his inclination but really his duty to try to make rain at
once, and in the particular locality just suited in his judgment for
securing an effect? As to the locality, there was no doubt. It was up
the foothills a mile or two above, and just beside the valley in which
were the picnickers. The men about the post were summoned, burros were
loaded, and at 2 P.M. the whole rain-making force was far up the
foothills unloading and preparing to fly gigantic kites and explode in
the upper vaults of the atmosphere bombs and rockets and all sorts of
things to make a rainstorm.

All went well. The wind was right, and the huge kites, bomb-laden,
climbed into the sky like vultures. The electric wires were in order,
and when at last the buttons were touched and the explosion came, it
seemed as if the very vaults of heaven were riven. It was a great
success. Gray, elated and hopeful, but not fully assured, stood and
watched and waited.

He did not have to wait long. Not far to the north in the hard blue sky
suddenly appeared a little dab of woolly white. Another showed in the
east. They showed all about, and grew and grew in size until they became
great, over-toppling, blending mountains, a new and mysterious world
against the sky. Then came a darkening of the mass. The cumulus was
changing to the nimbus. Then came a distant rumble, and, preceding
another, a great blaze of lightning went across the zenith. To those in
the region the world darkened. A mountain thunderstorm was on.

The darkness increased; the clouds hung lower and lower, the lightning
flashed more frequently and fiercely, and finally the flood-gates of the
clouds were opened and the rain fell with such denseness that the mass
of drops made literal sheets. The little brooks were filled, and tumbled
into the creek which ran down the canyon where were the picnickers. Bred
in the region, the picnickers knew what such a flood meant, and with the
first sound of thunder had clambered up the canyon side, where they sat
unsheltered and awaiting events. The very first downpour wetted every
young man and woman to the bone and filled thin boots with water. The
worst of it was that they had not yet eaten. They had brought up with
them two burros laden with supplies, and two mule teams, which had
dragged them up into the wooded elysium beside the tumbling creek of the
canyon. When the storm gathered it was at a moment when the burros
stood, still unloaded, and the mules attached t