s differing widely. The smaller ranchmen lived
roughly, sleeping under the stars, perhaps, cooking over an open fire,
eating from tinware. The larger ranchmen did things in better style.
They brought rocking chairs, big tents, chinaware, camp stoves and
Japanese servants to manipulate them. The women had flags and Chinese
lanterns with which to decorate, hammocks in which to lounge, books to
read, tables at which to sit, cots and mattresses on which to sleep. No
difference in social status was made, however. The young people
undertook their expeditions together: the older folks swapped yarns in
the peaceful enjoyment of the forest. Bob found interest in all, for as
yet the California ranchman has not lost in humdrum occupations the
initiative that brought him to a new country nor the influences of the
experience he has gained there. To his surprise several of the parties
were composed entirely of girls. One, of four members, was made up of
students from Berkeley, out for their summer vacation. Late in the
summer these four damsels constructed a pack of their belongings, lashed
it on a borrowed mule, and departed. They were gone for a week in the
back country, and returned full of adventures over the detailing of
which they laughed until they gasped.

To Bob's astonishment none of the men seemed particularly wrought up
over this escapade.

"They're used to the mountains," he was assured, "and they'll get along
all right with that old mule."

"Does anybody live over there?" asked Bob.

"No, it's just a wild country, but the trails is good."

"Suppose they get into trouble?"

"What trouble? And 'tain't likely they'd all get into trouble to once."

"I should think they'd be scared."

"Nothin' to be scared of," replied the man comfortably.

Bob thought of the great, uninhabited mountains, the dark forests, the
immense loneliness and isolation, the thousand subtle and psychic
influences which the wilderness exerts over the untried soul. There
might be nothing to be scared of, as the man said. Wild animals are
harmless, the trails are good. But he could not imagine any of the girls
with whom he had acquaintance pushing off thus joyous and unafraid into
a wilderness three days beyond the farthest outpost. He had yet to
understand the spirit, almost universal among the native-born
Californians, that has been brought up so intimately with the large
things of nature that the sublime is no longer the terrible. Perhaps
th