The Idaho Republican. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1904-1932, 1916-08-11

TO be picked up and gOtten out OF the
way. Some took land where there
was so much grass and brush that
on a hot day inAugust they can set
it afire and see 1t clear off the sage
for miles. Such instances have given
rise to certain localities being given
such quaint names as "Tilden Burn"
and "Delzer Burn" Why shouldn't
a Scott want to locate on it If that
was as near as he could get to Bobby
Burn!
Battle in Human Hearts
The world stands aghast at a
battle that has been prolonged in one
place to upwards of five months, and
we'll it may. But some long hard
battles are being fought in human
hearts in the desert. In a home
steader's cabin the heart warnings
may incline to different things. The
mar may be filled with the desire to
stay with his claim regardless OF
temporary hardships, seeing in the
future certain success for himself and
comforts for his loved ones. But
his wife may be unable to see any
thing but permanent hardship on the
claim and may not be able to en-
courage him or contribute an iota to
his pluck and endurance. 1t Is pretty
hard for the man in such a case and
harder still for the woman, and such
cases abound on the desert. Happy
is the family situated like "The
Rupees" who join in working to one
common purpose and laugh at hard
ship till they smother the heartaches
and rise in sheer strength above It.
Wages, Rattlesnakes and Mad Dogs
In many cases, most cases in fact,
the family larder has to be replenish-
ed at times by the head of the family
going to Snake river or Lost river
or to Blackfoot or Pocatello or Idaho
Falls and getting a job. Perhaps he
has to take the team with him, n
for some distant neighbor
to haul a load of water at intervals.
Slow indeed are the days and nights
when a lone woman on the desert
marks off the squares on the calen-
dar, one each evening at sunset, to
keep an understanding of the passing
of time, Shocked a plenty is the hus-
band who comes home and finds a
r~attlesnake dead by the path and
his wife tells him she killed it in the
house by the baby's crib. The man
who drove all Saturday night to get
home from where he had been work.
ing for wages for the paving contrac-
tor, and found his two dogs splitting
froth and swapping at things about
the place. was glad to find that none
of the family had been bitten by the
dogs up to the time he grasped the
gun and killed the two. But who
was sure that both dogs had not bit
ten the mich COW, and who could
whether to deprive the baby
of it's milk for nine days or make
other arrangements. The young fell
low whose cattle were visited by mad
dogs or mad coyotes so that he had
to shoot seven of his herd in a week
might be forgiven for saying he felt
a little DISCOURAGED at his prospects
for stockraising.
Woman Alone on a Claim
But there are little diversions. In
one neighborhood they got an auto
and twice a week they went
swimming. They lived near the
state highway and once into the high
way it wasn't very long to the swim
ming hole on Lost river Or to Black
foot. People who want to climb go
up on the Big Butte or on the
smaller buttes or all of them, but
not all the same day. At one place
found a middle aged woman hold
ing down a claim near the center of
The desert. She was grubbing sage
and piling it up with a fork for burn
ing. So far as she had gone she had
it absolutely clean and it was
ready to be plowed and farmed. And
she had gone about IS acres. She
said, when l get this ten-acre patch
lone I shall have cleared 40 acres"
They had been on the place about a
year, and her husband was working
On Little Lost river to get money for