Page:Letters from an Oregon Ranch.djvu/206

 glad of it,—glad of anything coming to break the dull uniformity of our lives. I was ready just then to reach out a welcoming hand to floods, earthquakes, cyclones, or any other excitement that might happen along.

Deer Leap, our dashing mountain stream, though drinking heavily for some weeks and rather ominously full, had up to this time kept his bed, showing no particularly riotous spirit. But with the first hint of the coming of the flood he began tossing and tumbling restlessly, and presently he broke loose from his restraining banks and went plunging through the alders and maples, whisking, whirling, and foaming, dealing destruction right and left, demolishing cattle-sheds, poultry-houses, and pasture fence. He then made a dash for the bridges, destroying one and trying hard for the other, blustering and raging about it for a day and night, hurling great logs against it, savagely bumping the floor, lifting a part of the planks, pulling and pushing and tugging fiercely at it; but though it trembled and swayed, it stood its ground bravely, aided by strong chains lashing it to the trees.

Our meadow looked a dreary waste. The trees and bushes seemed growing out of a lake. We one day saw fourteen Angora goats carried through this shallow sea. Fortunately they were thrown upon a little knoll in a thicket of briers, where sharp thorns caught their fleecy coats and held them fast until their owner came to the rescue. In being released from their thorny