nited States. Her husband made entry for a homestead and
she built the house, outbuildings, and fences on it, and bought the
implements with money she had saved from school-teaching. The first
year, their crop was frozen; the second, it was hailed out; and the
third, a spark from the threshing-machine burned their wheat stacks.
Their horses died and they had to incur debt for others. All this
time, the woman supported the household with the returns from her
poultry yard and dairy. These last years have been fat ones, thus
enabling them to save sufficient money to send two of their sons to the
business college in Town. The eldest girl is walking with the young
man on the adjoining farm and a wedding is brewing.

To my thinking, this homely, ill-accoutred woman is something like a
heroine, and it is a pity the end of her troubles is not yet. Her
husband, who appears to be a flabby-spirited fellow, has always wanted
to, and has finally decided that he will sell the farm and go to the
town to keep a boarding-house. She is opposed to the move and has been
in the town endeavouring to protect her interests in the property, but
finds she is unable so to do. Because of this she has decided to buy
the farm from him and has the agreement ready for his signature. I am
astounded by her hardihood. She has the soul of a warrior. If the
recalcitrant spouse refuses to sell--no, I won't tell what she intends
doing, for I am willing to wager you, even to the half of my kingdom,
that he sells.

The woman is proud, I can see, and accordingly careful to enlarge on
her man's good qualities, but it takes no acuteness to read through her
assurances that he is a pessimist and one who always draws tails in the
toss of life.

The readers who have come with me thus far may here swing off key, but,
People Dear, you would be wrong; she is not chastising him; she is
mothering him. It is a remarkable trait in the make-up of a good woman
that she can, in critical junctures, not only be her own mother but may
also act in this capacity to the husband of her children. It is this
same office the Holy Ghost performs in the Trinity.

The newsy is giving the last call to breakfast. He is a full-lifed
young man, with a cock-o'-my-walk air. I would not be surprised if he
were hatched out of the egg of a pouter-pigeon. He serves meals as far
as Edson, from whence we will be transferred to a construction train
and trust to manna being rained do