Page:Life Amongst the Modocs.djvu/402

 nzanita hills above me, towards the snow, where the grass is fresh the season through. You can hear the old white bull, the leader of the herd, lift up his voice in the morning, and challenge the whole world below to battle, but no David comes to meet him. When we want a fresh horse here, we mount one of those staked out yonder by lariat and hackamore, ride down to the band in the plain, take, with the lasso, the strongest and fastest of them all, saddle him, mount, and turn the other loose to run till strong and fresh again.

I have a field too, down yonder, where we lead the water through the corn, and the rich, rank growth of many kinds of vines. We have planted an orchard, and grape vines are climbing up the banks, and across the boulders that time has tumbled down from the manzanita hills. We will remain here by our vine and our fig tree till we can take shelter under their boughs.

We will yet eat fruit from the trees we have planted.

We? Why, yes! That means little "Calle Shasta," the little shy, brown girl that tried to hide, and refused to see me when I first returned to the mountains. She is with me now, and wears a red sash, and a scarf gracefully folded about her shoulders under her rich flow of hair. I call her Shasta because she was born here, under the shadows of Mount Shasta, many stormy years ago. How she can ride, shoot, hunt, and track the deer, and take t