CHAPTER XVA SAMOAN IDYLAmong the passengers from one of the other coaches who had occasionally visited the Cassowary and listened as the novel symposium progressed was a brown-bearded, middle-aged gentleman with a tanned face and merry eye. That he was of the navy the Colonel had soon learned, and to the naval officer he now addressed himself:"Lieutenant, you, necessarily, have visited many parts of the world and must have become acquainted with the facts of many a pretty romance or rough adventure. I believe you mentioned the circumstance that you were stationed for a time in the Samoan islands. Can you tell us a tale of Samoa?"The Lieutenant smiled: "I'll tell you a tale of Samoa, a little one," he said. "I was a witness to its main incident, and it interested me. It was this way:A SAMOAN IDYLUna Loa was a Samoan girl, and she wasfair to look upon. They have festivities in their season in Samoa as we have here, and, as here, there are rivalries among the young women. There are tests of beauty, too, and she who can show the most beautiful headdress of flowers is counted the most charming among the maidens. She is as the Jersey heifer which takes the first prize at the annual fair in some prosperous county; she is as the lithe and graceful and beautiful creature who doesn't fall over her train at the receptions at the Court of England; she is an adornment to the society in which she moves, and, in Samoa, it must of course be the best society, must consist of those who enter into the contest exhibiting the sublimity of all head-gear—for head-gear is a woman's glory.There was stationed upon one of the islands of the Samoan Group—there is no use of mentioning the island in particular—a young gentleman who had been sent out under the auspices of the Department of Agriculture of the United States, and, to speak more definitely, from that branch of the Department which is known as the Weather Bureau. His business was to sit at the top of a somewhat illy-constructed tower and note the variations of windand temperature and all that sort of thing, and then send his report to the Department at Washington, when he could catch a steamer, which didn't always often happen, for this was some time ago. Still he sat up in the tower and took notes and glowered, and made the best of things, and the work in this region of mild latitude and much lassitude did not wear upon him to such an extent that he could not fall in love, not in the purely abstract way that he loved some things either, as for instance, the equation of the parabola, but vigorously and deeply.He fell in love to such an extent that he became personally interested in the contest among the fair Samoans as to whom among the belles should show the most ardent and effective floral decoration of her mass of hair on the day appointed.Now, be it known that the Atlantic Ocean is the Atlantic Ocean, that the Washington Monument is the Washington Monument. They exist as they are. Be it known also, that the hair of a Samoan beauty, a great burnished mass, also exists as it is and is rarely washed between the rising of the sun and the droppinginto the ocean of the same luminary, or at any other time.The name of the young man connected with the Weather Bureau was John Thompson. That is not a very poetic name, but John Thompson can love just as hard as Everard Argyle. This John Thompson did anyhow, and he vowed that his sweetheart should win in the contest of flowery decorations of the heads of the maidens. This resolve came upon him some six weeks before the time of trial. He visited Una Loa."How long is it, sweetheart, since you let your hair down?" said he."I do not remember," said she."That is all right," said he.Now, John Thompson had entertained certain ideas regarding agricultural speculation in the Samoan Islands, and had imported for experimental purposes various small quantities of assorted delicate fertilizers—powdered bone and ammonia, or something of that sort. Here was material, and inspiration for action comes to a man sometimes in a way which makes it seem to him as if all the ancient gods were behind him and beside him, aiding him in every way. This sublimity of inspiration came to John Thompson at this moment.This is how the man, thus sublimated, reasoned: "All the other girls must, necessarily, as in the past, wear cut flowers, which must, to an extent, wither before the judgment of the Wise Ones is declared. I will make a real, living garden of my darling's head, a garden in which shall bloom, not only flowers of the islands here, but of Europe and America, and all countries of the world. Above one of her dark eyes shall dangle such a bunch of glowing and living pansies as the Islanders have never seen; the phlox shall lift itself aloft from her coronet; sweet peas and old-fashioned pinks shall adorn one side of her shapely head, while the other side will be blazing with tossing poppies. She shall appear among the contestants with such a crest as never a queen has worn, though the jewelers of all ages have struggled to make a surpassing crown."And the man did his work. "Eh," he said, as he patted the matted mass of dusky hair, "talk about farms in the States! Here is an area of the right kind for the support of a family! Talk about landscape gardening! I'll show them what real landscape gardening is!"He did.He planted right and left with ardor and goodjudgment, for he was not only an enthusiast but had the artist's gift. Una Loa yielded because she had the trust which every girl should have in a real lover of good character. As Thompson sowed and sowed, she submitted with all hopefulness and slept each night with her neck upon a little log, that each flower plant might grow without abrasion or disturbance. She saw but little of her kin, save a sister who stayed beside her, for Thompson was arrogant—said he was making a botanical experiment—and allowed none to visit her."THE AWARD COULD BUT GO TO UNA LOA""THE AWARD COULD BUT GO TO UNA LOA"The day of the contest came, as the world went round and round. At the appointed hour, all the Samoan maidens appeared together, each with her head in the halo and glory of fair flowers. But there was no contest. Una Loa stood among them all like a bright spirit from somewhere. The fragrance from the flowers upon her head sapped itself into the senses of all who were near her, and there was a glittering, a very splendor of brilliant, multicolored and flaming humming-birds about her queenly head. There was no discussion among the judges. The award could but go to Una Loa, and so it went!They say that there is a laziness, which is not, after all, a laziness, begotten in those whodwell among the islands in the Southern Seas. It is but adaptation, possibly most sensible. Thompson has resigned from the Weather Bureau and married Una Loa. He is keeping a cigar-store in South Apia and is doing tolerably well.And the listeners agreed that the Lieutenant had at least looked upon a romance as genuine as simple.CHAPTER XVIA WOMAN AND SHEEPNone had acquired a more general regard among the passengers than the Kansas Farmer. He bore no resemblance to the typical farmer as represented in the comic publications but was, on the contrary, a well-dressed, imposing looking man of middle age, a college graduate, as Stafford knew, and one who had selected his occupation because it appealed to him as, to their own and general good, it might appeal to hosts of others of the educated men of the country. Stafford and he had become friends, as was almost a matter of course, and it was the former who insisted that the Farmer bring to the front some curious experience of human nature in connection with farm life. "You are the tree we must tap now," he jested. "It's just because you are what you are that we want the thing. Inevitably, you, with your experience and associations, can tell us something of the inner being and its ways on a farm which will be edifying. Tell us the queerest and most unexplainablething you remember in connection with such life and of one man or woman's part in it."The farmer stroked his grizzled, close-cut beard and laughed:"It seems to me that the element of love has entered with tolerable regularity into most of the narratives to which I have had the pleasure of listening here. That is right, certainly, and natural. What I'm going to tell is a love story, too, in its way. It is of a love which budded and bloomed but bore no fruit, for the oddest reason in the world. It is about a man who loved a woman and was won away by sheep. No, he wasn't exactly won away; he just forgot. It was the strangest thing I ever knew or heard of, but it is true. I know the man and his sheep myself, though I never saw the woman. This isJASON'S LOVE STORYA swamp oak stump is one of the most contumacious stumps in the world. It is usually big and its roots extend, like the arms of an octopus, in all directions save upward. Furthermore, having been bred to the wet, feeding on dampness when alive, the wood does not rot willingly. The upper portion of the stump absorbs the showers of heaven and enduresthe cracking heat of the sun apathetically and remains pretty much the same for a long time, while the roots lie solid in their dark bed, almost regardless of the years as men grow old. So it is that an otherwise cleared area of land occupied largely by swamp oak stumps is what the farmers in Michigan's Lower Peninsula call an unpromising place for present making of crops. It was such an area that Jason Goodell—who was in love—owned. He possessed eighty acres, an eighth of a section, with fifteen acres cleared—but for stumps. The young woman whom he loved was Melissa Trumbull, the eldest daughter of "old man" Trumbull, who was well-to-do.The place where swamp oaks grow is of a sort to command respect. It has features. It is often a black ash swale. A swale is low ground, but not a swamp, crossed sometimes, at irregular intervals, by strips of higher ground referred to generally as beech ridges. In the lower ground thrive the black ash, the huge swamp oak, various moisture-loving bushes and luxurious growths of ferns. Up on the ridges grow the maple, the white ash, the beech, ironwood and birch and bushes whichdo not object to less damp soil, nannyberries elders and the like.In the swale proper the growth underfoot is bush and there are hundreds of puddles where the frogs congregate in thousands, mostly the small, brown wood frog, not the big, green "kerplunk" sort of the ponds and streams. Here the raccoon finds what is, to him, a land flowing with milk and honey, for he agrees with a frog diet as a frog diet agrees with him; here upon dead white trunks the solitary log-cock, the great black, red-crested woodpecker, largest of his genus, in the region, hammers away like a blacksmith; here the hermit thrush sings sometimes; and here little streams are born, to trickle at first, then ripple and then leap, bubbling and noisy, into the sloping fields outside, to attain the dignity of brooks at last and join the undercreek.On the beech ridges life is different. There the ruffed grouse struts about and feeds upon the nuts and berries; and there are the squirrels, black, gray and red. The grouse raise great families on the ridges and the wooing "drumming" of the males in spring is like nothing else in the world. It is the most distinctively wildwood sound there is. As for thesquirrels, the black is no longer holding his own with the red and the gray. He is going like the Red Indian and the buffalo and no one can tell why. He was not born to civilization. The red and gray adapt themselves. Of such swale and ridge, so peopled, consisted (as has been said) the greater portion of the estate of Jason Goodell; excellent land but requiring much work in its subjugation.Never better man for conquering a forest or making good soil yield the crops it has owed than this same brown-bearded Jason Goodell. Personally strong, six full feet in height, though a trifle stooping, and slouchy in his gait, thewed like a draft-horse, broad of forehead and strong of chin, with firm mouth and steady gray eyes, this man was one to accomplish things as thoroughly and doggedly as Victor Hugo's Gilliatt toiling sturdily at the wrecked ship. Like Gilliatt, too, Jason was toiling for love's sake. He had never spoken of his passion to Melissa Trumbull, but they had studied together in the little district school, had grown up together, had confided their plans and hopes to each other and, until Jason left the employ of old man Trumbull and began work on his own "eighty," had been almostconstantly together. To Jason, reticent, and timid as well, in a matter of this sort, it never occurred to make a definite engagement, and to Melissa, black-eyed, gingham-clad, buoyant and with plenty of work to do, the situation doubtless presented itself with the same aspect. No pledged word, though, could have made the matter more fixed and serious than it was, at least to Jason. What need of words? The first thing to do was to make a home for the occupancy of two young married people.So Jason built a rude cabin and lived in it alone and began clearing his land. At the end of the second year he had fifteen acres in crops of grass and grain, and the beginning of a herd of cattle and a drove of hogs, and was counted by his neighbors as a young man who would be well off some day. They were right in their conclusion. Jason was the one to succeed as a farmer. Living simply, working untiringly, the accomplishments of the isolated man were a surprise even to the rugged farmers who knew him well. At the end of the third year a new field had been hewed into the forest and the land first cleared had become more easily tillable. Fire had fed on the stumps. Half a dozen cows were feeding on the grassland, the hogs were fattening onlast year's corn crop and chickens and turkeys cackled and called about the rough log-barn. Butter and pork and eggs had a value at the nearest little town, and Jason had saved money. He bought another eighty acres of woodland—land was cheap then—and began to plan the building of a house. There was Melissa!No log house should this mansion be but one fit for a bride's reception. It should be a framed house, with all proper rooms, clap-boarded as to the sides and shingled as to the roof. There should be a porch in front and the building should be of two stories. Jason brooded fondly over it all and planned and dreamed. He consulted often with Jim Rubens, the farmer carpenter of the locality: "Never saw a man so wrapped up in his house-buildin' in all my life!" said Rubens.The beams and plates and joists and rafters for the house were planned and, with axe and broad-axe and saw, Jason and Rubens labored in the forest until oak and pine were cut and hewed, true to the line, and were then dragged by toiling oxen to the site of the house of which they were to be the stay and strength. The farmers round about assembled for the raising, there were heavings and shoutings, theparts were reared under the hoarse overseeing of Carpenter Rubens and the great timbers, tongue in socket, pinned lastingly together, stood aloft, the sturdy white outline of a pleasant home to face the roadway. What days they were for Jason as the two men labored afterward for weeks until the house stood all complete from cellar to roof-peak, and even painted—white, with green blinds, of course. Furnished it was too, well furnished for the country. It was the finest house in the neighborhood and Jason walked through the rooms with that feeling which comes to a man of purpose when he looks upon the thing accomplished. Not yet, though, was the place ready for Melissa. There was much to be done besides the mere building of a shelter, but, even now, the front part of it must be sacred for her. There Jason nailed up the door solidly.What comfort could a farmer's wife have with merely a house to live in! Here must be all convenience for her outdoor work in connection with the household and all should be pleasant to look upon. Jason settled down resolutely to what was yet to come.Obviously the old log barn had outlasted its original purposes. Its small stable no longerafforded shelter enough for the increasing herd of cattle and the horses nor its mows room for the hay and grain. There must be a frame barn, a big one, with high, wide doors into which a team with a load might be driven and with long stables and mows and roof room enough for all contingencies of harvest. The year after the completion of the house, the barn was built and the one of logs abandoned. But the barn had not absorbed Jason's thoughts so fully as had the house.The lonely toiling of the man was not lonely to him. He was strong and rejoiced in work, and there was ever Melissa and always something to be done for her. From the front door of the house down to the roadway he made a wide gravelled path and along its sides he made beds of old-fashioned pinks and sowed and planted larkspur and phlox and dahlias and peonies and golden coreopsis and bachelor's buttons and other flowers named in the circulars of a seed firm in the distant city. He made a neat picket gate in the fence where the walk opened on the roadway and beside the fence he had hollyhocks, and sunflowers, the latter trying every day to see Melissa, and turning their heads resolutely from sunrise until evening and going to sleepevery night with their faces toward her home, which was in the West. Close beside the house he planted rosebushes and "old hen and chickens" and lady-slippers and morning-glories, and a madeira vine for the porch. There was a path from the front around the house to the kitchen—which had a porch as well—and beside this path Jason had planted an abundance of sweet briar, thinking as he did so how its faint, sweet fragrance and fair blossoms would match Melissa. A hop-vine clambered up the kitchen porch. Jason was thirty years old, now, and Melissa twenty-five.One day old man Trumbull, who was a great trader, suddenly disposed of his farm and moved into the adjacent county. Somehow, the news did not have much effect on Jason Goodell. It would be as easy to bring her from thirty miles away as from where she had lived, he reasoned. The only difference to come would be that he would not see her often in the interval. There had never been any correspondence between them and it did not occur to Jason to write now.There came a hard winter, the horses and cattle and other stock required close attendance, and Jason was much about the house. It was at this time when he discovered the faults of thekitchen floor, which was of pine. The boards had shrunk and there were cracks and the soft wood had worn away under the tread of his heavy feet. That sort of kitchen floor would never do for Melissa! He made a new floor and was happy at his labor all through "the big snow." The floor was of hard, seasoned ash, matched perfectly and smooth as the floor of a ball-room. "It will be easier to mop" said he, and thought of Melissa's sunbonnet, and of how it would look hanging against the whitewashed wall.All winter in Jason's newer eighty acres the axes of two men had swung hardily and, with spring and early summer, came to Jason a stress of effort in helping at the clearing and in attendance on the crops. He had little time for work about the garden, though it was not neglected, but he felt that he must somewhat change his home life. He had lived in the kitchen and a little room adjoining it. He had, from the time the house was built, never changed in the feeling that the front part of the house was sacred to Melissa, but he felt that now a little change must come. His duties were increasing. He must have a hired man about him, one who would live with him. So the hired man came and slept in the room Jason had occupiedwhile Jason slept upstairs in what, in fancy, he had called "our room." "She won't mind," he thought.There is spur to effort for the real farmer and a great comforting pride in looking out upon a conquered province, to note the corn swaying full-eared, the timothy and clover and grain fields changing color with the shift of the clouds and sweep of the breeze, the lowing cattle in the pastures and the general promise of Autumn's wealth. Jason enjoyed it all, for was it not the product of his design and energy, and as the farm grew, he grew with it. Success fairly earned made him zealous for more. He broadened and was for trying things.One day old Rubens came along, and leaning idly over the front fence, began a farmer's chat with Jason, who was digging among the flowers. Rubens looked away at the vacant log barn."What are you going to do with the old barn?" he asked, "tool-house?""No," said Jason, "I have a tool-room in the big barn. I don't know what I'll do with the old one. Pull it down, maybe."Rubens gazed meditatively at the abandoned but still sound structure: "It would make a mighty good sheep barn," he suggested.No more was said at the time, but Ruben's idea was not forgotten. It remained in Jason's mind and the more he thought upon it the more he became impressed. Jason had never raised sheep, successful as he had been with other animals. He considered, and rightly, that most of his land was too low for them. There was an eighty acres of woodland adjoining that which he had latest bought that was hilly, not heavily timbered and with many springs and brooks. Partly cleared, with what woods were left well under-brushed, it would make a perfect sheep pasture. He had half a mind to buy it and experiment. And the plan grew in his mind until it overmastered him and he bought the land.Not the sort of man to venture upon a new venture carelessly was Jason, and he had a problem before him now: What sort of sheep should he raise? His cattle and hogs were of good breeds and to have seen to it that it was so he had found profitable. With sheep he was less acquainted. He asked advice. "Get Merinos, by all means," pronounced Henry Wilson, who lived to the north of him. "Get Southdowns and nothing else," said James Remington, who lived to the west. "I'll get twentyof each and experiment with them separately," decided Jason.Now as between the Merino and the Southdown sheep there is a great gulf fixed. The Merino is small with gnarled horns, wrinkled neck and nose; with silk-like wool curling close to the skin in its fineness, yellow underneath because of its oiliness, and dark outside because of the dust gathered and held by such close, sticky coat. Well tried is the endurance of the sheep-washer who, in late spring before shearing time, stands waist deep in some stream and seeks to cleanse the fleece of a flock of shivering Merinos driven bleating to the water, and dreading it like a tramp. But the fine Merino wool commands a price; the fleece is heavy and the breeder profits from that, not from the mutton. The flesh of the Merino requires for its consumption people who have been long besieged and who are hungry.Different is the quality of the Southdown; not from Spanish ancestors, feeding on Andalusian hills, as came the Merino, did he come, but from Anglo-Saxon forefathers who cropped the herbage of the Hampshire and Sussex downs. Big and white of body and dark-faced, sturdy of build and garbed in clean, not over finewhite wool, hornless but stepping free and high, the Southdown has a healthy individuality. As concerns his mutton, those who know how to eat, and what to eat, speak fluently while their eyes glisten.And almost as the flocks throve under Isaac, toiling for Rebecca, throve the flocks of Jason, toiling for Melissa. In summer and autumn they fed in the new pasture land and in winter they were sheltered and fared well in the old barn, now renovated and with a great shed attached for further room. Jason became absorbed in sheep-growing, as he had never been before in the growing of anything. He read books on the subject and tried experiments. At the end of the third year, with good flocks now his he selected from each the finest ram and ewe and entered them at the County fair. He wanted to learn with which breed he had been most successful.Canny and just are almost always the judges at an American County fair. Known personally throughout the region, selected for their uprightness and knowledge of special beast or fowl or any product of the fields, their verdict is almost mechanically accepted as a final and just one. More and more interested becameJason regarding the issue of his experiments in thus entering into competition with breeders, some of whom had raised sheep before he was born, and he puzzled himself much over the problem of where, in the opinion of these unbiased experts, he would prove to have done best. The decision, when it came, was hardly a surprise to him. His Merinos, it is true, received favorable mention, but his Southdowns took first prize in a field where there was decided and worthy competition. A proud man was Jason Goodell when he saw the blue ribbons tied by a gray-bearded giant in jeans about the necks of his two entries. He made an instant resolution. "I'll not raise wool," he said, "I'll leave that to the Ohioans of the Western Reserve. I'll raise mutton!"He sold the prize-winners for a mighty price and returned to his farm. Within a week the flock of Merinos was sold, as well, and the money so received was invested in an importation of more Southdowns, with blood as blue as that of the Hapsburgs, and far stronger. Then began sheep-raising that was sheep-raising.It is hard to serve two masters and it must be admitted that, since his thoughts and plans had turned so absorbingly to Southdowns, Jasonfelt less surpassingly the inspiration of Melissa. There had been a time when he dreamed of her almost nightly, but, now, his sleeping visions were of great flocks upon the hillsides and the eyes into which he looked were not always the sparkling ones of Melissa, but it might be the soft, gentle eyes of quite another color of some great ewe. Dreams are grotesque things.Still, instinctively, sometimes fervently, Jason worked and devised for the girl who had gone away. The big orchard back of the house and barns, now growing into fruitfulness, he cared for well. In the spring, feeding the just-weaned calves, as he put his fingers in the mouth of some vigorous youngster and then thrust its muzzle into the milk, that it might learn to drink, he thought as the calf butted joyously at the pail as if it were his own mother, how Melissa would like the calves and how much better than he she would attend to them! He was somewhat troubled, too, because the spring in the hollow was not nearer the house—he did not want Melissa to carry water so many yards—but he planned a "spring-house" with a cement floor, where Melissa should keep the milk and make the butter. That would be less labor for her. There would not be much butter-making anyhowHe was not going to have butter and eggs to sell. Only enough cattle and horses and hogs and chickens for farm purposes did he intend to keep. And he bought yet another eighty acres of land.It is wonderful how some over-mastering aim, one the accomplishment of which requires concentration of thought and exertion of all energy in one direction, will get its grip upon a man and hold it to the end. With high and low it is the same. Mozart died with the score of the Requiem Mass hardly dry from his feeble hand. Napoleon died with the word of command upon his lips. Seekers, investigators, experimenters in all fields, great and small, have grown into a forgetfulness of aught save one object, have abandoned all outside, and have dreamed and devised and labored toward one absorbing end. Such compelling influence in life may come to the farmer as to others. With Jason, who recognized a farmer's dignity, who knew that the farmer often fought men's battles and at all times fed them, the attainment of his own ambition was nothing small. He became almost a monomaniac over Southdowns. How they thrived!—for Nature ever loves a mentor. Peas grew where oats had grown, clover where wasbefore a cornfield, turnips where had been potatoes, for sheep must eat in winter. It became a Southdown farm, and acres were yet added, for the undertaking was most profitable—until the time came when Jason's keen eyes could not, as he stood looking from the barn door, reach more than vaguely the outlines of his own domain. One day, a girl wearing a sunbonnet matching exactly in shape and color the one Melissa had once worn, passed by and Jason's thoughts went back. That afternoon he took horses and wagon and drove to the growing town. He returned with a piano. "Melissa may have learned to play," he said to himself, "and she will be glad to find it here." But, for weeks, perhaps for months afterward, no Melissa came again into his waking dreams nor in his sleep."THE CHILDREN CARRIED AWAY ARMFULS OF BLOSSOMS""THE CHILDREN CARRIED AWAY ARMFULS OF BLOSSOMS"He had abundance of help about him now. Another hired man, accompanied by his wife, had been brought into the house, the wife proving a notable housekeeper and relieving Jason of all petty duties. He visited his neighbors and was liked among them. The children especially were fond of him and he allowed them to visit his house at will and to carry away armfuls of blossoms from his great flower-garden, seeing to it only that they did not harm the plants. Butthe parlor, with its furniture still unworn, though becoming somewhat old-fashioned now, and with its piano still untouched, was never entered except for dusting, and the front door was never opened.Far and wide as the great breeder of Southdown sheep, became known the name of Jason Goodell, and his flocks and barns grew with acres steadily. One afternoon a traveling nurseryman came to see him upon business and stayed to dinner. They chatted over the meal:"I was over at Wishtigo last week," said the man; "drove over one day and came back the next. Who d'ye think I met?""Couldn't guess.""I met County Clerk Jim Lacey's wife—her that used to be Melissa Trumbull, you know. It was the first I knew of it. I took dinner with 'em; she wouldn't allow anything else. They've been married seven years and they've got a mighty nice little family: three children. Jim's a good fellow."Jason said nothing for a few moments. Then he assented deliberately: "Yes, Jim's a good fellow. I've met him often. I didn't know whether he was married or not, though. What was it you said about them young pear trees? I may take a dozen or two of 'em."In the middle of the forenoon a few days later, while Jason was looking over the sheep barns and giving directions to the men at work there, a sudden fancy came upon him. He went to the house, asked for a hammer and withdrew the nails from the front door. Then he opened all the parlor windows and let in the sunlight. "It'll be healthier," he explained to the astonished and delighted housekeeper. "Keep them open as much as you want to now, in pleasant weather, and let the children in, too, if they like it. It'll brighten things up."At a table in one of the fine restaurants in the big city sat, recently, at dinner a man and woman, he a man of the world, she charming as women so often are. They were delighted with the wonderful mutton they had just eaten and were talking of it."It's a mutton only kings would be allowed to eat, if these were ancient times," the man asserted laughingly. "It's delicate as strawberries, though that isn't a good comparison. It may have come direct from the Goodell fields.""Who is Goodell?" queried the lady."Goodell, my dear madam, is a public benefactor.He is one of the wisest raisers of Southdown sheep the country knows. He's a splendid old fellow, too. I've visited his farm and met him. He's awfully fond of children."CHAPTER XVIITHE ENCHANTED COWFor some reason, not altogether clear, there was no comment for a time after the Farmer had finished his account of the affair of Jason and the girl and the Southdown sheep. Perhaps it was because of the grotesqueness of the idea that a man working so faithfully for and so dreaming of his love—a practical man—could have left absolute possession of her to the unreal, while making his hobby at hand the real. The silence was broken by the Young Lady:"That is very strange life history, it seems to me. How could any man, a real man, forget the girl he cared for in such a way? It seems all wicked and unnatural.""But, my dear young lady," explained the Professor, banteringly ponderous, "he did not forget her. In fact, from the account he appears to have been a most devoted lover. What he forgot was time. Besides," he continued, "taking the broader point of view, how much better it is for all of us that, in one regionat least, we have better mutton than that Jason should have raised a family!""Bother the mutton!" was the indignant and somewhat irreverent answer, and then the Colonel intervened:"My dear Miss," he explained ingratiatingly, "I am confident that it is neither the Professor's lack of heart nor sympathy nor gallantry that has spoken, but, instead, his superior and appreciative judgment in the matter of mutton. It may be that he is braver than some of us. However, it doesn't matter, because your sensibilities are going to be soothed and fed on caramels just now. I am most confident of that, since I am about to commandeer the Poet. Mr. Poet, there is no alternative."There is something anomalous about the successful modern poets. They are usually disguised as citizens. They do not have shaven faces and long hair and another world expression upon their countenances. Sometimes they have even a stubby mustache and a bad look. This particular poet chanced to be good-looking, but that proves nothing. He responded easily enough:"Vocalism is difficult to me. I'd rather write this out. I can tell you a story, though, of theregion where, it is said, were sowed the Dragon's Teeth from which sprang the men who later owned the Eastern Hemisphere. The story of the Enchanted Cow has the merit that it is true."THE ENCHANTED COWIt is odd how often when from some legendary source a fairy story comes, we find fact mixed with the fancy. This tale, for instance, might just as well be called "Single Hoof and Double Hoof" or the "Wild Ride for Caviare," as to be named "The Enchanted Cow." Certainly every one should know about caviare, and why some beasts have split hoofs and some round, unyielding ones, but that enchantment should have anything to do with it is curious.Into the Danube far southwest of Buda-Pesth once ran a deep, still stream which babbled when it began in the hills, became more quiet as it reached the plain, and was almost sluggish when it entered the Black Tarn, as the broad sheet of water was called, though it was in fact a lake surrounded by sedgy marshes. The stream after feeding and passing through the Black Tarn became a deep river, and broadened as it poured itself into the Danube, the father of waters of all the region. To the north of theBlack Tarn was the Moated Grange where lived the Lady Floretta Beamish, that is the lady whose name would have been that if translated into English, for the country in which she lived was Hungary. The streams which would, in English, have been called Ken Water after flowing through the Black Tarn as told, went on through the estate of Sir Gladys Rhinestone. It is true that Gladys is usually accepted as the name of a gentlewoman, but this time it belonged to a gentleman, and one of high degree. He explained his name himself by frankly confessing that he had been named after his mother.In the days referred to people of the class of the Lady Floretta Beamish and Sir Gladys Rhinestone were generally under the immediate sovereignty of a prince, and the prince in their case was scarce a model. The one to whom all of that part of Hungary owed allegiance was Prince Rugbauer, and he was hardly of a type to be called gentle or considerate. In fact none of the people of the lands about were accustomed to pronounce the name of Prince Rugbauer above a whisper. Whenever it became necessary to allude to the prince, the inhabitants of the country were used to make the motion, hand on throat, of strangling. Thiswas a direct allusion to the prince's system of taxation, and was understood by the humblest knave in the whole valley of Ken Water. Even the prince knew the meaning of this gesture, though when first told of it he but laughed grimly and no one ever spoke to him again about it. It was the witch of Zombor who told the prince. Anything malicious might be expected from her.It was because of the witch that the cow was in trouble. The witch had enchanted the cow for a thousand years, and the seven hundredth year was passing when this tale begins. It may be said straightforwardly of the witch, that she was one of the worst of a disagreeable class of beings now, happily, becoming rare. She lived in a sort of hutch, a round mud-walled den on a hill which would be called Endbury Moon in English, and throughout the day she lay curled up in this den like a snail in its shell, but at night she came out regularly to work such mischief as she might in the country round about. Wherever she found there was no trouble she proceeded at once to brew some. There was no end to her pernicious activity.The Lady Floretta Beamish was an orphan and sole mistress of the two-towered Grangeand all the lands and waters a mile either up and down the deep Ken Water. But the land was far from rich, and the revenues of the lady came mostly from the sturgeon in the river which were caught each year in the same manner as in the Danube itself. The Lady Floretta was a very beautiful creature. Her hair was of a pale golden hue, and her eyes were blue. Her cheeks were like June roses. She was tall and fair, and walked around the walled Grange in a long white satin robe embroidered with gold, and down her back rippled the golden hair, even to the hem of her trailing gown.It required the services of seven maidens and seven hours daily to comb and brush the Lady Floretta's hair, but they did not mind it. The seven maids had nothing else to do, so they combed and they combed, and they brushed and they smoothed the pale golden treasure of their mistress' hair, fastening each shining braid of it at last to the hem of her trailing gown, with pins sparkling with diamonds, moonstones, rubies and emeralds. Why the Lady Floretta did not dispose of some of these jewels when the strait came, which will be told of, it is not easy to understand. It may be they were all heirlooms and so not to be parted with.A year of trial came at last for both the Lady Floretta and Sir Gladys Rhinestone. No fish were caught and that was a disaster which affected everything. The fish were the fortune of the country, for from the eggs of the great sturgeon was made the caviare, without which no true-born noble of the realm could make a tolerable meal. The caviare was shipped away to all parts of the civilized world as it is now, and it will be seen that to have the stream fail of fish was a calamity of first magnitude.It was a wonderful thing to see the manner of fishing in those days, and they fish in the same way upon the Danube now. They cut a great gap through the ice in the winter, the gap extending across the stream, and in it they set monster nets. Then, miles above the nets, a band of horsemen ranged themselves straight across the river on the ice, which would bear an army, and at a signal blast come thundering down at utmost speed. The noise was terrific. "Ohe! ohe! a hun! a hun!" yelled the wild horsemen, there was a blare of trumpets and the strong ice trembled beneath the impact of the mighty hoofs. The timid sturgeon fled beneath the ice before the pursuing shock, and at last rushed blindly into the awaiting nets,to be taken by thousands and tens of thousands. But from Ken Water, though the horsemen rode as in the past, no fish were found. The stewards explained that the stream had run very low, and that the fish had gone either to the Danube or the depths of the Black Tarn. The case was very bad. Prince Rugbauer announced that Sir Gladys and Lady Floretta were false traitors both, and announced as well that he would cancel their ownership of their lands and castles, and hold them no better than common folk themselves unless the heavy annual taxes were paid within a week.And so it came to pass one night that from his castle Sir Gladys paced with bowed head along Ken Water, around the Black Tarn toward the witch's hut on Endbury Moor, and at the same time, the moon over her right shoulder, came to the desolate hill-top Lady Floretta, each bent on consulting the Witch as to what should be done about the fish that had left Ken Water.The Witch, seated on top of her hut, gave what is called in old stories, an eldritch laugh when she saw Sir Gladys advancing on one side of the Moor, and Lady Floretta, more slowly climbing up the other.When the Lady Floretta heard the strange laugh of the Witch, she was startled and alarmed and stood still for the space of a full half-hour, while her seven maidens coaxed her to go on, and so Sir Gladys, who was less affected by the eldritch laugh than she and who, moreover, was alone, arrived first at the Witch's haunt and secured audience at once. He gave the Witch a gold-plated candlestick and two sugar spoons of silver, then explained his woeful plight, and asked advice and counsel.The Witch clutched the articles eagerly in her claw-hands, climbed down from the little hut, and standing in her low door croaked out:"By the light of yonder moon,Look and see your fortune soon!"She thrust the candlestick and sugar spoons into a bag at her girdle, and, curling up within her hut, fell fast asleep without ceremony, leaving Sir Gladys peering doubtfully in at the door which she had left open. What she had said was certainly vague and unsatisfactory and he felt that he had been imposed upon. He tried in vain to arouse the creature and tiring at last of shouting into the hut at a figure apparently of stone, he turned away but to meet, fair and full, the beautiful Lady Floretta Beamishattended by the seven maidens carrying seven lighted horn lanterns, and followed by a gentle snow-white cow with golden horns and hoofs.Sir Gladys swept the heather with his plumed hat, as he bowed before the Lady Floretta."Madam," he said, with deep respect, "upon what quest do you come upon this lonely moor by the uncertain light of the moon feebly aided by the seven lanterns carried by your maidens?"The Lady Floretta could not speak. Her embarrassment and confusion were such that she could scarcely stand even when supported by her maidens. She looked around for a chair.Sir Gladys took from his shoulders his cloak of purple velvet, and spread it at the lady's feet. "Rest," he said, "rest, and recover your strength, fair and honored Lady! I will await your pleasure, meanwhile examining the unusual specimen of the animal kingdom which I see following your gracious footsteps."He took a step or two toward the Enchanted Cow—for it was she—but she shook her golden horns, and he remained standing near the Lady Floretta, who sat down, affably and quite comfortably, upon the cloak of purple."Hark to the thunder!" said the Lady Floretta. "It is going to rain!" and she beganto chide the maids for not bringing umbrellas. Each it is true had a small parasol to ward off moon-stroke, but there was not one umbrella worthy of the name among them all."It is not thunder that you hear, sweet lady," said Sir Gladys. "'Tis but the stertorous and unseemly breathing of the foul Witch in the den.""Oh, is she asleep? And no one dares awaken her!" sighed the Lady Floretta. "I have walked a weary distance to consult her," she explained, as she became convinced that the sounds she had heard indeed came from the Witch's hut.Sir Gladys came nearer, the seven maidens drew nearer, the Enchanted Cow herself walked closer to Lady Floretta, as she sat upon the cloak spread upon the heather, and there in the summer night the Lady Floretta and Sir Gladys exchanged confidences and condolences about their sore strait, and often made the dread gesture as they talked, for neither thought best to name the Prince Rugbauer and both were too well-bred to whisper in company.The seven maidens sitting there on the heather, fell asleep, each nodding over her horn lantern. The Enchanted Cow, however was wide awake, and, from her expression, appearedto sympathize deeply with the two distressed mortals whose troubles were so freely poured forth in her presence. They spoke of the disastrous happening of the winter, and of the probable hopelessness of an attempt to retrieve their fortunes at this time of the year."The outlook is black indeed," remarked Sir Gladys, and the Lady Floretta agreed with him dejectedly."It is the Split Hoof that you need," said a soft deep voice; and the two turning their heads saw the Enchanted Cow looking upon them earnestly. It was she who had spoken.Sir Gladys and Lady Floretta were dumb with astonishment. After a brief silence, the Enchanted Cow continued: "Last winter when you rode furiously upon the frozen stream the thunder of your horses' hoofs scared no fish into your nets, and when spring came the water was as low as it had been the summer before and is still shallow. But I know where the fish are hidden and that they have not spawned. I stand, during the heat of these summer days, knee deep in the water in the shallows of the Black Tarn, and I see what I see.""Dear Enchanted Cow," said the Lady Floretta, "please tell us what you see!""This one night in the year," resumed the Enchanted Cow, without appearing to notice what the Lady Floretta has said, "this one night in the year, and the only one night in the year, yonder crafty Witch must sleep. She cannot awaken until midnight and this is the one night in the year that the Witch's spell is lifted from me, and I am given the power of speech until the clock strikes twelve.""Oh! however can you stand it to be dumb so much of the time?" exclaimed the pitying Lady Floretta.The Enchanted Cow looked at the Lady in surprise, for it is a great and beneficent thing to a cow to be allowed to speak at all."It is getting late," said Sir Gladys, looking at his watch by the light of one of the lanterns, and then, addressing the White Cow: "You were making an interesting observation concerning fish in the Black Tarn, if I mistake not.""The Black Tarn is full of the great fish," the Enchanted Cow declared. "They have taken refuge there, Ken Water being so low. You have but to stretch your nets, draw them, and reap your harvest.""But, my dear madam," urged Sir Gladys, "the Black Tarn is surrounded by fens andmarshes. Our horses were mired in trying to take out boats and nets this spring, when the ice first broke and we thought to fish in the Black Tarn, at a venture.""As I remarked at the beginning of this conversation," said the White Cow, somewhat testily, "it is the split hoof that you need—"Just then the distant Church clocks of the Saag could be heard, all striking the hour of twelve.The White Cow turned at once and walked in the direction of the Black Tarn, and Sir Gladys, the Lady Floretta and the seven maidens, now fully awake, followed, the more speedily because of a screech from the Witch, as she burst from the door, her inevitable yearly nap at an end.But no word could be heard from the Enchanted Cow. She looked meaningly at Sir Gladys, though, and that gallant gentleman seemed plunged in thought as the little party of wanderers left the white figure standing on the edge of the swampy ground which surrounded the Black Tarn. Sir Gladys escorted the Lady Floretta home, and what the two said to each other as they hurried over the moor toward the Moated Grange is what no one needconsider. They were companions in misfortune, and so drawn closely. Having bowed to the ground at the Great Gate, and having seen it close on the disappearing forms of the lady and her seven maidens, Sir Gladys hied him home, with quickened step. All the while he was thinking deeply. He had been from boyhood a student of natural history.
A SAMOAN IDYL
Among the passengers from one of the other coaches who had occasionally visited the Cassowary and listened as the novel symposium progressed was a brown-bearded, middle-aged gentleman with a tanned face and merry eye. That he was of the navy the Colonel had soon learned, and to the naval officer he now addressed himself:
"Lieutenant, you, necessarily, have visited many parts of the world and must have become acquainted with the facts of many a pretty romance or rough adventure. I believe you mentioned the circumstance that you were stationed for a time in the Samoan islands. Can you tell us a tale of Samoa?"
The Lieutenant smiled: "I'll tell you a tale of Samoa, a little one," he said. "I was a witness to its main incident, and it interested me. It was this way:
A SAMOAN IDYL
Una Loa was a Samoan girl, and she wasfair to look upon. They have festivities in their season in Samoa as we have here, and, as here, there are rivalries among the young women. There are tests of beauty, too, and she who can show the most beautiful headdress of flowers is counted the most charming among the maidens. She is as the Jersey heifer which takes the first prize at the annual fair in some prosperous county; she is as the lithe and graceful and beautiful creature who doesn't fall over her train at the receptions at the Court of England; she is an adornment to the society in which she moves, and, in Samoa, it must of course be the best society, must consist of those who enter into the contest exhibiting the sublimity of all head-gear—for head-gear is a woman's glory.
There was stationed upon one of the islands of the Samoan Group—there is no use of mentioning the island in particular—a young gentleman who had been sent out under the auspices of the Department of Agriculture of the United States, and, to speak more definitely, from that branch of the Department which is known as the Weather Bureau. His business was to sit at the top of a somewhat illy-constructed tower and note the variations of windand temperature and all that sort of thing, and then send his report to the Department at Washington, when he could catch a steamer, which didn't always often happen, for this was some time ago. Still he sat up in the tower and took notes and glowered, and made the best of things, and the work in this region of mild latitude and much lassitude did not wear upon him to such an extent that he could not fall in love, not in the purely abstract way that he loved some things either, as for instance, the equation of the parabola, but vigorously and deeply.
He fell in love to such an extent that he became personally interested in the contest among the fair Samoans as to whom among the belles should show the most ardent and effective floral decoration of her mass of hair on the day appointed.
Now, be it known that the Atlantic Ocean is the Atlantic Ocean, that the Washington Monument is the Washington Monument. They exist as they are. Be it known also, that the hair of a Samoan beauty, a great burnished mass, also exists as it is and is rarely washed between the rising of the sun and the droppinginto the ocean of the same luminary, or at any other time.
The name of the young man connected with the Weather Bureau was John Thompson. That is not a very poetic name, but John Thompson can love just as hard as Everard Argyle. This John Thompson did anyhow, and he vowed that his sweetheart should win in the contest of flowery decorations of the heads of the maidens. This resolve came upon him some six weeks before the time of trial. He visited Una Loa.
"How long is it, sweetheart, since you let your hair down?" said he.
"I do not remember," said she.
"That is all right," said he.
Now, John Thompson had entertained certain ideas regarding agricultural speculation in the Samoan Islands, and had imported for experimental purposes various small quantities of assorted delicate fertilizers—powdered bone and ammonia, or something of that sort. Here was material, and inspiration for action comes to a man sometimes in a way which makes it seem to him as if all the ancient gods were behind him and beside him, aiding him in every way. This sublimity of inspiration came to John Thompson at this moment.
This is how the man, thus sublimated, reasoned: "All the other girls must, necessarily, as in the past, wear cut flowers, which must, to an extent, wither before the judgment of the Wise Ones is declared. I will make a real, living garden of my darling's head, a garden in which shall bloom, not only flowers of the islands here, but of Europe and America, and all countries of the world. Above one of her dark eyes shall dangle such a bunch of glowing and living pansies as the Islanders have never seen; the phlox shall lift itself aloft from her coronet; sweet peas and old-fashioned pinks shall adorn one side of her shapely head, while the other side will be blazing with tossing poppies. She shall appear among the contestants with such a crest as never a queen has worn, though the jewelers of all ages have struggled to make a surpassing crown."
And the man did his work. "Eh," he said, as he patted the matted mass of dusky hair, "talk about farms in the States! Here is an area of the right kind for the support of a family! Talk about landscape gardening! I'll show them what real landscape gardening is!"
He did.
He planted right and left with ardor and goodjudgment, for he was not only an enthusiast but had the artist's gift. Una Loa yielded because she had the trust which every girl should have in a real lover of good character. As Thompson sowed and sowed, she submitted with all hopefulness and slept each night with her neck upon a little log, that each flower plant might grow without abrasion or disturbance. She saw but little of her kin, save a sister who stayed beside her, for Thompson was arrogant—said he was making a botanical experiment—and allowed none to visit her.
"THE AWARD COULD BUT GO TO UNA LOA"
"THE AWARD COULD BUT GO TO UNA LOA"
The day of the contest came, as the world went round and round. At the appointed hour, all the Samoan maidens appeared together, each with her head in the halo and glory of fair flowers. But there was no contest. Una Loa stood among them all like a bright spirit from somewhere. The fragrance from the flowers upon her head sapped itself into the senses of all who were near her, and there was a glittering, a very splendor of brilliant, multicolored and flaming humming-birds about her queenly head. There was no discussion among the judges. The award could but go to Una Loa, and so it went!
They say that there is a laziness, which is not, after all, a laziness, begotten in those whodwell among the islands in the Southern Seas. It is but adaptation, possibly most sensible. Thompson has resigned from the Weather Bureau and married Una Loa. He is keeping a cigar-store in South Apia and is doing tolerably well.
And the listeners agreed that the Lieutenant had at least looked upon a romance as genuine as simple.
A WOMAN AND SHEEP
None had acquired a more general regard among the passengers than the Kansas Farmer. He bore no resemblance to the typical farmer as represented in the comic publications but was, on the contrary, a well-dressed, imposing looking man of middle age, a college graduate, as Stafford knew, and one who had selected his occupation because it appealed to him as, to their own and general good, it might appeal to hosts of others of the educated men of the country. Stafford and he had become friends, as was almost a matter of course, and it was the former who insisted that the Farmer bring to the front some curious experience of human nature in connection with farm life. "You are the tree we must tap now," he jested. "It's just because you are what you are that we want the thing. Inevitably, you, with your experience and associations, can tell us something of the inner being and its ways on a farm which will be edifying. Tell us the queerest and most unexplainablething you remember in connection with such life and of one man or woman's part in it."
The farmer stroked his grizzled, close-cut beard and laughed:
"It seems to me that the element of love has entered with tolerable regularity into most of the narratives to which I have had the pleasure of listening here. That is right, certainly, and natural. What I'm going to tell is a love story, too, in its way. It is of a love which budded and bloomed but bore no fruit, for the oddest reason in the world. It is about a man who loved a woman and was won away by sheep. No, he wasn't exactly won away; he just forgot. It was the strangest thing I ever knew or heard of, but it is true. I know the man and his sheep myself, though I never saw the woman. This is
JASON'S LOVE STORY
A swamp oak stump is one of the most contumacious stumps in the world. It is usually big and its roots extend, like the arms of an octopus, in all directions save upward. Furthermore, having been bred to the wet, feeding on dampness when alive, the wood does not rot willingly. The upper portion of the stump absorbs the showers of heaven and enduresthe cracking heat of the sun apathetically and remains pretty much the same for a long time, while the roots lie solid in their dark bed, almost regardless of the years as men grow old. So it is that an otherwise cleared area of land occupied largely by swamp oak stumps is what the farmers in Michigan's Lower Peninsula call an unpromising place for present making of crops. It was such an area that Jason Goodell—who was in love—owned. He possessed eighty acres, an eighth of a section, with fifteen acres cleared—but for stumps. The young woman whom he loved was Melissa Trumbull, the eldest daughter of "old man" Trumbull, who was well-to-do.
The place where swamp oaks grow is of a sort to command respect. It has features. It is often a black ash swale. A swale is low ground, but not a swamp, crossed sometimes, at irregular intervals, by strips of higher ground referred to generally as beech ridges. In the lower ground thrive the black ash, the huge swamp oak, various moisture-loving bushes and luxurious growths of ferns. Up on the ridges grow the maple, the white ash, the beech, ironwood and birch and bushes whichdo not object to less damp soil, nannyberries elders and the like.
In the swale proper the growth underfoot is bush and there are hundreds of puddles where the frogs congregate in thousands, mostly the small, brown wood frog, not the big, green "kerplunk" sort of the ponds and streams. Here the raccoon finds what is, to him, a land flowing with milk and honey, for he agrees with a frog diet as a frog diet agrees with him; here upon dead white trunks the solitary log-cock, the great black, red-crested woodpecker, largest of his genus, in the region, hammers away like a blacksmith; here the hermit thrush sings sometimes; and here little streams are born, to trickle at first, then ripple and then leap, bubbling and noisy, into the sloping fields outside, to attain the dignity of brooks at last and join the undercreek.
On the beech ridges life is different. There the ruffed grouse struts about and feeds upon the nuts and berries; and there are the squirrels, black, gray and red. The grouse raise great families on the ridges and the wooing "drumming" of the males in spring is like nothing else in the world. It is the most distinctively wildwood sound there is. As for thesquirrels, the black is no longer holding his own with the red and the gray. He is going like the Red Indian and the buffalo and no one can tell why. He was not born to civilization. The red and gray adapt themselves. Of such swale and ridge, so peopled, consisted (as has been said) the greater portion of the estate of Jason Goodell; excellent land but requiring much work in its subjugation.
Never better man for conquering a forest or making good soil yield the crops it has owed than this same brown-bearded Jason Goodell. Personally strong, six full feet in height, though a trifle stooping, and slouchy in his gait, thewed like a draft-horse, broad of forehead and strong of chin, with firm mouth and steady gray eyes, this man was one to accomplish things as thoroughly and doggedly as Victor Hugo's Gilliatt toiling sturdily at the wrecked ship. Like Gilliatt, too, Jason was toiling for love's sake. He had never spoken of his passion to Melissa Trumbull, but they had studied together in the little district school, had grown up together, had confided their plans and hopes to each other and, until Jason left the employ of old man Trumbull and began work on his own "eighty," had been almostconstantly together. To Jason, reticent, and timid as well, in a matter of this sort, it never occurred to make a definite engagement, and to Melissa, black-eyed, gingham-clad, buoyant and with plenty of work to do, the situation doubtless presented itself with the same aspect. No pledged word, though, could have made the matter more fixed and serious than it was, at least to Jason. What need of words? The first thing to do was to make a home for the occupancy of two young married people.
So Jason built a rude cabin and lived in it alone and began clearing his land. At the end of the second year he had fifteen acres in crops of grass and grain, and the beginning of a herd of cattle and a drove of hogs, and was counted by his neighbors as a young man who would be well off some day. They were right in their conclusion. Jason was the one to succeed as a farmer. Living simply, working untiringly, the accomplishments of the isolated man were a surprise even to the rugged farmers who knew him well. At the end of the third year a new field had been hewed into the forest and the land first cleared had become more easily tillable. Fire had fed on the stumps. Half a dozen cows were feeding on the grassland, the hogs were fattening onlast year's corn crop and chickens and turkeys cackled and called about the rough log-barn. Butter and pork and eggs had a value at the nearest little town, and Jason had saved money. He bought another eighty acres of woodland—land was cheap then—and began to plan the building of a house. There was Melissa!
No log house should this mansion be but one fit for a bride's reception. It should be a framed house, with all proper rooms, clap-boarded as to the sides and shingled as to the roof. There should be a porch in front and the building should be of two stories. Jason brooded fondly over it all and planned and dreamed. He consulted often with Jim Rubens, the farmer carpenter of the locality: "Never saw a man so wrapped up in his house-buildin' in all my life!" said Rubens.
The beams and plates and joists and rafters for the house were planned and, with axe and broad-axe and saw, Jason and Rubens labored in the forest until oak and pine were cut and hewed, true to the line, and were then dragged by toiling oxen to the site of the house of which they were to be the stay and strength. The farmers round about assembled for the raising, there were heavings and shoutings, theparts were reared under the hoarse overseeing of Carpenter Rubens and the great timbers, tongue in socket, pinned lastingly together, stood aloft, the sturdy white outline of a pleasant home to face the roadway. What days they were for Jason as the two men labored afterward for weeks until the house stood all complete from cellar to roof-peak, and even painted—white, with green blinds, of course. Furnished it was too, well furnished for the country. It was the finest house in the neighborhood and Jason walked through the rooms with that feeling which comes to a man of purpose when he looks upon the thing accomplished. Not yet, though, was the place ready for Melissa. There was much to be done besides the mere building of a shelter, but, even now, the front part of it must be sacred for her. There Jason nailed up the door solidly.
What comfort could a farmer's wife have with merely a house to live in! Here must be all convenience for her outdoor work in connection with the household and all should be pleasant to look upon. Jason settled down resolutely to what was yet to come.
Obviously the old log barn had outlasted its original purposes. Its small stable no longerafforded shelter enough for the increasing herd of cattle and the horses nor its mows room for the hay and grain. There must be a frame barn, a big one, with high, wide doors into which a team with a load might be driven and with long stables and mows and roof room enough for all contingencies of harvest. The year after the completion of the house, the barn was built and the one of logs abandoned. But the barn had not absorbed Jason's thoughts so fully as had the house.
The lonely toiling of the man was not lonely to him. He was strong and rejoiced in work, and there was ever Melissa and always something to be done for her. From the front door of the house down to the roadway he made a wide gravelled path and along its sides he made beds of old-fashioned pinks and sowed and planted larkspur and phlox and dahlias and peonies and golden coreopsis and bachelor's buttons and other flowers named in the circulars of a seed firm in the distant city. He made a neat picket gate in the fence where the walk opened on the roadway and beside the fence he had hollyhocks, and sunflowers, the latter trying every day to see Melissa, and turning their heads resolutely from sunrise until evening and going to sleepevery night with their faces toward her home, which was in the West. Close beside the house he planted rosebushes and "old hen and chickens" and lady-slippers and morning-glories, and a madeira vine for the porch. There was a path from the front around the house to the kitchen—which had a porch as well—and beside this path Jason had planted an abundance of sweet briar, thinking as he did so how its faint, sweet fragrance and fair blossoms would match Melissa. A hop-vine clambered up the kitchen porch. Jason was thirty years old, now, and Melissa twenty-five.
One day old man Trumbull, who was a great trader, suddenly disposed of his farm and moved into the adjacent county. Somehow, the news did not have much effect on Jason Goodell. It would be as easy to bring her from thirty miles away as from where she had lived, he reasoned. The only difference to come would be that he would not see her often in the interval. There had never been any correspondence between them and it did not occur to Jason to write now.
There came a hard winter, the horses and cattle and other stock required close attendance, and Jason was much about the house. It was at this time when he discovered the faults of thekitchen floor, which was of pine. The boards had shrunk and there were cracks and the soft wood had worn away under the tread of his heavy feet. That sort of kitchen floor would never do for Melissa! He made a new floor and was happy at his labor all through "the big snow." The floor was of hard, seasoned ash, matched perfectly and smooth as the floor of a ball-room. "It will be easier to mop" said he, and thought of Melissa's sunbonnet, and of how it would look hanging against the whitewashed wall.
All winter in Jason's newer eighty acres the axes of two men had swung hardily and, with spring and early summer, came to Jason a stress of effort in helping at the clearing and in attendance on the crops. He had little time for work about the garden, though it was not neglected, but he felt that he must somewhat change his home life. He had lived in the kitchen and a little room adjoining it. He had, from the time the house was built, never changed in the feeling that the front part of the house was sacred to Melissa, but he felt that now a little change must come. His duties were increasing. He must have a hired man about him, one who would live with him. So the hired man came and slept in the room Jason had occupiedwhile Jason slept upstairs in what, in fancy, he had called "our room." "She won't mind," he thought.
There is spur to effort for the real farmer and a great comforting pride in looking out upon a conquered province, to note the corn swaying full-eared, the timothy and clover and grain fields changing color with the shift of the clouds and sweep of the breeze, the lowing cattle in the pastures and the general promise of Autumn's wealth. Jason enjoyed it all, for was it not the product of his design and energy, and as the farm grew, he grew with it. Success fairly earned made him zealous for more. He broadened and was for trying things.
One day old Rubens came along, and leaning idly over the front fence, began a farmer's chat with Jason, who was digging among the flowers. Rubens looked away at the vacant log barn.
"What are you going to do with the old barn?" he asked, "tool-house?"
"No," said Jason, "I have a tool-room in the big barn. I don't know what I'll do with the old one. Pull it down, maybe."
Rubens gazed meditatively at the abandoned but still sound structure: "It would make a mighty good sheep barn," he suggested.
No more was said at the time, but Ruben's idea was not forgotten. It remained in Jason's mind and the more he thought upon it the more he became impressed. Jason had never raised sheep, successful as he had been with other animals. He considered, and rightly, that most of his land was too low for them. There was an eighty acres of woodland adjoining that which he had latest bought that was hilly, not heavily timbered and with many springs and brooks. Partly cleared, with what woods were left well under-brushed, it would make a perfect sheep pasture. He had half a mind to buy it and experiment. And the plan grew in his mind until it overmastered him and he bought the land.
Not the sort of man to venture upon a new venture carelessly was Jason, and he had a problem before him now: What sort of sheep should he raise? His cattle and hogs were of good breeds and to have seen to it that it was so he had found profitable. With sheep he was less acquainted. He asked advice. "Get Merinos, by all means," pronounced Henry Wilson, who lived to the north of him. "Get Southdowns and nothing else," said James Remington, who lived to the west. "I'll get twentyof each and experiment with them separately," decided Jason.
Now as between the Merino and the Southdown sheep there is a great gulf fixed. The Merino is small with gnarled horns, wrinkled neck and nose; with silk-like wool curling close to the skin in its fineness, yellow underneath because of its oiliness, and dark outside because of the dust gathered and held by such close, sticky coat. Well tried is the endurance of the sheep-washer who, in late spring before shearing time, stands waist deep in some stream and seeks to cleanse the fleece of a flock of shivering Merinos driven bleating to the water, and dreading it like a tramp. But the fine Merino wool commands a price; the fleece is heavy and the breeder profits from that, not from the mutton. The flesh of the Merino requires for its consumption people who have been long besieged and who are hungry.
Different is the quality of the Southdown; not from Spanish ancestors, feeding on Andalusian hills, as came the Merino, did he come, but from Anglo-Saxon forefathers who cropped the herbage of the Hampshire and Sussex downs. Big and white of body and dark-faced, sturdy of build and garbed in clean, not over finewhite wool, hornless but stepping free and high, the Southdown has a healthy individuality. As concerns his mutton, those who know how to eat, and what to eat, speak fluently while their eyes glisten.
And almost as the flocks throve under Isaac, toiling for Rebecca, throve the flocks of Jason, toiling for Melissa. In summer and autumn they fed in the new pasture land and in winter they were sheltered and fared well in the old barn, now renovated and with a great shed attached for further room. Jason became absorbed in sheep-growing, as he had never been before in the growing of anything. He read books on the subject and tried experiments. At the end of the third year, with good flocks now his he selected from each the finest ram and ewe and entered them at the County fair. He wanted to learn with which breed he had been most successful.
Canny and just are almost always the judges at an American County fair. Known personally throughout the region, selected for their uprightness and knowledge of special beast or fowl or any product of the fields, their verdict is almost mechanically accepted as a final and just one. More and more interested becameJason regarding the issue of his experiments in thus entering into competition with breeders, some of whom had raised sheep before he was born, and he puzzled himself much over the problem of where, in the opinion of these unbiased experts, he would prove to have done best. The decision, when it came, was hardly a surprise to him. His Merinos, it is true, received favorable mention, but his Southdowns took first prize in a field where there was decided and worthy competition. A proud man was Jason Goodell when he saw the blue ribbons tied by a gray-bearded giant in jeans about the necks of his two entries. He made an instant resolution. "I'll not raise wool," he said, "I'll leave that to the Ohioans of the Western Reserve. I'll raise mutton!"
He sold the prize-winners for a mighty price and returned to his farm. Within a week the flock of Merinos was sold, as well, and the money so received was invested in an importation of more Southdowns, with blood as blue as that of the Hapsburgs, and far stronger. Then began sheep-raising that was sheep-raising.
It is hard to serve two masters and it must be admitted that, since his thoughts and plans had turned so absorbingly to Southdowns, Jasonfelt less surpassingly the inspiration of Melissa. There had been a time when he dreamed of her almost nightly, but, now, his sleeping visions were of great flocks upon the hillsides and the eyes into which he looked were not always the sparkling ones of Melissa, but it might be the soft, gentle eyes of quite another color of some great ewe. Dreams are grotesque things.
Still, instinctively, sometimes fervently, Jason worked and devised for the girl who had gone away. The big orchard back of the house and barns, now growing into fruitfulness, he cared for well. In the spring, feeding the just-weaned calves, as he put his fingers in the mouth of some vigorous youngster and then thrust its muzzle into the milk, that it might learn to drink, he thought as the calf butted joyously at the pail as if it were his own mother, how Melissa would like the calves and how much better than he she would attend to them! He was somewhat troubled, too, because the spring in the hollow was not nearer the house—he did not want Melissa to carry water so many yards—but he planned a "spring-house" with a cement floor, where Melissa should keep the milk and make the butter. That would be less labor for her. There would not be much butter-making anyhowHe was not going to have butter and eggs to sell. Only enough cattle and horses and hogs and chickens for farm purposes did he intend to keep. And he bought yet another eighty acres of land.
It is wonderful how some over-mastering aim, one the accomplishment of which requires concentration of thought and exertion of all energy in one direction, will get its grip upon a man and hold it to the end. With high and low it is the same. Mozart died with the score of the Requiem Mass hardly dry from his feeble hand. Napoleon died with the word of command upon his lips. Seekers, investigators, experimenters in all fields, great and small, have grown into a forgetfulness of aught save one object, have abandoned all outside, and have dreamed and devised and labored toward one absorbing end. Such compelling influence in life may come to the farmer as to others. With Jason, who recognized a farmer's dignity, who knew that the farmer often fought men's battles and at all times fed them, the attainment of his own ambition was nothing small. He became almost a monomaniac over Southdowns. How they thrived!—for Nature ever loves a mentor. Peas grew where oats had grown, clover where wasbefore a cornfield, turnips where had been potatoes, for sheep must eat in winter. It became a Southdown farm, and acres were yet added, for the undertaking was most profitable—until the time came when Jason's keen eyes could not, as he stood looking from the barn door, reach more than vaguely the outlines of his own domain. One day, a girl wearing a sunbonnet matching exactly in shape and color the one Melissa had once worn, passed by and Jason's thoughts went back. That afternoon he took horses and wagon and drove to the growing town. He returned with a piano. "Melissa may have learned to play," he said to himself, "and she will be glad to find it here." But, for weeks, perhaps for months afterward, no Melissa came again into his waking dreams nor in his sleep.
"THE CHILDREN CARRIED AWAY ARMFULS OF BLOSSOMS"
"THE CHILDREN CARRIED AWAY ARMFULS OF BLOSSOMS"
He had abundance of help about him now. Another hired man, accompanied by his wife, had been brought into the house, the wife proving a notable housekeeper and relieving Jason of all petty duties. He visited his neighbors and was liked among them. The children especially were fond of him and he allowed them to visit his house at will and to carry away armfuls of blossoms from his great flower-garden, seeing to it only that they did not harm the plants. Butthe parlor, with its furniture still unworn, though becoming somewhat old-fashioned now, and with its piano still untouched, was never entered except for dusting, and the front door was never opened.
Far and wide as the great breeder of Southdown sheep, became known the name of Jason Goodell, and his flocks and barns grew with acres steadily. One afternoon a traveling nurseryman came to see him upon business and stayed to dinner. They chatted over the meal:
"I was over at Wishtigo last week," said the man; "drove over one day and came back the next. Who d'ye think I met?"
"Couldn't guess."
"I met County Clerk Jim Lacey's wife—her that used to be Melissa Trumbull, you know. It was the first I knew of it. I took dinner with 'em; she wouldn't allow anything else. They've been married seven years and they've got a mighty nice little family: three children. Jim's a good fellow."
Jason said nothing for a few moments. Then he assented deliberately: "Yes, Jim's a good fellow. I've met him often. I didn't know whether he was married or not, though. What was it you said about them young pear trees? I may take a dozen or two of 'em."
In the middle of the forenoon a few days later, while Jason was looking over the sheep barns and giving directions to the men at work there, a sudden fancy came upon him. He went to the house, asked for a hammer and withdrew the nails from the front door. Then he opened all the parlor windows and let in the sunlight. "It'll be healthier," he explained to the astonished and delighted housekeeper. "Keep them open as much as you want to now, in pleasant weather, and let the children in, too, if they like it. It'll brighten things up."
At a table in one of the fine restaurants in the big city sat, recently, at dinner a man and woman, he a man of the world, she charming as women so often are. They were delighted with the wonderful mutton they had just eaten and were talking of it.
"It's a mutton only kings would be allowed to eat, if these were ancient times," the man asserted laughingly. "It's delicate as strawberries, though that isn't a good comparison. It may have come direct from the Goodell fields."
"Who is Goodell?" queried the lady.
"Goodell, my dear madam, is a public benefactor.He is one of the wisest raisers of Southdown sheep the country knows. He's a splendid old fellow, too. I've visited his farm and met him. He's awfully fond of children."
THE ENCHANTED COW
For some reason, not altogether clear, there was no comment for a time after the Farmer had finished his account of the affair of Jason and the girl and the Southdown sheep. Perhaps it was because of the grotesqueness of the idea that a man working so faithfully for and so dreaming of his love—a practical man—could have left absolute possession of her to the unreal, while making his hobby at hand the real. The silence was broken by the Young Lady:
"That is very strange life history, it seems to me. How could any man, a real man, forget the girl he cared for in such a way? It seems all wicked and unnatural."
"But, my dear young lady," explained the Professor, banteringly ponderous, "he did not forget her. In fact, from the account he appears to have been a most devoted lover. What he forgot was time. Besides," he continued, "taking the broader point of view, how much better it is for all of us that, in one regionat least, we have better mutton than that Jason should have raised a family!"
"Bother the mutton!" was the indignant and somewhat irreverent answer, and then the Colonel intervened:
"My dear Miss," he explained ingratiatingly, "I am confident that it is neither the Professor's lack of heart nor sympathy nor gallantry that has spoken, but, instead, his superior and appreciative judgment in the matter of mutton. It may be that he is braver than some of us. However, it doesn't matter, because your sensibilities are going to be soothed and fed on caramels just now. I am most confident of that, since I am about to commandeer the Poet. Mr. Poet, there is no alternative."
There is something anomalous about the successful modern poets. They are usually disguised as citizens. They do not have shaven faces and long hair and another world expression upon their countenances. Sometimes they have even a stubby mustache and a bad look. This particular poet chanced to be good-looking, but that proves nothing. He responded easily enough:
"Vocalism is difficult to me. I'd rather write this out. I can tell you a story, though, of theregion where, it is said, were sowed the Dragon's Teeth from which sprang the men who later owned the Eastern Hemisphere. The story of the Enchanted Cow has the merit that it is true."
THE ENCHANTED COW
It is odd how often when from some legendary source a fairy story comes, we find fact mixed with the fancy. This tale, for instance, might just as well be called "Single Hoof and Double Hoof" or the "Wild Ride for Caviare," as to be named "The Enchanted Cow." Certainly every one should know about caviare, and why some beasts have split hoofs and some round, unyielding ones, but that enchantment should have anything to do with it is curious.
Into the Danube far southwest of Buda-Pesth once ran a deep, still stream which babbled when it began in the hills, became more quiet as it reached the plain, and was almost sluggish when it entered the Black Tarn, as the broad sheet of water was called, though it was in fact a lake surrounded by sedgy marshes. The stream after feeding and passing through the Black Tarn became a deep river, and broadened as it poured itself into the Danube, the father of waters of all the region. To the north of theBlack Tarn was the Moated Grange where lived the Lady Floretta Beamish, that is the lady whose name would have been that if translated into English, for the country in which she lived was Hungary. The streams which would, in English, have been called Ken Water after flowing through the Black Tarn as told, went on through the estate of Sir Gladys Rhinestone. It is true that Gladys is usually accepted as the name of a gentlewoman, but this time it belonged to a gentleman, and one of high degree. He explained his name himself by frankly confessing that he had been named after his mother.
In the days referred to people of the class of the Lady Floretta Beamish and Sir Gladys Rhinestone were generally under the immediate sovereignty of a prince, and the prince in their case was scarce a model. The one to whom all of that part of Hungary owed allegiance was Prince Rugbauer, and he was hardly of a type to be called gentle or considerate. In fact none of the people of the lands about were accustomed to pronounce the name of Prince Rugbauer above a whisper. Whenever it became necessary to allude to the prince, the inhabitants of the country were used to make the motion, hand on throat, of strangling. Thiswas a direct allusion to the prince's system of taxation, and was understood by the humblest knave in the whole valley of Ken Water. Even the prince knew the meaning of this gesture, though when first told of it he but laughed grimly and no one ever spoke to him again about it. It was the witch of Zombor who told the prince. Anything malicious might be expected from her.
It was because of the witch that the cow was in trouble. The witch had enchanted the cow for a thousand years, and the seven hundredth year was passing when this tale begins. It may be said straightforwardly of the witch, that she was one of the worst of a disagreeable class of beings now, happily, becoming rare. She lived in a sort of hutch, a round mud-walled den on a hill which would be called Endbury Moon in English, and throughout the day she lay curled up in this den like a snail in its shell, but at night she came out regularly to work such mischief as she might in the country round about. Wherever she found there was no trouble she proceeded at once to brew some. There was no end to her pernicious activity.
The Lady Floretta Beamish was an orphan and sole mistress of the two-towered Grangeand all the lands and waters a mile either up and down the deep Ken Water. But the land was far from rich, and the revenues of the lady came mostly from the sturgeon in the river which were caught each year in the same manner as in the Danube itself. The Lady Floretta was a very beautiful creature. Her hair was of a pale golden hue, and her eyes were blue. Her cheeks were like June roses. She was tall and fair, and walked around the walled Grange in a long white satin robe embroidered with gold, and down her back rippled the golden hair, even to the hem of her trailing gown.
It required the services of seven maidens and seven hours daily to comb and brush the Lady Floretta's hair, but they did not mind it. The seven maids had nothing else to do, so they combed and they combed, and they brushed and they smoothed the pale golden treasure of their mistress' hair, fastening each shining braid of it at last to the hem of her trailing gown, with pins sparkling with diamonds, moonstones, rubies and emeralds. Why the Lady Floretta did not dispose of some of these jewels when the strait came, which will be told of, it is not easy to understand. It may be they were all heirlooms and so not to be parted with.
A year of trial came at last for both the Lady Floretta and Sir Gladys Rhinestone. No fish were caught and that was a disaster which affected everything. The fish were the fortune of the country, for from the eggs of the great sturgeon was made the caviare, without which no true-born noble of the realm could make a tolerable meal. The caviare was shipped away to all parts of the civilized world as it is now, and it will be seen that to have the stream fail of fish was a calamity of first magnitude.
It was a wonderful thing to see the manner of fishing in those days, and they fish in the same way upon the Danube now. They cut a great gap through the ice in the winter, the gap extending across the stream, and in it they set monster nets. Then, miles above the nets, a band of horsemen ranged themselves straight across the river on the ice, which would bear an army, and at a signal blast come thundering down at utmost speed. The noise was terrific. "Ohe! ohe! a hun! a hun!" yelled the wild horsemen, there was a blare of trumpets and the strong ice trembled beneath the impact of the mighty hoofs. The timid sturgeon fled beneath the ice before the pursuing shock, and at last rushed blindly into the awaiting nets,to be taken by thousands and tens of thousands. But from Ken Water, though the horsemen rode as in the past, no fish were found. The stewards explained that the stream had run very low, and that the fish had gone either to the Danube or the depths of the Black Tarn. The case was very bad. Prince Rugbauer announced that Sir Gladys and Lady Floretta were false traitors both, and announced as well that he would cancel their ownership of their lands and castles, and hold them no better than common folk themselves unless the heavy annual taxes were paid within a week.
And so it came to pass one night that from his castle Sir Gladys paced with bowed head along Ken Water, around the Black Tarn toward the witch's hut on Endbury Moor, and at the same time, the moon over her right shoulder, came to the desolate hill-top Lady Floretta, each bent on consulting the Witch as to what should be done about the fish that had left Ken Water.
The Witch, seated on top of her hut, gave what is called in old stories, an eldritch laugh when she saw Sir Gladys advancing on one side of the Moor, and Lady Floretta, more slowly climbing up the other.
When the Lady Floretta heard the strange laugh of the Witch, she was startled and alarmed and stood still for the space of a full half-hour, while her seven maidens coaxed her to go on, and so Sir Gladys, who was less affected by the eldritch laugh than she and who, moreover, was alone, arrived first at the Witch's haunt and secured audience at once. He gave the Witch a gold-plated candlestick and two sugar spoons of silver, then explained his woeful plight, and asked advice and counsel.
The Witch clutched the articles eagerly in her claw-hands, climbed down from the little hut, and standing in her low door croaked out:
"By the light of yonder moon,Look and see your fortune soon!"
"By the light of yonder moon,Look and see your fortune soon!"
She thrust the candlestick and sugar spoons into a bag at her girdle, and, curling up within her hut, fell fast asleep without ceremony, leaving Sir Gladys peering doubtfully in at the door which she had left open. What she had said was certainly vague and unsatisfactory and he felt that he had been imposed upon. He tried in vain to arouse the creature and tiring at last of shouting into the hut at a figure apparently of stone, he turned away but to meet, fair and full, the beautiful Lady Floretta Beamishattended by the seven maidens carrying seven lighted horn lanterns, and followed by a gentle snow-white cow with golden horns and hoofs.
Sir Gladys swept the heather with his plumed hat, as he bowed before the Lady Floretta.
"Madam," he said, with deep respect, "upon what quest do you come upon this lonely moor by the uncertain light of the moon feebly aided by the seven lanterns carried by your maidens?"
The Lady Floretta could not speak. Her embarrassment and confusion were such that she could scarcely stand even when supported by her maidens. She looked around for a chair.
Sir Gladys took from his shoulders his cloak of purple velvet, and spread it at the lady's feet. "Rest," he said, "rest, and recover your strength, fair and honored Lady! I will await your pleasure, meanwhile examining the unusual specimen of the animal kingdom which I see following your gracious footsteps."
He took a step or two toward the Enchanted Cow—for it was she—but she shook her golden horns, and he remained standing near the Lady Floretta, who sat down, affably and quite comfortably, upon the cloak of purple.
"Hark to the thunder!" said the Lady Floretta. "It is going to rain!" and she beganto chide the maids for not bringing umbrellas. Each it is true had a small parasol to ward off moon-stroke, but there was not one umbrella worthy of the name among them all.
"It is not thunder that you hear, sweet lady," said Sir Gladys. "'Tis but the stertorous and unseemly breathing of the foul Witch in the den."
"Oh, is she asleep? And no one dares awaken her!" sighed the Lady Floretta. "I have walked a weary distance to consult her," she explained, as she became convinced that the sounds she had heard indeed came from the Witch's hut.
Sir Gladys came nearer, the seven maidens drew nearer, the Enchanted Cow herself walked closer to Lady Floretta, as she sat upon the cloak spread upon the heather, and there in the summer night the Lady Floretta and Sir Gladys exchanged confidences and condolences about their sore strait, and often made the dread gesture as they talked, for neither thought best to name the Prince Rugbauer and both were too well-bred to whisper in company.
The seven maidens sitting there on the heather, fell asleep, each nodding over her horn lantern. The Enchanted Cow, however was wide awake, and, from her expression, appearedto sympathize deeply with the two distressed mortals whose troubles were so freely poured forth in her presence. They spoke of the disastrous happening of the winter, and of the probable hopelessness of an attempt to retrieve their fortunes at this time of the year.
"The outlook is black indeed," remarked Sir Gladys, and the Lady Floretta agreed with him dejectedly.
"It is the Split Hoof that you need," said a soft deep voice; and the two turning their heads saw the Enchanted Cow looking upon them earnestly. It was she who had spoken.
Sir Gladys and Lady Floretta were dumb with astonishment. After a brief silence, the Enchanted Cow continued: "Last winter when you rode furiously upon the frozen stream the thunder of your horses' hoofs scared no fish into your nets, and when spring came the water was as low as it had been the summer before and is still shallow. But I know where the fish are hidden and that they have not spawned. I stand, during the heat of these summer days, knee deep in the water in the shallows of the Black Tarn, and I see what I see."
"Dear Enchanted Cow," said the Lady Floretta, "please tell us what you see!"
"This one night in the year," resumed the Enchanted Cow, without appearing to notice what the Lady Floretta has said, "this one night in the year, and the only one night in the year, yonder crafty Witch must sleep. She cannot awaken until midnight and this is the one night in the year that the Witch's spell is lifted from me, and I am given the power of speech until the clock strikes twelve."
"Oh! however can you stand it to be dumb so much of the time?" exclaimed the pitying Lady Floretta.
The Enchanted Cow looked at the Lady in surprise, for it is a great and beneficent thing to a cow to be allowed to speak at all.
"It is getting late," said Sir Gladys, looking at his watch by the light of one of the lanterns, and then, addressing the White Cow: "You were making an interesting observation concerning fish in the Black Tarn, if I mistake not."
"The Black Tarn is full of the great fish," the Enchanted Cow declared. "They have taken refuge there, Ken Water being so low. You have but to stretch your nets, draw them, and reap your harvest."
"But, my dear madam," urged Sir Gladys, "the Black Tarn is surrounded by fens andmarshes. Our horses were mired in trying to take out boats and nets this spring, when the ice first broke and we thought to fish in the Black Tarn, at a venture."
"As I remarked at the beginning of this conversation," said the White Cow, somewhat testily, "it is the split hoof that you need—"
Just then the distant Church clocks of the Saag could be heard, all striking the hour of twelve.
The White Cow turned at once and walked in the direction of the Black Tarn, and Sir Gladys, the Lady Floretta and the seven maidens, now fully awake, followed, the more speedily because of a screech from the Witch, as she burst from the door, her inevitable yearly nap at an end.
But no word could be heard from the Enchanted Cow. She looked meaningly at Sir Gladys, though, and that gallant gentleman seemed plunged in thought as the little party of wanderers left the white figure standing on the edge of the swampy ground which surrounded the Black Tarn. Sir Gladys escorted the Lady Floretta home, and what the two said to each other as they hurried over the moor toward the Moated Grange is what no one needconsider. They were companions in misfortune, and so drawn closely. Having bowed to the ground at the Great Gate, and having seen it close on the disappearing forms of the lady and her seven maidens, Sir Gladys hied him home, with quickened step. All the while he was thinking deeply. He had been from boyhood a student of natural history.