All Those Things Had To Be Taken Down A Ladder, Which Made It Really Very Hard Work.

Having faith in Major Bagley's word, the house was cleaned from top to bottom, much painting and calcimining having been done.

All the floors were painted and hard-oiled, and everyone knows what discomfort that always brings about. But at last everything was finished, and we were about to settle down to the enjoyment of a tidy, cheerful little home when Major Bagley appeared the second time, and within two hours Faye was notified that his quarters had been selected by him!

We are at present in two rooms and a shed that happened to be unoccupied, and I feel very much as though I was in a second-hand shop. Things are piled up to the ceiling in both rooms, and the shed is full also. All of the vegetables were brought up from the cellar, of course, and as the weather has been very cold, the celery and other tender things were frozen. General and Mrs. Bourke have returned, and at once insisted upon our going to their house, but as there was nothing definite about the time when we will get our house, we said "No." We are taking our meals with them, however, and Hang is there also, teaching their new Chinaman. But I can assure you that I am more than cross. If Major Bagley had selected the house the first time he came, or even if he had said nothing at all about the quarters, much discomfort and unpleasantness would have been avoided. They will get our nice clean house, and we will get one that will require the same renovating we have just been struggling with. I have made up my mind unalterably to one thing - the nice little dinner I had expected to give Major and Mrs. Bagley later on, will be for other people, friends who have had less honey to dispose of.

The splendid hunting was interrupted by the move, too. Every October in this country we have a snowstorm that lasts usually three or four days; then the snow disappears and there is a second fall, with clear sunny days until the holidays. This year the weather remained warm and the storm was later than usual, but more severe when it did come, driving thousands of water-fowl down with a rush from the mountain streams and lakes. There is a slough around a little plateau near the post, and for a week or more this was teeming with all kinds of ducks, until it was frozen over. Sometimes we would see several species quietly feeding together in the most friendly way. Faye and I would drive the horses down in the cutter, and I would hold them while he walked on ahead hunting.

One day, when the snow was falling in big moist flakes that were so thick that the world had been narrowed down to a few yards around us, we drove to some tall bushes growing on the bank of the slough. Faye was hunting, and about to make some ducks rise when he heard a great whir over his head, and although the snow was so thick he could not see just what was there, he quickly raised his gun and fired at something he saw moving up there. To his great amazement and my horror, an immense swan dropped down and went crashing through the bushes. It was quite as white as the snow on the ground, and coming from the dense cloud of snow above, where no warning of its presence had been given, no call sounded, one felt that there was something queer about it all. With its enormous wings spread, it looked like an angel coming to the earth.

The horses thought so, also, for as soon as it touched the bushes they bolted, and for a few minutes I was doubtful if I could hold them. I was so vexed with them, too, for I wanted to see that splendid bird. They went around and around the plateau, and about all I was able to do at first was to keep them from going to the post. They finally came down to a trot, but it was some time before I could coax them to go to the bushes where the swan had fallen. I did not blame them much, for when the big bird came down, it seemed as if the very heavens were falling. We supplied our friends with ducks several days, and upon our own dinner table duck was served ten successive days. And it was just as acceptable the last day as the first, for almost every time there was a different variety, the cinnamon, perhaps, being the most rare.

Last year Hang was very contrary about the packing down of the eggs for winter use. I always put them in salt, but he thought they should be put in oats because Mrs. Pierce had packed hers that way. You know he had been Mrs. Pierce's cook two years before he came to me, and for a time he made me weary telling how she had things done. Finally I told him he must do as I said, that he was my cook now. There was peace for a while, and then came the eggs.

He would not do one thing to assist me, not even take down the eggs, and looked at Volmer with scorn when he carried down the boxes and salt. I said nothing, knowing what the result would be later on if Hang remained with me. When the cold weather came and no more fresh eggs were brought in, it was astonishing to see how many things that stubborn Chinaman could make without any eggs at all. Get them out of the salt he simply would not. Of course that could not continue forever, so one day I brought some up and left them on his table without saying a word.

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