house was not only rendered
habitable, but was even made picturesque by clean white curtains at
its barred windows, and some bright, half-Moorish coloring of beams and
rafters. Nearly the whole ground floor was given up to the saloon of
the tienda, which consisted of a small counter at one side, containing
bottles and glasses, and another, flanking it, with glass cases,
containing cigars, pipes, and tobacco, while the centre of the room was
given up to four or five small restaurant tables. The staff of Jovita
was no longer limited to Sanchicha, but had been augmented by a little
old man of indefinite antiquity who resembled an Aztec idol, and an
equally old Mexican, who looked not unlike a brown-tinted and veined
tobacco leaf himself, and might have stood for a sign. But the genius
of the place, its omnipresent and all-pervading goddess, was Jovita!
Smiling, joyous, indefatigable in suavity and attention; all-embracing
in her courtesies; frank of speech and eye; quick at repartee and
deftly handling the slang of the day and the locality with a childlike
appreciation and an infantine accent that seemed to redeem it from
vulgarity or unfeminine boldness! Few could resist the volatile
infection of her presence. A smile was the only tribute she exacted,
and good-humor the rule laid down for her guests. If it occasionally
required some mental agility to respond to her banter, a Californian
gathering was, however, seldom lacking in humor. Yet she was always the
principal performer to an admiring audience. Perhaps there was security
in this multitude of admirers; perhaps there was a saving grace in this
humorous trifling. The passions are apt to be serious and solitary, and
Jovita evaded them with a jest,--which, if not always delicate or witty,
was effective in securing the laughter of the majority and the jealousy
of none.

At the end of the week another peculiarity was noticed. There was a
perceptible increase of the Mexican population, who had always hitherto
avoided Buckeye. On Sunday an Irish priest from El Pasto said mass in a
patched-up corner of the old Mission ruin opposite Rollinson's Ford. A
few lounging "Excelsior" boys were equally astonished to see Jovita's
red rose crest and black mantilla glide by, and followed her unvarying
smile and jesting salutation up to the shadow of the crumbling portal.
At vespers nearly all Buckeye, hitherto virtuously skeptical and
good-humoredly secure in Works without Faith, made a