The Flying U's Last Stand. B. M. Bower
Читать онлайн.| Название | The Flying U's Last Stand |
|---|---|
| Автор произведения | B. M. Bower |
| Жанр | Языкознание |
| Серия | |
| Издательство | Языкознание |
| Год выпуска | 0 |
| isbn | 4057664628596 |
B. M. Bower
The Flying U's Last Stand
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4057664628596
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 2. ANDY GREEN'S NEW ACQUAINTANCE
CHAPTER 3. THE KID LEARNS SOME THINGS ABOUT HORSES
CHAPTER 4. ANDY TAKES A HAND IN THE GAME
CHAPTER 5. THE HAPPY FAMILY TURN NESTERS
CHAPTER 6. THE FIRST BLOW IN THE FIGHT
CHAPTER 7. THE COMING OF THE COLONY
CHAPTER 8. FLORENCE GRACE HALLMAN SPEAKS PLAINLY
CHAPTER 9. THE HAPPY FAMILY BUYS A BUNCH OF CATTLE
CHAPTER 10. WHEREIN ANDY GREEN LIES TO A LADY
CHAPTER 11. A MOVING CHAPTER IN EVENTS
CHAPTER 12. SHACKS, LIVE STOCK AND PILGRIMS PROMPTLY AND PAINFULLY REMOVED
CHAPTER 13. IRISH WORKS FOR THE CAUSE
CHAPTER 14. JUST ONE THING AFTER ANOTHER
CHAPTER 15. THE KID HAS IDEAS OF HIS OWN
CHAPTER 16. “A RELL OLD COWPUNCHER”
CHAPTER 18. THE LONG WAY ROUND
CHAPTER 19. HER NAME WAS ROSEMARY
CHAPTER 20. THE RELL OLE COWPUNCHER GOES HOME
CHAPTER 22. LAWFUL IMPROVEMENTS
CHAPTER 23. THE WATER QUESTION AND SOME GOSSIP
CHAPTER 24. THE KID IS USED FOR A PAWN IN THE GAME
CHAPTER 25. “LITTLE BLACK SHACK'S ALL BURNT UP”
CHAPTER 26. ROSEMARY ALLEN DOES A SMALL SUM IN ADDITION
CHAPTER 27. “ITS AWFUL EASY TO GET LOST”
CHAPTER 1. OLD WAYS AND NEW
Progress is like the insidious change from youth to old age, except that progress does not mean decay. The change that is almost imperceptible and yet inexorable is much the same, however. You will see a community apparently changeless as the years pass by; and yet, when the years have gone and you look back, there has been a change. It is not the same. It never will be the same. It can pass through further change, but it cannot go back. Men look back sick sometimes with longing for the things that were and that can be no more; they live the old days in memory—but try as they will they may not go back. With intelligent, persistent effort they may retard further change considerably, but that is the most that they can hope to do. Civilization and Time will continue the march in spite of all that man may do.
That is the way it was with the Flying U. Old J. G. Whitmore fought doggedly against the changing conditions—and he fought intelligently and well. When he saw the range dwindling and the way to the watering places barred against his cattle with long stretches of barbed wire, he sent his herds deeper into the Badlands to seek what grazing was in the hidden, little valleys and the deep, sequestered canyons. He cut more hay for winter feeding, and he sowed his meadows to alfalfa that he might increase the crops. He shipped old cows and dry cows with his fat steers in the fall, and he bettered the blood of his herds and raised bigger cattle. Therefore, if his cattle grew fewer in number, they improved in quality and prices went higher, so that the result was much the same.
It began to look, then, as though J. G. Whitmore was cunningly besting the situation, and was going to hold out indefinitely against the encroachments of civilization upon the old order of things on the range. And it had begun to look as though he was going to best Time at his own game, and refuse also to grow old; as though he would go on being the same pudgy, grizzled, humorously querulous Old Man beloved of his men, the Happy Family of the Flying U.
Sometimes, however, Time will fill a four-flush with the joker, and then laugh while he rakes in the chips. J. G. Whitmore had been going his way and refusing to grow old for a long time—and then an accident, which is Time's joker, turned the game against him. He stood for just a second too long on a crowded crossing in Chicago, hesitating between going forward or back. And that second gave Time a chance to play an accident. A big seven-passenger touring car mowed him down and left him in a heap for the ambulance from the nearest hospital to gather on its stretcher.
The Old Man did not die; he had lived long on the open range and he was pretty tough and hard to kill. He went back to his beloved Flying U, with a crutch to help him shuffle from bed to easy chair and back again.
The Little Doctor, who was his youngest sister, nursed him tirelessly; but it was long before there came a day when the Old Man gave his crutch to the Kid to use for a stick-horse, and walked through the living room and out upon the porch with the help of a cane and the solicitous arm