said,
when Alessandro first led her to it, and said, deprecatingly, "It is
small, Majella,--too small;" and he recollected bitterly, as he spoke,
the size of Ramona's own room at the Senora's house. "Too small," he
repeated.

"Very small to hold so much joy, my Alessandro," she laughed; "but quite
large enough to hold two persons."

It looked like a palace to the San Pasquale people, after Ramona had
arranged their little possessions in it; and she herself felt rich as
she looked around her two small rooms. The old San Luis Rey chairs
and the raw-hide bedstead were there, and, most precious of all, the
statuette of the Madonna. For this Alessandro had built a niche in the
wall, between the head of the bed and the one window. The niche was deep
enough to hold small pots in front of the statuette; and Ramona kept
constantly growing there wild-cucumber plants, which wreathed and
re-wreathed the niche till it looked like a bower. Below it hung her
gold rosary and the ivory Christ; and many a woman of the village, when
she came to see Ramona, asked permission to go into the bedroom and say
her prayers there; so that it finally came to be a sort of shrine for
the whole village.

A broad veranda, as broad as the Senora's, ran across the front of the
little house. This was the only thing for which Ramona had asked. She
could not quite fancy life without a veranda, and linnets in the thatch.
But the linnets had not yet come. In vain Ramona strewed food for them,
and laid little trains of crumbs to lure them inside the posts; they
would not build nests inside. It was not their way in San Pasquale. They
lived in the canons, but this part of the valley was too bare of trees
for them. "In a year or two more, when we have orchards, they will
come," Alessandro said.

With the money from that first sheep-shearing, and from the sale of part
of his cattle, Alessandro had bought all he needed in the way of farming
implements,--a good wagon and harnesses, and a plough. Baba and Benito,
at first restive and indignant, soon made up their minds to work. Ramona
had talked to Baba about it as she would have talked to a brother. In
fact, except for Ramona's help, it would have been a question whether
even Alessandro could have made Baba work in harness. "Good Baba!"
Ramona said, as she slipped piece after piece of the harness over his
neck,--"Good Baba, you must help us; we have so much work to do, and
you are so strong! Good Baba, do you l