tern drovers used to drive their herds into the
brush for the winters. The few that the winter and the wolves
didn't get were supposed to be hardy enough to demand a
price. It was found, however, that wintering-out cost the
beasts more in vitality than they would spend in seven years
of labour; that the result was decrepit colts and stringy
dwarfs for the beef market. Also there was agitation on the
subject, and the custom passed. City men who owned horses in
large numbers found their _efficiency_ brought to a higher
notch at the sacrifice of a little more air and food, warmth
and rest. There is a far-drive to this appeal, and there are
those who believe that it will see us through to the
millennium.

A woman told this story: "When I was a child in the country
there was an old cow that we all knew and loved. She was red
and white like Stevenson's cow that ate the meadow flowers.
Her name was Mary--Mr. Devlin's Mary. The Devlin children
played with us, and they were like other children in every
way, only a little fatter and ruddier perhaps. The calves
disappeared annually (one of the mysteries) and the Devlin
children were brought up on Mary's milk. It wasn't milk, they
said, but pure cream. We came to know Mary, because she was
always on the roadside--no remote back-pastures for her. She
loved the children and had to know what passed. We used to
deck her with dandelions, and often just as we were getting
the last circlet fastened, old Mary would tire of the game
and walk sedately out of the ring--just as she would when a
baby calf had enough or some novice had been milking too
long. I have been able to understand how much the Hindus
think of their cattle just by thinking of Mary. For years we
passed her--to and from school. It was said that she could
negotiate any gate or lock.

"Well, on one Spring morning, as we walked by the Devlin
house, we saw a crated wagon with a new calf inside, and they
were tying Mary behind. She was led forth. I remember the
whites of her eyes and her twisted head. Only that, in a kind
of sickening and pervading blackness. The calf cried to her,
and Mary answered, and thus they passed.... 'But she is old.
She dried up for a time last summer,' one of the Devlin
children said.

"Devlin wasn't