rich, greasy odor came
out from it with puffs of the onion-laden smoke of frying things which
blurred the light of the one candle set in the neck of a bottle. * * *
In the centre of the floor a circle of blackened stones held a fire of
wood coals, on the top of which rested a big clay griddle. Cakes of
ground corn were frying there, and on the stove were _enchiladas_
and _tamales_ and _chili-con-carne_ being kept warm. The air
was thick with the pungent, strong smells.

GWENDOLEN OVERTON,
in _The Golden Chain._

JUNE 22.

The homely house furnishings seemed to leap out of the darkness; the
stove, the littered table, and the couch, the iron crucifix, and the
carved cradle in the corner--all his long life Juan will see them
so--and 'Cencion turned; the dusky veil was blown and rent like the
sea mist, revealing--Holy Mother of Heaven! her father, Cenaga, the
outlaw! Juan Lopez fell on his knees below the window, the smoking
rifle clattered from his broken grasp, and the missile sped, aimless
and harmless, high into the adobe wall.

GERTRUDE B. MILLARD,
in _An Outlaw's Daughter, S.F. Argonaut, Nov._, 1896.

IN HUMBOLDT.

Dim in the noonday fullness,
Dark in the day's sweet morn--
So sacred and deep are the canyons
Where the beautiful rivers are born.

LILLIAN H. SHUEY,
in _Among the Redwoods._

JUNE 23.

The glow of the days of Comstock glory was still in the air. San
Francisco was still the city of gold and silver. The bonanza kings had
not left it, but were trying to accommodate themselves to the palaces
they were rearing with their loose millions. Society yet retained its
cosmopolitan tone, careless, brilliant, and unconventional. There were
figures in it that had made it famous--men who began life with a pick
and shovel and ended it in an orgy of luxury; women, whose habits of
early poverty fell off them like a garment, and who, carried away by
their power, displayed the barbaric caprices of Roman empresses.

The sudden possession of vast wealth had intoxicated this people,
lifting them from the level of the commonplace into a saturnalia of
extravagance. Poverty, the only restraint many of them had ever felt,
was gone. Money had made them lawless, whimsical, bizarre. It had
developed all-conquering personalities, potent individualities. They
were still playing with it, wondering at it, throwing it about.

GERALDINE BONNER,
in _Tomorrow's Tangle._

JUNE 24.

Menlo P