WELCOME NEWS. 



margin is twenty-six inches, as, when the time comes, 

 I will show you." 



" Right you are ! right you are ! " he answered, 

 blithely. " You don't take me for an old ' know 

 nothing/ that is not open to reason." 



So we finished our whiskey and our pipes, little 

 supposing when we turned in that a change of 

 weather was at hand. 



At four in the morning it was cold enough 

 for me to require another blanket upon my 

 bed ; at breakfast time the thermometer must 

 have been down to near freezing point, while fitful 

 gusts of wind every now and then sung in mournful 

 cadence around the chimney stacks and gables of the 

 house. On going forth, big black clouds, solid as if 

 cut out of boot leather, were rising higher and higher 

 in the north-west, and an odd, straggling flake of 

 snow drifted past as if not anxious to terminate its 

 existence by making closer acquaintance with 

 Mother Earth. 



The season had at length broken, winter was at 

 last come, and with its advent, of course, would arrive 

 the migratory wildfowl. 



Soon after breakfast one of the farm hands came 

 in from a distant part of the ranche with a load of 

 cord-wood ; he was brimful of news for the " boss," 

 so must see him. His interview was not delayed. 

 " Boss, the fowl are come, the big slough beyond my 

 shanty is full of them, and they are fairly booming 

 around the lower part of the corn-field that had a 

 miss-crcp." This field had been drowned out in 

 spring, so its produce was not worth gathering ; 

 but, to make the best possible use of the grain it 

 had borne, five or six score of hogs had been turned 

 into it, and, as may be imagined, its soil was trampled 

 into a quagmire. This place was in the most 

 splendid condition for a ducks' feeding- ground, and 

 would remain so until it was frozen. A smart team 



