virile appearance; and many of them,
who a few years before, in their former homes in the East and in the
Old Land, had not known what it meant to dry a dish, cook a meal or
make a dress, who had trembled at the thought of a warm ray of God's
blessed sunshine falling on their tender, sweet-milk complexions
unless it were filtered and diluted through a parasol or a drawn
curtain, now knew, from hard, honest experience, how to cook for their
own household and, in addition, to cater for a dozen ever-hungry ranch
hands and cattlemen:--knew not only how to make a dress but how to
make one over when the necessity called for it; could milk the cows
with the best of their serving-girls; could canter over the ranges,
rope a steer and stare the blazing summer sun straight in the eye,
with a laugh of defiance and real, live happiness.

The feminine hired-help chatted freely with their mistresses in a
comradeship and a kind of free-masonry that only the hard battling
with nature in the West could engender.

Phil was leaning idly against the door-post at the entrance to the
dance-room, contemplating the kaleidoscope, when Jim's voice roused
him.

"Phil,--I see your dear, dear friend, Mayor Brenchfield, is here."

"You've wonderful eyesight!" Phil answered. "Brenchfield is hardly the
one to let anyone miss seeing him. His middle name is publicity, in
capital letters."

"Little chatterbox Jenny Steele tells me he has had three dances out
of the last five with Eileen Pederstone," was the next tantaliser.

"That shows his mighty good taste!"

"You bet it does! But he shows darned poor breeding, unless he's tied
up to her."

"It is up to her, anyway, and maybe they are engaged," returned Phil,
lightly enough.

"I don't doubt that he would like to be. Guess he will be too, sooner
or later. Gee!" he continued in disgust, "I wish some son-of-a-gun
would cut the big, fat, over-confident bluffer out."

"Why don't you have a try, Jim?" laughed his companion.

"Me? I never had a lass in my life. I'm--I'm not a lady's man. They
are all very nice to me, and all that; but I never feel completely
comfortable unless it happens to be a woman who could be my
great-grandmother."

"You're begging the question, Jim. Why don't you go over and claim a
dance or two from Miss Pederstone, seeing you are so anxious over her
and Brenchfield?"

"I would,--bless your wee, palpitating, undiscerning soul, but I don't
dance."

"Go and talk to he