Page:Six months in Kansas.djvu/55

Rh faith still left in the power to sleep, even tinder difficulties.

It is written, "Ye know not what shall be on the morrow." Verily, no fertile imaginings of your daughter could have conjured up the torture to be applied to her on this initiatory night in the new territory. Mother, in the first place, did you ever see a FLEA? Don't consider the question impertinent; or as throwing reproach upon your most respectable housekeeping. I ask for information; because I have. And on this night, when I imagined no enemy was near, they took sole possession of us all! I think I always had some respect for mosquitoes ; they give warning always of their approach, and their note is unmistakably Woody; and a cheap bar over the bed secures you from everything but the cry for "blood." Quite another sort of villain is this black, shambling, hydra-legged "varmint;" using his legs only to leap with; never walking off, as though he had rights, but sneaking up from the floor just as one hopes to take possession of a bed, paid for, whisking in between the sheets in columns. Yet, put your finger on one of them if you can! Settle down and