CHAPTER III. 



OUR CROPS. 



SEVEN of the clock on a fair summer morning. 

 The breakfast is fizzling on the stove ; the 

 aroma of mocha and Java floats out through 

 open doors and windows. The flock of 

 ebony hens, lately released, and heralded by 

 gay chanticleer, their score or so of scarlet 

 combs glowing in the sunshine, are grazing 

 in the alfalfa, uttering loud croons of satis- 

 faction. In the stable-corral chicks are 

 furiously scratching. The cows, long since 

 fed and milked, chew the cud of bovine 

 ease. Up and down the drive, round and 

 round in the alfalfa, kicking up its heels 

 in the joy of life, races a beautiful colt, the 

 hope of the ranchera, to whom the beast 

 of the Far West is as the abomination of 

 desolation. Meanwhile the mother tugs at 



