Page:Pratt portraits - sketched in a New England suburb (IA prattportraitssk00full).pdf/202

 goes sweeping across level leagues unhindered by any obstacle, unabashed by any contrary currents. This minister's son, with his high-bred features and his air of conscious power, belonged to the finest type of ranchman. In him many of the best qualities springing from the old civilization existed side by side with the spirit and vigor which animate the pioneer. There was not lacking a touch of the absolute monarch, such as your genuine ranchman was five-and-twenty years ago. Being, then, a young man of ready decision and of hitherto unalterable determination, no sooner did he behold the little girl whom he had patronized in big-boy fashion a few years previous, transformed into a surprising likeness to his secretly-cherished ideal of a woman, than he fell precipitately in love with her. There was no time to be lost in preliminaries, and Fred pressed his suit with the courage and persistency which might have been expected of an absolute monarch—to say nothing of a Yankee boy accustomed to deal with rough cowboys and pitching bronchos.

Mary was at first thrown off her guard by the very suddenness of the assault. She had been predisposed in his favor by all she knew of the daring and independence of his course in breaking loose from family traditions and choosing his own rough path in life. She looked upon him as a kindred spirit, and they had many a long talk and more than one walk together in the sparkling Christmas weather before she took the alarm.