nd for the Jacks was among the farms, where not only
Osage hedges, but also the newly arrived barb-wire, made hurdles and
hazards in the path of possible enemies. But the finest of the forage
is nearer to the village among the truck-farms--the finest of forage
and the fiercest of dangers. Some of the dangers of the plains were
lacking, but the greater perils of men, guns, Dogs, and impassable
fences are much increased. Yet those who knew Warhorse best were not at
all surprised to find that he had made a form in the middle of a
market-gardener's melon-patch. A score of dangers beset him here, but
there was also a score of unusual delights and a score of holes in the
fence for times when he had to fly, with at least twoscore of
expedients to help him afterward.

III

Newchusen was a typical Western town. Everywhere in it, were to be seen
strenuous efforts at uglification, crowned with unmeasured success. The
streets were straight level lanes without curves or beauty-spots. The
houses were cheap and mean structures of flimsy boards and tar paper,
and not even honest in their ugliness, for each of them was pretending
to be something better than itself. One had a false front to make it
look like two stories, another was of imitation brick, a third
pretended to be a marble temple.

But all agreed in being the ugliest things ever used as human
dwellings, and in each could be read the owner's secret thought--to
stand it for a year or so, then move out somewhere else. The only
beauties of the place, and those unintentional, were the long lines of
hand-planted shade-trees, uglified as far as possible with whitewashed
trunks and croppy heads, but still lovable, growing, living things.

The only building in town with a touch of picturesqueness was the grain
elevator. It was not posing as a Greek temple or a Swiss chalet, but
simply a strong, rough, honest, grain elevator. At the end of each
street was a vista of the prairie, with its farm-houses, windmill
pumps, and long lines of Osage-orange hedges. Here at least was
something of interest--the gray-green hedges, thick, sturdy, and high,
were dotted with their golden mock-oranges, useless fruit, but more
welcome here than rain in a desert; for these balls were things of
beauty, and swung on their long tough boughs they formed with the soft
green leaves a color-chord that pleased the weary eye.

Such a town is a place to get out of, as soon as possible, so thought
the travel