777 K IRRIGATION AGE. 



353 



gowns, straggling about her naked 

 feet, being supplemented by a 

 black merino shawl spotted and 

 rent, one end of which was care- 

 lessly flung over her left shoulder, 

 after the fashion of her people. 

 Yet in her clear olive complexion, 

 her handsome dark eyes, whose 

 drooping lashes were of the finest 

 texture, her gleaming teeth, and 

 in the glance of captivating naievt6 

 with which she met my solemn 

 scrutiny, there lay a witchery be- 

 yond resistance, and as I watched 

 her oread grace and saw the con- 

 fiding innocence of her youthful de- 

 light, I forgot the unkempt shep- 

 herdess in the gentle, maidenly 

 creature whose buoyancy was like 

 an embodied ray of the rich sun- 

 light around us. 



"Do you want your hat. Senor?" 



"Oh, not in the least," I replied 

 with nonchalance. "Perhaps the 

 warmth of the sun upon my head 

 may prove an efficient hair-re- 

 storer." (I knew the pitiless rail- 

 lery with which her race regarded 

 physical shortcomings, although 

 nowhere in the world is to be found 

 a more heterogeneous assemblage 

 of human ills than maybediscov- 

 ered amcnsr them.) 



My answer evidently discon- 

 certed her. She wanted to play, 

 and I was serious: Changing her 

 behavior she approached without 

 speaking, and demurely dropped 

 the hat beside me. 



It was now my turn to be merry. 

 Observing that one of her flock 

 was diappearing at the farther end 

 of the enclosure, I challenged her 

 to race after the wanderer. She 

 bounded away, calling prettily 

 -upon Santa Barbara to aid her, 



springing over the turf with free, 

 elastic step, and easily outrunning 

 me, an exploit I could not regret, 

 being glad enough to watch her 

 splendid grace of motion as she 

 sped forward. 



Her delinquent charge having 

 been at length coral led with the 

 herd, she produced a tin cup from 

 her pocket, and asked if I would 

 like a drink of goat's milk. 



Now this was dangerous. There 

 has come to me from an authentic 

 source a tradition that, at the very 

 outset of my career, when my at- 

 tenuated dimensions might readily 

 have been embraced by a quart-pot, 

 my existance was guaranteed, as 

 it were, through the beneficent 

 ministrations of goat's milk. 

 Thereafter, being sorely ground 

 upon fortune's'wheel yea, having 

 so far become the shuttlecock of 

 fate that the feathers were well 

 nigh knocked out of me I have at 

 times questioned the propriety of 

 that fond yet deluded rescue from 

 oblivion, cherishing an abhorance 

 of the vile fluid which had medi- 

 ated to prolong my woes. Here, 

 however, I beheld the preserver of 

 of my infant anatomy in an auspi- 

 cious form, and hastened to accept 

 the girl's rustic hospitality. 



She had some trouble in procur- 

 ing the desired beverage. Goats, 

 even in their soberest mood, are 

 not wont to be tractable, their 

 thoughts being less reduced to sys- 

 tem than those of most animals, so 

 that the direction they are about 

 to take can scarcely be predicted 

 with more certainty than that of a 

 metropolitan herdic in search of 

 prey. My hostess was neverthe- 

 less equal to her task, and we were 



