubted 
 
Modern Monterey. 295 
 
 Don Rosario's word, but because I wanted to see what a 
 real, live Mission Indian looked like. I failed to discover 
 her; but of the thousands who will flock to Monterey in the 
 course of this summer, I hope that some one may make it a 
 special task to find and interview Yumesa. 
 
'