Page:Letters from an Oregon Ranch.djvu/99

 country, and that groceryman will ask, ‘Whose butter is this?’”

“Then look him square in the eye and say, ‘Mrs. Jacob Ruggles’s butter.’ Whereupon he will frown reflectively, saying, ‘Ruggles, Ruggles,—I can’t recall any Ruggles up your way.’ Tell him they are newcomers from the Kentucky bluegrass region.”

sighed Mary.

“That’s so, Mary; we’re getting tangled in a labyrinth of lies. Let’s try a new tack. How would this do? You remember, Katharine, that set of old tin candle-moulds that I raked out from under the porch? Well, say we melt this stuff, mould it in those things, make Roman candles of it, and then throw them on the market about the Fourth of July. I’m sure they’ll go off with a boom.”

With this brilliant suggestion the conference broke up.

And now you have our first experience in butter-making. The surprise was never eaten; Tom used it for axle-grease,—to my lasting humiliation. Two or three weeks later the butter suddenly became sweet and delicious. Then I knew the joy of the ancient mariner when the dead albatross fell from his neck.

But it occurs to me that in your Eastern home