170 Life and Sport on the Pacific Slope 



In or out of his cups Johnnie damns the country 

 for his failure. The country, need it be said, is not 

 to blame. No finer country than California lies 

 out of doors. Others — plenty of them — succeed 

 where Johnnie and his friends failed. Had he 

 given undivided attention to his business, he too 

 would have succeeded. But from the start he 

 misinterpreted that grim word — work. He pro- 

 nounced ranching simple. Had he been taught 

 that nothing in life is simple, that in the strenuous 

 competition of to-day no hour may be wasted with 

 impunity, no dollar squandered, no trifle ignored 

 — had he mastered these, the principia of life's 

 science, he might, who knows, have graduated with 

 honours. 



To be crowned with laurel abroad, this sort of 

 teaching must begin at home. Perhaps the fool 

 will never learn his lesson. A youth not clever 

 enough to pass into the army or navy, the Civil 

 Service, or the learned professions, not quick-witted 

 enough for the Stock Exchange or business, a hope- 

 less duffer in short at all that pertains to genteel 

 bread- winning, — such a lamb as this must be kept 

 in the fold, not suffered to stray into the stony 

 places of the world. 



True ; but what can you do with him at home ? 



Let him serve his sovereign as a soldier or a sailor 

 in the ranks ; let him be apprenticed to some honest 

 trade ; let him become a hewer of wood, a drawer 

 of water ; let him fill any position, however humble, 

 under the eye and aegis of authority, rather than 

 be driven forth into the wilderness to perish 

 miserably. 



