Page:Letters from an Oregon Ranch.djvu/226

 the best, and have been so thoroughly and thoughtfully read that she seems to know them by heart. She is a good comrade, and we enjoyed many delightful walks during the time of mists of which I have written. As there were still frequent showers, and the ground was well soaked by the Winter rains, I followed her example, donning a pair of rubber boots which Tom had bought for me to wear during “snake week.”

A rainy-day walk in town is an uncomfortable experience compared with our free-and-easy hill excursions. We wear old soft felt hats, and our most disreputable jackets, and gowns with skirts reaching but little below our boot-tops. Unhampered by gloves and umbrellas, we swing along with the mist in our faces, as happy as gypsies. Four barking dogs go frisking ahead, so insanely gleeful they must needs run back very often to leap on us with muddy feet, just to ask if this isn’t a lark and if we aren’t glad they let us come.

As we skirt the red-furrowed fields, hugging the old rail-fence for the sake of a grassy path, frightened quails go scurrying off through the tall weeds and tangled briers, while from near-by thickets, with a rush of wings that is almost a roar, startled China pheasants fly up and over, croaking as hoarsely as though an epidemic of sore throat were raging among them.

Our foot-path leads straight to the woods, the entrance barred only by a few mossy poles. We slide back the two middle ones, and gracefully tumble through the