Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1897-10-09

had wandered there and asked for work.
He had proposed to hire one of them,
but the boys protested that they had
never been separated, and that if they
got jobs at different ranches "the other
one wouldn't know where the other
one was, a contingency which they
could not abide. So Whalen offered to
take the two at the price of one, and on
that basis they shared with him the
shack, herded the flock and cooked the
grub. They soon knew as much or as
little about sheep as Brick himself,
and the proprietor found opportunity
to break the monotony of camp life by
occasional trips to the railroad and
once to San Francisco
"I'm going to see my friend Mar
tim" he told the boys. "Now, tend to
business and don't let any get away. !"
And the boys gave their word that not
one should escape.
During Whalens absence in the city
he went out Of the sheep business even
more abruptly than he went into it the
previous autumn. The instruction to the
boys was fulfilled to the letter. Not any
got away.
1t happened on a hot day in June
when, contrary to the usual custom, the
boys brought the flock to camp and the
shade Of sheds at noontime. 1t never
rains in that arid region, but sometimes
pours. This was one Of those times.
Charged with ice and water, a great
black cloud came drifting down the
wind and emptied out its load upon the
camp and the hillside above it. The
canal, curving around its base, formed
an cave trough for the whole mountain
and poured several thousand inches of
water into Whalen's improvised sheep
sheds. The food very soon subsidized,
but when the cloud had passed and the
sun again shone forth there were no
living sheep. Not many minutes are
required to drown rat in hole
Meanwhile the boys, greatly fright
ened by the sudden storm and with no
thought for the safety of the flock, were
in the shack. The hail pounded and the
wind shook it. Water covered the floor.
PRAY, Billy" said the one on the
barrel.
"No; you do it," he answered from
the table top.
The shack had no window, and with
the door closed it was pretty dark in
there. When Whalen reached home two
hours later, the floor was still wet and
the boys were yet roosting Oh table and
barrel, but outside, in the bright sun
light, the ground appeared already al
most dry. A solitary goat stood upon
the shed roof He had been among the
sheep in the pen.
"You can't keep good man down
any more than you can goat, was
Bricks comment on the catastrophe.
While Whalen was working the boys
double time at pulling the wool from
the dead sheep he had the happy
thought of stocking his ranch with
bees. Having money enough from the
proceeds of his wool sale to buy 10C
stands, he promptly carried the thought
into effect.
Again he sat down in the door of his
shack to double his money"
"This is better than sheep" said he,
"for they herds themselves. And they
are like mules in one thing-you are
liable to get hurt if you fool with 'em. u
This wave Of prosperity broke up as
soon as former ones had done, for he
had imported bad case of foul brood,
and within year the hundred swarms
had petered out When we went down
there last summer in the interest of a
new company which has taken up the
work of completing the canal, Whalen
gathered the bones out of the old shed
in the cut and hauled them to the rail
road, where he sold them for fertilizer,
realizing enough to buy two more mules.
With his four mule team he is at work
in the ditch for day IS wages. Somewhat
grizzled now, and not so brick red Of
hair and whisker as formerly, he is
happy as ever and sanguine that he will
double his money.
"Here's hoping" that he may.--G.
B. Durham in San Francisco Argonaut.
Barristers' Fees.