ths and appetizers to the sick on clearings within walking
distances; and she would bid us stay a while at different houses where
we could be helpful, but to be sure and bring careful reports from each
home we entered. Under such training, we learned much about diseases
and the care of the suffering. Anon, we would find in the plain wooden
cradle, a dainty bundle of sweetness, all done up in white, which its
happy owner declared grandma had brought her, and we felt quite repaid
for our tiresome walk if permitted to hold it a wee while and learn its
name.

[Illustration: MISSION SAN FRANCISCO SOLANO, LAST OF THE HISTORIC
MISSIONS OF CALIFORNIA]

[Illustration: RUINS OF THE MISSION AT SONOMA]

We were sent together on these missions, in order that we might help
each other to remember all that was told us; yet grandma had us take
turns, and the one whom she commissioned to make the inquiries was
expected to bring the fuller answers. Sometimes, we played on the way
and made mistakes. Then she would mete out to us that hardest of
punishments, namely, that we were not to speak with each other until
she should forgive our offence. Forgiveness usually came before time
to drive up the cows, for she knew that we were nimbler-footed when she
started us off in happy mood.

Each cow wore a bell of different tone and knew her own name; yet it
was not an easy task, even in pleasant weather, to collect the various
strings and get them home on time. They mixed, and fed with neighbors'
cattle on the range, and hid themselves behind clumps of trees and
other convenient obstructions. Often grandma would get her string in by
the main trail and have them milked before we could bring up the
laggards that provokingly dawdled along, nibbling stray bunches of
grass. When late on the road, we saw coyotes sneaking out for their
evening meal and heard the far-away cry of the panther. But we were not
much afraid when it was light enough, so that imagination could not
picture them creeping stealthily behind us.

Our gallant Company C, officered by Captain Bartlett and Lieutenants
Stoneman and Stone, was ordered to another post early in August; and
its departure caused such universal regret that no one supposed Company
H, under Captain Frisbie, could fill its place. Nevertheless, that
handsome young officer soon found his way to the good-will of the
people, and when Captain Joe Hooker brought him out to visit grandma's
dairy, she, too, was great