Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1892-12-22

y
can ride witt, me if you want to, but
anything you have to say can just as
well be said here and now, and have it
over"
fancy he must have mentioned to
her the suspicion we all had, and said
something to the effect that ne had
hored she came down to the camp es-
pecially to bid him good-by before she
left; perhaps there had been some
thing between them that justified him
in thinking SO. Whatever he had said
! he had succeeded in making her blaz-
ing mad, and before the cool insolence
of that speech of hers he turned away
heart-broken, saying:
Il guess you don't care for me to
ride with you, and what l had thought
to say had better remain unsald."
She looked after him, as he went to
help the others with the saddling, very
regretfully.
"Aha! Mistress Pussy" I thought.
'.you clawed your mouse little too
hard that time. Anyhow" 1 added,
| virtuously, you know enough about
the poor fellows devotion now, and
you shan't have the satisfaction of re-
I myself rode with her as far as the dry
arroyo, told the party to ride briskly,
as some of US thought there was a
norther coming, and was turning back
when Miss Belle stopped me. Her eyes
were large and frightened.
do you really think there will be a
Storm" she said. II am such baby
about storms Great, grown woman
as 1 am, always break for mamma
and hide my head in her lap when one
comes up at home. and out here on the
prairie 1 know it would scare me to
death"
treasured her, told her that the
squall, if it came at all, would hardly
strike before morning, and rode back
through the focks to the camp.
That was Christmas picture not TO
be forgotten. The sleeping herds.
couched peacefully beneath the white
wonder of a Texas moonlight night;
the sweep and swell of the low, grassy
hills and plain. very like. fancy, to
that country where the shepherds
watched their hocks at night nearly
two Thousand years ago, when the
angel of the Lord awakened them and
sung to their ravished ears the first
Christmas carol.
I found the two boys very low in
their minds. We all had the feeling
prisoner must have when the visitors
go out and leave him alone again with
his four walls. and as we were all dead
beat we prepared silently and expedi-
tiously to turn in.
That was the worst miscalculation l
40, 1,ud 1,.,p nlS,
closed our eyes when it was on us; first
with rafting dash of rain like a dis
charge of musl<etry, then the wet tent
was yanked from above MS by a spite
fun gust and dashed dripping upon the
campfire. and we were in pitchy black
ness, no hint of moon, and in the mid
die of splitting, clawing norther.
Fortunately the temperature fell less
than in any such storm 1 have ever ex-
perienced, and we were not so des-
perateIy cold.
Our first thought, of course-or mine.
anyway-was for the sheep. These
worthless, who are undoubtedly at once
the most idiotic and obstinate of brute
beasts always break for the open
when a storm comes on, there to wan
der about till their long wool becomes
first sodden with moisture and then
frozen to ice, when they lie down COM
fortably and die-and a mans money
with them.
We raced down among them as son
rs we could gather ourselves together
and worked for an hour. more like
devils than men, driving them into the
thickets and lunches of mesquite and
keeping them punched.
BY that time the Storm, which after
all was a small affair. was practically
over, the thunder muttering of south
ward, and the moon looking out glori-
ously now and then.
After awhile missed the Old MAJ.
Though he lacks CORDS inctes, and IL
slighter. he is worth any ten OF him to
turn out work. and. in such an emcr-
gency rs this. round DOZEN Never
complaining. never losing his head nor
his temper. and always right there. i