af the numerous activities of the
ranch, a broad, graded road over which she and her father had come here
the last time together in the big touring-car.

Here the valley was only a mile across, shut in on both sides by cliff
and steep, rocky mountain, walled by cliffs at the upper end, where the
river from three-mile distant Blue Lake came down in flashing
waterfalls.

But, as she rode, the valley widened, changed in character. At first,
wandering herds of beef-cattle, with now and then a riding cowboy
turning in his saddle to wonder at her; then a gate to be opened as she
stooped forward from her own saddle, and wide fields where the grass
stood tall and untrodden and blooded Jersey cows looked up in mild
interest; yonder a small pasture in which were five Guernseys, kept in
religious seclusion, under ideal conditions, to further certain
investigations into the ratios of five different kinds of fodder to the
amount of butter-fat produced; across a green meadow a pure-blooded
Jersey bull, whose mellow bellowings drew Judith's eyes to the clean
line of his perfect back, over which, with pawing hoofs, he was
throwing much trampled earth; in a more distant pen, accepting the
trumpeted challenge and challenging back, a beautiful specimen of
careful breeding in Ayrshire.

The road wound on, following generally the line of the river, which
began a generous broadening, flowing more evenly through level fields.
Looking down the valley, Judith could see the whitewashed clump of
buildings where were the second office, the store and the blacksmith's
shop, the tiny cottages. And beyond, the barns, the dairy, the tall
silos standing like lookout towers, the alfalfa-fields crisscrossed
with irrigating ditches, and still farther on, the pasture-lands where
the big herd of cows was grazing.

Here the valley was spread out until from side to side it measured
something more than four miles. The bordering mountains, like the
river, had grown into a softer mood; rolling hills scantily timbered,
rich in grass, were dotted with herds, cattle and horses, or fenced off
here and there, reserved for later pasturage.

Across the river, to the south, Judith marked the wandering calves,
offspring of the herd; to the north, along the foothills, the subdued
green of the olive-orchards.

"It's a big, big thing!" she whispered, and her eyes were very bright
with it all, her cheeks flushed. "Big!"

Passing one of the great barns, she heard