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constant repetition, and yet all strange and new. If he could only arrive somewhere.

The straight line is Art. Nature moves in circles. A straightforward man is more an artificial product than a diplomatist is. Men lost in the snow travel in exact circles until they sink, exhausted, as their footprints have attested. Also, travellers in philosophy and other mental processes frequently wind up at their starting-point.

It was when Sam Webber was fullest of contrition and good resolves that Mexico, with a heavy sigh, subsided from his regular, brisk trot into a slow, complacent walk. They were winding up an easy slope covered with brush ten or twelve feet high.

“I say now, Mex,” demurred Sam, “this here won’t do. I know you’re plumb tired out, but we got ter git along. Oh, Lordy, ain’t there no mo’ houses in the world!” He gave Mexico a smart kick with his heels.

Mexico gave a protesting grunt as if to say: “What’s the use of that, now we’re so near?” He quickened his gait into a languid trot. Rounding a great clump of black chaparral, he stopped short. Sam dropped the bridle reins and sat, looking into the back door of his own house, not ten yards away.

Marthy, serene and comfortable, sat in her rocking-chair before the door in the shade of the house, with her feet resting luxuriously upon the steps. Randy, who was playing with a pair of spurs on the ground, looked up for a moment at his father and went on