ere was absolutely no help for
it, nothing could be done; the mare had taken her determined long,
continuous stride, the road was a straight, steady descent all the way
back to the village, Chu Chu had the bit between her teeth, and there
was no prospect of swerving her. We could only follow hopelessly,
idiotically, furiously, until Chu Chu dashed triumphantly into the
Saltellos' courtyard, carrying the half-fainting Consuelo back to the
arms of her assembled and astonished family.

It was our last ride together. It was the last I ever saw of Consuelo
before her transfer to the safe seclusion of a convent in Southern
California. It was the last I ever saw of Chu Chu, who in the confusion
of that rencontre was overlooked in her half-loosed harness, and allowed
to escape though the back gate to the fields. Months afterwards it was
said that she had been identified among a band of wild horses in the
Coast Range, as a strange and beautiful creature who had escaped the
brand of the rodeo and had become a myth. There was another legend that
she had been seen, sleek, fat, and gorgeously caparisoned, issuing from
the gateway of the Rosario patio, before a lumbering Spanish cabriole in
which a short, stout matron was seated--but I will have none of it. For
there are days when she still lives, and I can see her plainly still
climbing the gentle slope towards the summit, with Consuelo on her back,
and myself at her side, pressing eagerly forward towards the illimitable
prospect that opens in the distance.

MY FIRST BOOK.

When I say that my "First Book" was NOT my own, and contained beyond the
title-page not one word of my own composition, I trust that I will not
be accused of trifling with paradox, or tardily unbosoming myself of
youthful plagiary. But the fact remains that in priority of publication
the first book for which I became responsible, and which probably
provoked more criticism than anything I have written since, was a small
compilation of Californian poems indited by other hands.

A well-known bookseller of San Francisco one day handed me a collection
of certain poems which had already appeared in Pacific Coast magazines
and newspapers, with the request that I should, if possible, secure
further additions to them, and then make a selection of those which I
considered the most notable and characteristic, for a single volume to
be issued by him. I have reason to believe that this unfortunate man was
actutate