Chapter 9 No.9

G'lang there, yeoo-oo-oo, Rip. Yeoo-oo-oo, Squat. Yeoo-oo-oo -- -- -- Buff.

Bang.

As it is difficult to make a noise in print, it might be well to explain that, of the above words, the last is supposed to sound like a revolver-shot. It is as near as we can come to the disturbance made by a Texas "prairie buster" as he came down Claxton road.

Ahead of him were ten oxen-five yoke. His far-reaching bull-whip exploded just beside Rip's left ear. The next shot took Squat exactly as aimed. There was a momentary scuffling of hoofs, an awful threat in the ox-driving language; then everything went on peacefully as before. The ox-driver caught the returning cracker deftly in two fingers of his right hand and settled down on his iron seat with his elbow on his knee while he took a chew of tobacco. The big tongue of his "busting" plow knocked in the ring of the wheelers' yoke; the chain clanked idly against it; a little cloud of debris-hair and dust which the cracker had bit out of the tuft between Squat's horns-floated away on the breeze.

All this was not done with any expectation of making them go faster. For an ox to alter his gait, except slightly to run away, would be unnatural. It was merely to convey to certain ones that they were not out to enjoy the roadside grass. And to remind the string in general that the seat of authority was still being occupied.

For several days his voracious plowshare had been turning over the prairie in long ribbons of swath like the pages of a book. Texas in those days was turning over a new leaf; and such outfits as this did the turning. His last job had been to put an addition on a farm for an Ohio man about six miles out of town; he had turned forty more acres of tough prairie sod black side upwards and left behind him a dry dusky square in the horizon-girt green of the range. Being now homeward bound, he bent his sharp gray eyes upon the road ahead. The Claxton Road community, a moneyed streak in the population, was only half a mile away.

In the distance appeared a black man riding a broncho mule. It was Colonel Chase's man, Uncle Israel; he was coming along at an unsatisfactory pace, using his quirt regularly and remonstrating with the mule. As he drew near the head of the ox procession, the driver roared out a Wo-o-o-o in a tone which was intended to be understood as a general command; the powerful wheelers held back obediently and drew the chain tight in their efforts to stop; the rest of the string, after pulling them a short distance, also obeyed.

"Hello, Uncle."

"Good-mawnin', Mistah Hicks."

"How's things doing down home? Anything new?"

"Well-no, sah. Ev'ything jes' 'bout de same."

"Is the Colonel home?"

"No, sah. He's done gone to San Antone."

"Has he shipped yet?"

"Yes, sah."

"Who went up to Chicago with them?"

"Mistah Sattlee an' John Dick an' some mo'."

"Is Steve Brown at home?"

"No, sah. He 's gone somewha's. An' he ain' come back. Mos' all de men folks is gone away."

"Has Miss Alice got back yet?"

"No, sah. She's off to de school-house in Boston yet. An' it ain't leff out. She 's gwine be back dis spring."

"What's cattle bringing now?"

"Dunno, sah. I heah dey 's done riz."

"Has little Johnnie Martin got his curls cut yet?"

"No, sah. Ah seed 'em on him."

"What's doing in town? Anything new there?"

"No, sah. Jes' 'bout de same as usual."

Uncle Israel, feeling that his information had not been very abundant, scratched his head and stirred his mind up thoroughly for news. He met the demand with two pieces of information.

"De railroad's done built a new loadin'-pen. An' dat high-tone bull took sick wif acclimatin'. But we 's got him restin' easy now."

"The railroad's getting real extravagant, ain't it?" commented Jonas, turning his attention to the oxen again.

Having said a few words appropriate to the occasion of starting up, he flung out his bullwhip in a flourish of aerial penmanship and drove home the aforesaid remarks with a startling report. Again the bovine procession got under way.

In the course of time he came to where Claxton road ends and Claxton Road begins. It will be recalled that Claxton road, hemmed in by barb wire, leads interminably past vacant stretches of prairie with occasionally a farm and farmhouse. Nearing town its scene and atmosphere suddenly change. On the left are the ranchmen's home estates, with the stables and windmills and short avenues of china-berry trees leading up to comfortable porches; to the right, or facing these, is a large square of green with no roadside houses and no longer any confining fence. To any one who had come a long distance between the barb wires, this emergence upon the free, open common was very much as if he had been following a stream which, after long confinement to its course, opens out suddenly into a lake. This piece of land was not different from the prairie it had always been, except that the houses which faced it on all sides, as if it were a lake of the summer-resort variety, gave it an importance which was not its own. It was no more nor less than a square of primeval prairie whose owner, being satisfied with it, let it be as it was. Surrounded on all sides by real estate and other improvements, it held its own as immovably as if Texas had here taken her last stand, in hollow square, against the encroachments of civilization. It belonged to Jonas Hicks. In the exact middle of it was the paintless frame house which we have already mentioned.

This structure is easily described. It consisted of a house with one room downstairs and one room upstairs. Its boarding was of the kind that runs up and down with battening strips at the cracks. Any one familiar with prairie architecture would see at once that the owner, having a house to build, had gone straightway to work and erected a herder's shack on a residential scale and put some windows in it. Because of its porchlessness it seemed rather tall, as if it had grown after it was built or had stretched itself up to get a better view; and the single window in the end of the upper story gave it a watchful appearance. This watchful window, which might be said to mark its front, looked toward the residences along Williston Road.

The cottages which faced this place on the side toward town were confined to "lots" along an unpaved street. Across on Claxton Road town lots grew to the size of country estates and looked more commanding. But the shack house, with its twenty acres of elbow room, rather commanded them all, especially as its central position marked the common as its own grounds. Being tall and upright and spare, like a Texan, it had an attitude toward them like that of a pioneer drill-master; it seemed to be standing out on the drill-grounds with the other houses all marshaled up before it and toeing the social line.

The place was given shape and form entirely by the other property, all of which was fenced on its own side of the highway, the owner of the twenty acres never having shut it off from the roads which passed along two sides of it. This hospitable openness was a fortunate thing for the traveling public, affording as it did a short cut to town. Quite a little of the traffic that came down Williston Road turned out and followed the trail which led diagonally across it past the door of the house. And usually the traveler, whether horseman or driver, would speak in passing; or, more likely, stop to have a talk with Jonas Hicks, who, if he were at home, might be engaged in plaiting a whip or mixing batter for pancakes or taking a stitch in his clothes, the iron seat of a "prairie-busting" plow being particularly hard on the seat of a man's trousers. It was to this place that the plowman was bending his homeward way.

Eventually, as oxen always do, they arrived. Having navigated them up to the kitchen door and brought them to a stop with a stentorian Wo, he unhooked the wheelers, dropped the chain from each yoke, and turned them loose to graze or lie down as each pair might decide; then he went around the corner of the house and set to work making a fire in the stove. It was an outdoor stove of the locomotive variety, having two large iron wheels upon which it had traveled thousands of miles in the service of the J. W. Cattle Company. Mr. Hicks had fastened its tongue or handle to a staple in the chimney of the house, for which chimney it had no use, having a smoke-stack of its own.

When the stove was belching forth smoke he turned his attention to the inside of the house. Presently he came out with a pan of flour and various kitchen utensils which he placed on a bench beside the door; then he drew a bucket of water and proceeded to mix pancake batter. He had not accomplished much when he was interrupted. Just when the batter was mixed to the right consistency, and the first spoonful was ready to go on, a little girl appeared. She had a pie which she bore before her with a look of great responsibility.

"Ma says maybe you would like to have a pie."

"Why, how do, Susie. How 's Susie getting along these days?"

"Real well," replied Susan, holding the pie up higher.

Mr. Hicks bent his tall Texas form in the middle and took it from her. The pie had the outlines of a star in its centre by way of a vent-hole; the edges were nicely crimped.

"It's a mighty good-looking pie. What does that stand for, Susie?" he asked, holding the pie up so that she could view its face and placing his finger upon its centre.

"That stands for Texas," answered Susan promptly.

Mr. Hicks put the pie on the bench and sat down beside it with his elbows on his knees.

Something like a smile betrayed itself in the lean muscles of his jaw and showed somehow around his large aggressive chin.

"How does it come that you did n't go to school to-day, Susie?" He pointed to the white frame school-house which occupied a corner of his place.

"'Cause," answered Susan, by way of complete explanation.

"That's a mighty good reason. If I had an excuse like that I would n't go to school myself. How's your ma? Is she well?"

"Yes, sir. Only she had a kinda headache this morning, and I wiped the dishes."

"You did? How did you know so quick that I was back? Were you watching for me so that you could bring over the pie?"

"Oh!" exclaimed Susan, "we heard you coming. We could hear you saying bad words when you was 'way up the road."

A change suddenly came over the spirit of Mr. Hicks's physiognomy. He sat stroking his wide-spreading moustache. Jonas Hicks had a self-made moustache which seemed to have borrowed its style from the horns of a Texas steer. It might be said that, for the moment, he looked serious; but you could never tell from his face exactly what his emotions were. It was against his principles to be caught laughing, and yet his solemnity was somewhat radiant despite him.

Suddenly he rose and went into the house. In a little while he reappeared carrying a milk-pan filled with comb-honey. It was white honey which the bees had deposited in his useless chimney; the sirup filled the pan almost to its edge, while the middle was piled high with oozing chunks of comb. He placed it on the bench beside him. The eyes of Susan opened wide as she saw this sight. He talked about one thing and another and asked her many inconsequential questions. After much tantalizing talk on Mr. Hicks's part, she learned that the honey was for her and that she was to take it all home with her.

Susan was for starting home at once.

"What' s your hurry, Susie? Won't you stay a while and have a piece of pie?"

"I 'd rather I 'd have a pancake," said Susan, looking furtively at the smoking griddle.

He rose at once and put on a large spoonful of batter. When the cake was ready to turn, he caused it to turn a somersault with a quick toss of the griddle; then he spread it evenly with honey and rolled it into the form of a cylinder with the honey inside.

"There, now, Susie. That's what I call a joof-lickum tamale. It's pancake de la verandah. Watch out that you don't burn your fingers."

He set the griddle temporarily aside and sat down again. While Susan ate, she leaned across his tall knee and looked up at him admiringly.

"I like your pancakes," she volunteered. "Your pancakes has got fringe on them."

Mr. Hicks's countenance took on more of an expression around the eyes; he regarded her with deep interest.

"All the boys at school like your pancakes, too," she continued. "They are coming over some other recess when you are home, and you can make them all a pancake again. Will you put honey on their pancakes?"

"For boys!" exclaimed Susan's heroine in great surprise. "No honey for boys. Honey is only for girls."

"And mas too," added Susan. "Ain't honey for mas too?"

"Does n't your ma make them with fringe on?" inquired Jonas, in hope of making a new start.

Susan vouchsafed no reply. The subject stood in abeyance while she feasted and took thought. Presently her attention rested upon the griddle. On it there was a diminutive pancake which had made itself from the drippings of an overgenerous spoonful.

"I like little pancakes too," she hinted.

Jonas took it off and presented it to her.

"There, Susie. When you go home you can give that to your dollie."

Susan's eyes seemed to expand as she turned them up to Mr. Hicks, the source of supernal illumination. If the pancake had seemed desirable, this wonderful idea was ten times as much of a present. Her bliss grew visibly deeper as she looked first at the pancake and then at the resourceful Mr. Hicks. She was so completely won that she consented to sit on his knee. There she resumed her tamale in the intervals of conversation.

"Mr. Hicks. How did the bees come to go down your chimbly?"

"'Cause," replied Mr. Hicks.

"Oh, Mister Hicks-tell me why the bees went down your chimbly. I want to know why."

"I guess they thought it was an old hollow tree."

"Do you think maybe they would think our chimbly was an old hollow tree? Oh, I wish they would come down our chimbly."

"Oh, they would n't come down your chimney. That would n't do at all."

"Why would n't they, Mr. Hicks?"

"'Cause," answered Jonas, still pretending to be taciturn and mysterious.

"Oh, Mister Hicks. Please don't talk that way. Tell me why."

"Because," explained Mr. Hicks, "bees would know better than that. If they came and stopped your chimney all up with honey, how would Santa Claus ever get down? Who gave you the dolly?"

"Santa Claus."

"Well, don't you see if the chimney was all full of honey he would get it all over his clothes? And all over her clothes? And besides, he would get his whiskers all chock-full of honey. How would you like to have your curls all full of molasses?"

As he made this remark he lifted a curl and contemplated it, the truth being that he was not nearly so much interested in the honey as in her hair. He made these remarks simply by way of sticking to the subject. Susan, conscious of her curls, gave her head a toss which sent them flying about her face, one side and then the other; then she took another bite and returned to her speculations.

"Did the bees know that you haven't got any little girl?"

Mr. Hicks was inclined to sanction the idea that the bees had this view of the uselessness of his chimney. The subject of his girllessness leading on to another case of "why," he fell back promptly upon the hollow tree theory pure and simple; the which he took pains to establish by stories of trees filled with honey and of terrible big bears that lived in the trees and ate the honey. He was going on to consider the advantages of living in a hollow tree-with a good strong door to it-when a new game offered itself.

Leaning forward and turning his head to see how the stove was doing, the end of his long moustache stroked Susan under the chin and drew a fine trail of titillation across her throat. To the surprise of the owner of the "whiskers," she clapped her chin to her shoulder and shrank from the excruciating touch. Before long Mr. Hicks had occasion to turn his head to the other side. This time it tickled even more and Susan had to giggle. After that a surprising number of things, of all imaginable sorts, demanded his attention on one side or the other, and every time the moustache acted in the same manner, much to the surprise of the innocent Mr. Hicks. As soon as that beard developed its full powers of tickling, it took effect wherever it touched, and Susan had to protect herself by grabbing the moustache and pushing Mr. Hicks's face, which face seemed able to stand any amount of rough usage. When finally his every move produced such paroxysms of laughter that she could stand it no longer, Susan squirmed out of his arms. Then, with sudden seriousness, she picked up the doll's pancake which had fallen from her hand. Their visit thus brought to an end, Jonas did not try to renew it; he was growing hungry. He gave her the pan of honey and placed her hands so that she would hold it level.

"There, now, Susan. Be careful that you don't fall down and get any of it in your mouth."

Susan, who was nobody's fool, knew that Mr. Hicks sometimes made remarks which were purposely foolish. This one engaged her mind for a moment as if she hoped to make head and tail of it, but as it seemed to be unanswerable she gave him an amused look and started for home.

As Susan neared her front gate another visitor was approaching-this time from the direction of Claxton Road. It was Mrs. Norton; she had in mind to get the rockery returned. Jonas, watching Susan to see whether she got home with the honey unspilt, was oblivious to the half of the world that was behind his back; but when he turned about and took up the dish of batter, intending to pour out a griddleful of pancakes, he saw her coming. Immediately he seized the pie and hurried it into the house. By the time he came out she had arrived.

"Good-morning, Mrs. Norton."

"Good-morning, Mr. Hicks. Have you got all through with your work?"

"All except sewing on a few buttons. Ploughing is all done for the present, I guess."

"Mr. Hicks, we have been wondering whether you could do us a little favor. The ladies of the Chautauqua Circle have been studying geology,-the earth, you know,-and we needed some stones for specimens-samples. And of course stones are not very plentiful around here-"

"Why don't you go and take some out of Steve Brown's rockery? Help yourself, as God says."

"Why, that's just what we did do. We were passing there, and we each took one-without particularly thinking. They are lying behind Colonel Chase's big gate. We got them up there, but found they were rather heavy. Could we get you to haul them back for us?"

"I bet you could, Mrs. Norton. The next time I pass there with the wagon I 'll put them on. I don't suppose those stones are in any particular hurry, are they?"

"Well," said Mrs. Norton, taking thought, "I have been thinking that perhaps it would be just as well to get them back before he comes home. He is out at the Thompson ranch tending to those sheep again, you know."

"Did you hear whether any one went with him?"

"Well, no-er-yes. That is, I don't really know whether there is or not. I heard there was somebody out there."

Her answer, or the manner of it, struck Jonas as peculiar.

"Extra herder or two?" he suggested.

"One of the boys who was out at the ranch told somebody in town that there was somebody out there. The regular herder was up at the county-seat and had n't got back."

Mrs. Norton, now that she had boggled, by surprise, into the acknowledgment that she knew anything whatever about the matter, felt herself in a problematical position. She did not know whether his question had been accidental or not; it sounded as if he knew; possibly he had put it as a feeler to discover whether she knew. In which case the subject became rather difficult; she did not know whether to dissemble, nor how much to dissemble, nor how to do it.

Jonas, his curiosity aroused, persevered with more inquiries. Mrs. Norton, after answering with a few vague references to Tuck Reedy's report, suddenly made a bald evasion of the subject; she went back without ceremony to the subject of rocks. Jonas had a new feeling that there was something peculiar about the matter.

"And so I was thinking," continued Mrs. Norton, "that we had better return them pretty soon. It was really an improper thing for us to do-though we did not particularly think of it at the time. If he came home and found the rockery gone he might not like it."

"Steve is rather peculiar, some ways," remarked Jonas.

"Is he? In what way?"

This remark of his had seemed to bear upon the hidden subject. She had hope of receiving moral enlightenment from the masculine standpoint.

"Mostly about rocks. Did you ever hear about the time I hauled that tombstone for him?"

"I knew you did, of course. What did he do?"

"Well, he did n't do anything much. He expected me to drive oxen without using any strong language. Just took a sudden notion he did n't want it. I had got that stone loaded onto a strong truck that I had rigged up apurpose; then I started up and got the cattle headed up Main Street in fine shape. Steve was coming along on the sidewalk. All of a sudden he stepped out into the road and spoke to me. He said he did n't like the sound of it and he wished I 'd leave out the swearing. He said it rather cool and solemn, like Pastor Gates does when he says to omit the second stanza. For a minute I did n't know what to think. I was doing a plain job of ox-driving and I told him so. 'That's all right; I understand that,' he says. 'But you don't expect to go cussing into that cemetery, do you?' 'Well-no,' I says. 'Not since you mention it.' For a minute he had me where I could n't go ahead nor back up. A man has got to use language to oxen, and what is he going to say? I am so used to it that I don't even hear myself, unless I stop to listen; and so it does n't mean any more than the oxen understand by it. And that is n't much. 'No,' I says, 'not since you mention it.' 'Well, then,' he says, 'you might as well quit now. Afterwards you can drive them any way you please and say anything you want. But it does n't sound right to me now, and I don't want any swearing on this job.' He said it in such a way that I could see just about how he felt about it. I saw that any more of it would n't do. I guess I ought to 'a' thought of it myself."

"And did you succeed in doing as he wished?" asked Mrs. Norton.

"Well, I managed to get them there somehow-considering I hadn't had any time to practice. It made me wonder, though, what a deaf and dumb man would think if he got a job driving oxen."

"And that is what you mean by his being peculiar?"

"That's sort of it. But maybe that one does n't quite cover the point. What I mean is that he 's got all sorts of notions of what's right and wrong; and he tells it to you all of a sudden. He 's quicker 'n pig-tail lightning."

"Do you suppose he might think it wrong for us to meddle with his property?"

"Oh, no. He is n't that way. You know how he is about such things. And besides he would n't be likely to say anything. I only mentioned that tombstone business because his mother set so much store by the rockery. He looks at that as a sort of a monument."

A look of deep seriousness came over Mrs. Norton's countenance. It deepened as she thought.

"Of course, Mr. Hicks, we intended to tell him about it-and thank him for the use of the stones. But possibly it would be more considerate not to say anything about it."

"Not tell him at all," repeated Jonas reflectively.

"But I suppose that no matter how we put them back he would notice that it had been changed."

"Yes. I guess he knows it by heart. He had those blue-flower vines started on it."

"It was really very thoughtless of us," mused Mrs. Norton.

"Oh, well; it is n't anything serious," remarked Jonas. "If he seems serious about it you can blame me. Tell him I told you to. I 'm really part owner anyway; I discovered a lot of those stones and put them there. He 'll understand how it was. And if he says anything to me I 'll tell him I did n't think. If you want me to I 'll make it all right when I go out there this afternoon."

"Are you going out there?" she asked, looking up with sudden interest.

"I 've been thinking I would. I want to drop out those three middle yoke and let them run on grass a while. While I 'm out there, I guess I 'll make Steve a call and stop overnight. It 'll be late when I get there."

"Oh!"

She saw a very lively and interesting picture of Mr. Hicks's arrival at the shack. He would not be a very welcome visitor, she thought. Having the misconceptions she did of affairs at the ranch, she saw all sorts of possibilities; she said nothing, however, which would keep this interesting three-cornered meeting from taking place. She turned the conversation at once into other channels. Having answered his inquiries regarding neighborhood affairs, and having been finally assured that he would return the rockery and make everything "all right," she took her leave.

Jonas had had no very definite intention of undertaking the journey at once; but now that his mind was turned in that direction, he saw that to-day was as good as to-morrow, or even the day after; he fired up the stove and again took the batter in hand. This time the pancakes went ahead without interruption. When he had stacked up the requisite number, and eaten them with honey and bacon, he hooked the wheelers to the wagon, and then added the rest of the cattle, yoke after yoke. The plough was to remain where it was. Ensconced upon the more altitudinous seat of authority he swung his lash out with a report like a starting-gun and made his way, with the necessary language, across the open and up Claxton Road.

Jonas's trip to the ranch took longer than it takes to tell it. But there is not, in truth, anything about the trip itself to tell-and yet there ought to be some way of describing time. Under the circumstances, and especially as oxen cannot be hurried, it might be well to pass the time by talking about Jonas Hicks's past; it will be better than to take up the scenery again. In those parts the scenery, if the weather remains settled, is rather uneventful; it is the same when you arrive as when you started. On a prairie the human mind carries its own scenery.

Jonas Hicks's past had been somewhat variegated and thus all of a piece. Some years before the present moment, when the railroad was younger and the "garden spot of the world" was just beginning to attract attention to its future, Jonas carelessly acquired a patch of forty acres near the new town of Thornton. At that time he was still "on the drive," a vocation which took him with the big herds anywhere from Texas to Fort Benton in Montana. In the calling of cowboy he had, by a process of natural selection, risen and gradually settled into the character of cook. Risen, we say, because, in a cattle outfit, there is not a more important and unquestioned personage; his word is law and they call him pet names. However, from the day he got down out of the saddle, in an emergency, and consented to act in the capacity of "Ma,"-which was a joke,-he was in continual demand as cook, with increasing popularity. Though he still claimed the ability to ride and rope and hog-tie with the best of them, he was thenceforth a cook with all the cook's perquisites and autocratic say-so. There is nowhere, we might observe, so deep an indication of the true power of Woman as this respect that is paid to her position, even when it is being occupied by a red-faced being who wears whiskers and who has no real right, of his own, to be anything more than an equal of his brother man. But the cook's laws must not be disobeyed; they allow him to make laws because he is cook; masculine sentiment is on his side; human welfare demands it. As Jonas was popular in the position, and did not mind the work when it was appreciated, he continued to fry bacon and fringy flapjacks and, in general, to furnish "the grease of life," as he called it, to the outfit. And while he was doing it his fellows conducted the beef, on ten thousand legs, from the South to the North. They took them North so that they would put on fat under the stimulus of a Northern winter.

In those days he engineered the peculiar cookstove which we have already noticed. It was a big, square, sheet-iron stove with an iron axle and wheels like those of a sulky plow. This piece of machinery was hooked on behind the chuckwagon, which it followed from clime to clime. Jonas, being a live man and a "hustler," seldom waited for the outfit to reach the camping-place and come to a halt before starting to get a meal. As he explained, he had to get about a two-mile start on their appetites, with pancakes; and so, while the stove was yet far off from its destination, he would fire up and get things going. Then he would trot along behind and cook. While "she" (the stove) lurched into buffalo wallows and rode the swells and unrolled the smoke other stack far out across the billowy prairie, Jonas would hurry along behind and keep house. Entirely occupied with his kitchen duties he would move busily here and there or remain steadily behind or beside the stove while it pursued its onward way, and with the bucket of batter in his hand and the griddle smoking and sizzling, he would seldom miss a flap. From the standpoint of a weary cowboy it was a beautiful sight. It is, indeed, a pleasant thing, when you are tired and hungry, to see your supper thus coming along as conqueror over space and time.

No one but a man like Jonas, who had the combined talents of a sea-cook and a cowboy, could have managed it. To make coffee under such circumstances took considerable ability, of course. And even the flapjacks, which stayed on the stove better, might seem difficult. Jonas, however, was a man of quick hand and eye; things seldom got the drop on him, and he handled the pancakes with a revolver wrist. As the foreman said, he was "a first-class culinary engineer." In doing this, his longtime experience on bucking bronchos stood him in good stead; then, too, his practice was confined almost entirely to pancakes and coffee, for they were but few and simple dishes that he knew by heart. But even with this special expertness it took a quick man and a philosopher, especially when the stove cut a caper and the footing was uneven. As Jonas once remarked when he stepped amiss on his high boot-heel and spilled all the batter into a buffalo wallow, "This is certainly a corrugated country." He was not always and necessarily a profane man, whatever one might think who heard him driving oxen. In times of real trouble he expressed himself coolly and then stuck to the facts.

For a long time Jonas thought little of the small patch of prairie which belonged to him; he only began to take it seriously when he sold twenty acres-a deal which was consummated through the agency of Stephen Brown, senior, who paid the taxes in his absence and thus knew, generally, where Jonas was. Coming back a year or two later he was surprised to see how that place had built up; and when, after repeated visits, he had made himself known to all the neighbors and discovered what nice people they were,-it was a new sensation for Jonas to have neighbors,-he got it more and more into his head that they were his neighbors, and that he belonged there. He decided to settle down in those parts. Things in general seemed to be shifting into a new mode of life and impelling him to go along. In the early eighties, central Texas was becoming tightly fenced; the barb wire was spreading out generally; railroads were hauling herds where formerly they went afoot; shorthorn bulls were changing the face of nature; it was plain to be seen that before a great while the long drives would be a thing of the past. While there was still use for the cowboy, there was less call for Jonas's peculiar abilities.

Having land which seemed to call for a house, he built one on it; but at first he did not occupy it himself. During his absences it was occupied by "white" families of the sort that move often by wagon and work cotton on shares; meantime his fancy was playing about the place and taking root. Coming back in the fall the house was vacant. As Jonas was himself an excellent wife and a kind husband, he moved in. Having in mind to stop a while, he of course stopped at his own house.

The problem of living on one spot solved itself in the most natural manner. Instead of driving cattle in the old way, he conquered a few and drove them from the seat of a plow. Thus while everything was going forward, he mounted the wheel of Progress and put his hand to the throttle; and now every time he got back from one of his occasional absences a new farm had been opened up forever and ever. But it must not be thought that he had himself become an agriculturist. He had not even dreamed of it. There is not necessarily any more relation between a "prairie buster" and the land he "busts" than there is between a farmer and a locomotive engineer; the spirit of it is different. Jonas bossed cattle.

If there would seem to be anything of incongruity or humorous contrast between Jonas and his married neighbors, it must be remembered that, under the circumstances of a growing country, there was not. In a land where many men live alone in shacks and do their own work, and where any woman's husband must be able to go forth with a frying-pan and shift for himself at times, it was no marvel to see Jonas Hicks doing the same; though, to be sure, he was doing it a little nearer town than is customary, and this proximity made his single-blessedness shine out a little plainer. But if there was any humor in that, or in fact anything else, it was Jonas's prerogative to see it first and to stretch the joke as far as it would go. Then, too, he lived there only at intervals-which were getting to cover the greater part of the time-in the style of a man who camps out. And after a few days' absence in "busting," he would suddenly reappear and turn loose his oxen and start up housekeeping with all the new pleasure of a man who is glad to get back among the folks again.

From all of which it will be seen that Jonas's house needed to make no apology for its presence; he had owned land there among the first; it was the others who were the innovators and the newcomers; and as to his way of housekeeping it simply clung a little closer to nature. It was, in fact, the most natural thing in the neighborhood.

As he continued to live there he liked it more and more. He was glad that things turned out just as they did. His very location in "the middle of the puddle," as Steve Brown put it, made it look, to him, as if all these beautiful women and interesting little children had gathered round to ornament his position in life; and there is a great deal in looks. He felt also, having owned some of the land upon which the townspeople were settled, that he was in some manner responsible for it all; and so he had a corresponding pride in the community at large and was personally interested in everybody's welfare.

His own property he could have sold or cultivated; but he was well enough satisfied with things as they were. He could have put up a sign, "keep off the grass"; he could have built a fence or forbidden any one to use his place as a short cut to town; he could have done anything that goes with private ownership; but with him ownership was not necessarily private. To a man with such large Texas views and lifelong experience of "free grass," such carefulness of a mere twenty acres would seem rather small, especially small as directed against such neighbors. He was pleased to be numbered among them, and he acted accordingly. If the minister's wife needed temporary pasturage for her real shorthorn cow, just arrived from the North, he invited her to use his place permanently; he rather liked to see cows around. If an incoming herd of cattle wished to halt there they were welcome; it reminded him of old times. If the whole surrounding country went "cross-lots" over his land, there was no objection; what difference did it make? And besides, it was the farmers and ranchmen who gave him employment.

He would not sell any land, though. Right here was where he exercised his private right. He liked things well enough as they were. But when the proposition came up to purchase a small site for a school-house, he presented them with a small piece off the corner, only asking that they refrain from putting a fence around it. As this restriction was no drawback to the community, they readily acceded to it; consequently the children played ball or did whatever they pleased all over the place, much to his entertainment. At recess the youngsters spent much of their time around him, if he were at home, and though this interfered considerably with his housework he did not mind the delay.

However difficult it might be to name his particular function in the social organism, he had certainly made a place for himself; and it was wonderful, as time went on, how large that place grew to be. Any woman, when her husband is away from home, is likely to face situations which make sudden call for a Man. In a neighborhood where husbands and hired men were frequently away at the ranch, this state of affairs was always breaking out somewhere, and Jonas, occupying his prominent position as next door neighbor to everybody, and being naturally adapted to act in that capacity, was always the Man. His very geographical situation was sufficient to turn the mind towards him, but the particular reason for that heliotropism on the part of his feminine neighbors was that he was an easy man for a woman to ask. Being asked, he always served her in a spirit of masculine banter and then went away as if he had enjoyed the joke. Thus she could be grateful for his neighborly turn without feeling herself under any painful state of obligation. Naturally his custom grew. One moment he would be mending a yoke or plaiting a lash, the next moment he would be clapping himself on a broncho to outdodge an escaped bull, or dashing up the road to put out a prairie fire before it reached the stable; he could lift a stove or drive a nail or spade up a little place for flower seed; he could do any one of these things in about a minute and then have time to sit down and have a good neighborly visit. Possibly his familiarity with cookstove affairs had brought him nearer to woman's point of view. He looked like a Texas Ranger, and was just as generally useful, but in a more domestic way. And yet he had been good with a six-shooter. So times change; and men with them.

Altogether, he might be best described simply as Jonas Hicks; his position being one that he naturally fell into. And he filled the position of Jonas Hicks the same as if he were a policeman or a priest or a fire department. In time of trouble it was only necessary for a woman to ask. Indeed, his trade with woman grew to such proportions that he had been obliged, on more than one occasion, to cancel an engagement with a man in order that he might do something for his wife. And he stated the case in just about that way.

Chivalry is not entirely a thing of the past. It is a virtue which grows wild in Texas. When it is domesticated with the ox, and pursues the even tenor of everyday life, it is a most useful institution.

With all this talk of ours, it is doubtful if we have brought the oxen a mile on their way. At this point we shall go on ahead.

It will be easy enough to reach the next chapter before he does.