lowing business-like epistle to the queen thereof:

Mrs. Yeager--The Nopalito Ranch:

Dear Madam:

I am instructed by the owners of the Rancho Seco to purchase 100
head of two and three-year-old cows of the Sussex breed owned by
you. If you can fill the order please deliver the cattle to the
bearer; and a check will be forwarded to you at once.

Respectfully,

Webster Yeager,
Manager the Rancho Seco.

Business is business, even--very scantily did it escape being written
"especially"--in a kingdom.

That night the 100 head of cattle were driven up from the pasture and
penned in a corral near the ranch-house for delivery in the morning.

When night closed down and the house was still, did Santa Yeager throw
herself down, clasping that formal note to her bosom, weeping, and
calling out a name that pride (either in one or the other) had kept
from her lips many a day? Or did she file the letter, in her business
way, retaining her royal balance and strength?

Wonder, if you will; but royalty is sacred; and there is a veil. But
this much you shall learn:

At midnight Santa slipped softly out of the ranch-house, clothed in
something dark and plain. She paused for a moment under the live-oak
trees. The prairies were somewhat dim, and the moonlight was pale
orange, diluted with particles of an impalpable, flying mist. But
the mock-bird whistled on every bough of vantage; leagues of flowers
scented the air; and a kindergarten of little shadowy rabbits leaped
and played in an open space near by. Santa turned her face to the
southeast and threw three kisses thitherward; for there was none to
see.

Then she sped silently to the blacksmith-shop, fifty yards away; and
what she did there can only be surmised. But the forge glowed red; and
there was a faint hammering such as Cupid might make when he sharpens
his arrow-points.

Later she came forth with a queer-shaped, handled thing in one hand,
and a portable furnace, such as are seen in branding-camps, in the
other. To the corral where the Sussex cattle were penned she sped with
these things swiftly in the moonlight.

She opened the gate and slipped inside the corral. The Sussex cattle
were mostly a dark red. But among this bunch was one that was milky
white--notable among the others.

And now Santa shook from her shoulder something that we had not seen
before--a rope lasso. She freed the loop of it, coiling the length in
her left hand, a