Abigail Scott Duniway

“ Ah, John Ranger! Materialist as you used always to proclaim yourself, you cannot, in the deepest recesses of your soul, rebel against the faith that is "the evidence of things not seen." What have you done with your agnosticism?
"Captain," said Sally, in a subdued tone, "I have seen the day when I would have followed Sam O'Dowd to the ends of the earth if he had commanded. I could and would have lived on the acorns of the forest rather than have failed to be his wife. Do not ask me to love you now. I cannot be your wife." ”

“ O sky, all a-twinkle with your myriads of stars, how inscrutable you are in your infinitude! And how like a worm of the dust is man, who has no power to hold in the precious body of even the woman he loves the mystery of existence, of which Creation is the only master!"
Below him, so far away that it gleamed like a silver ribbon in the starlight, ran the muddy Missouri, carrying in its turbid waves the debris of the Mandan district, and bearing on its troubled breast the throng of river craft at whose little windows hundreds of lights were twinkling, like diamonds on parade. ”

“ The very soil on which they have trodden is dear to them, and seems instinct with sentience. They make a boon companion of everything with which they come in contact, whether pertaining to the earth, the water, or the air. Their little gardens are familiar friends; the flowers of the wildwood are loving entities; the brook that sings in summer through the tangled grass and sleeps in winter under a bed of ice is always a communing spirit. The sighing winds chant rhythmic lullabies in the treetops, and the language of every insect, bird, and beast has, to them, a distinctive meaning. ”

“ Her concluding words were inaudible.
"Yes, darling, your parents are provided for; there is no doubt about it," cried her husband, as she awoke again to semi-consciousness. And if ever a man experienced a thrill of supreme satisfaction in the midst of a grave sorrow, that man was Captain John Ranger, of the overland wagon train.
"Mary!"
It was her next word of consciousness.
"Come close, dear; and Jean, and Marjorie, and Harry. The light has faded, and I cannot see you, darlings. But be good. Obey your father. Take good care of Bobbie, Sadie, and Baby Annie. ”

“ Robinson had emerged from her room after a hurried toilet.
"Sister Mollie!"
"Brother John!"
For half a minute not another word was spoken.
"I never expected to set eyes on you again," cried the sister at last, as, half crying and half laughing, she held him at arm's length for a better view. "It seemed as if you had left the world when you went to Oregon; and now you are back again,—the same old John."
"This is an age of progress, Mollie. The planet doesn't seem so very big, if you know how to get around it." ”

“ Jean never could forgive herself for not sounding an alarm. During the remainder of the short summer night Mrs. Ranger wrestled with her fate, suffering and unattended. The heavy breathing of the weary oxen as they slept, or the low chewing of their cuds in the silence, the occasional hoot of an owl, or the sharp scream of a belated eagle, the sighing of the wind in the juniper-trees, and the acute pangs of her suffering body occupied her half conscious thoughts as she patiently awaited the dawn, which broke at last, spreading over earth and sky the radiance of approaching sunrise. ”

“ Night had come; and the autumn rains were gently enwrapping the Ranch of the Whispering Firs in a sheet of mist when Joseph Ranger sought Jean in her little schoolroom for a private conversation.
The flickering light of a single kerosene lamp emitted a characteristic odor. A rough table supported the lamp; and on a three-legged stool sat the schoolma’am, trying to bring order out of the chaos of a score or more of papers left by the children.
“Ah!” she said, arising. “Come in, Uncle Joe. You won’t find our crude beginnings very inviting, but we mustn’t despise the day of small things.” ”

“ What will my dear mother think of me when John acquaints her with the facts? What will my father say or do?”
It is well that Mother Nature, in her wisdom and mercy, has provided a limit to human suffering, else everybody in this world would at times become insane.
Cicadas gave forth their rasping notes in the dry grass, and a colony of prairie dogs played hide-and-seek over the uneven streets above an underground settlement hard by. A badger peeped cautiously from the mouth of his sagebrush-guarded den, and a rattlesnake crawled unnoticed past his feet. ”

“ A child has to stumble and hurt itself many times before it learns to walk steady. We've all got to be purified and saved, as by fire, before we are fit to stand in the presence of the awful God."
"The God I love and worship isn't an awful God," cried Jean. "I couldn't love Him if He were awful. My earthly daddie whipped me once. No doubt I deserved the punishment, but I couldn't love him for a whole month afterwards. And I'd have hated him for the rest of my life if I hadn't deserved the whipping." ”

“ The cattle whose labor had saved the lives of the immigrants the previous year were now sleek and fat.
Behind the dwelling rose the foot-hills of the Cascade Mountains, their sides and summits clothed with the majestic forest of pointed firs from which the ranch had derived its name. Still higher up, and yet up, above the serrated steeps, loomed hoary old Mount Hood, spreading his snowy robes over the misty lesser heights, the top of his white turban hidden among the clouds, his flowing beard resting upon the pointed crests of the most distant trees. ”

“ Benson.
“I undertook it to gratify my good husband,” was Mrs. Ranger’s prompt reply.
“And I to gratify my daughter.”
“Excuse me, ladies; but I came along to please myself,” interposed Mrs. O’Dowd.
“I, too, came to please myself,” cried Jean; “that is, I made a virtue of necessity, and compelled myself to be pleased. There are two things that mother says we must never fret about: one is what we can, and the other what we cannot, help. Every human being belongs primarily to himself or herself, and to satisfy one’s self is sure to please somebody.” ”

“ No, John. We can no more clearly comprehend the springtime, with its many wondrous revelations, than we can comprehend anything else that is unknowable. We know that sunshine, air, and moisture are necessary for the sustenance of organic life; but we don’t know what life itself is. It is as invisible to us, in all its wonderful activities, as God himself. No; we know no more about the life that animates spring than we know about the Atlantans. But we do know that travel is a great eye-opener ”

“ Selfishness is a necessary attribute of human existence,” said the Little Doctor, punching the dying fire into a blaze. “Don’t you think so, Mr. Burns?”
“I quite agree with you, madam. Selfishness belongs to human environment, and is as much a part of us as hunger, thirst, love, or ambition. Nothing is made in vain.”
“Not even sin?” asked Mary.
“Not even sin!” echoed Jean. “This would have been a very useless world if there had been no wrongs to set right in it, and no suffering to relieve. Nobody could [182] appreciate heat if it were not for cold, or light if there were no darkness. ”

“ Ranger, one evening, as she lay wrapped in blankets in the big family wagon, watching the usual preparations for the evening meal.
He gazed into her pinched, white face with sudden apprehension.
"Don't be afraid of the cholera, dear," he said tenderly. "I understand the nature of the epidemic, and I don't fear it at all. Cholera is a filth disease, and we are guarding against it at every point. Your blood is pure, darling. There's nothing the matter with you but a little debility, the result of past years of overwork. Time and rest and change of climate will cure all that. ”

“ Months after, when the remnant of the Ranger family had reached the land “where rolls the Oregon,” a letter came to the bereaved husband and father, by way of the Isthmus of Panama, bringing tidings of the dear great-grandmother’s transition; and John Ranger, still an agnostic, awaiting the proofs of immortality that had never come to his physical senses in such a manner as to be recognized, wandered out alone among the whispering firs, and cried in bitterness of spirit: “Man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?” ”

“ John Ranger laughed.
"So-long!" he cried, and galloped away to a point overlooking a bend in the river, where he loosened the reins and allowed the mare to nibble the tender herbage, which, tempted by the sunshine, was clothing the moist earth in a covering of grass and buttercups.
"O life," he cried," what a mystery you are! How puny, yet how mighty! The living rain comes down in silent majesty upon the sleeping earth; the living sunshine melts the ice and snow ”

“ The air is so foul from the stench of decaying cattle, the water of the little river is so warm, and the heat so intolerable that sickness and death must soon ensue if the conditions do not change. It is no wonder that we see many graves by the roadside. Most of them are the last resting-places of mothers who have mercifully fallen asleep and been buried, often with their babes in their arms. ”

“ The sun’s expiring rays fell upon the open tent, illuminating her angelic face, settling like an aureole upon her bright brown hair, and causing her eyes to glow like stars. “I’m not afraid of death, dear. I am not even afraid to leave you alone with the children in the wilderness, for I know you’ll do your duty. But I am sorry to leave all the burden for you to carry alone. There is One who heareth even the young ravens when they cry. Trust in Him, dearest. He doeth all things well.”
“How can I give you up?” cried the distracted husband, stroking her pale cheeks and forehead tenderly. ”

“ Our ox-drivers have caught the gold fever. They are all going to leave us in this wilderness but Scotty; and he'd go too, no doubt, if he weren't crippled and helpless."
"Don't let the desertion of your teamsters worry you," exclaimed Sally O'Dowd. "I can drive one of the teams myself."
"What! You?"
"Yes! Didn't I tell you that you'd never be sorry if you'd let me travel in your train to Oregon?"
"We can all drive oxen," cried his three daughters, in a breath.
"But who will drive for Mrs. Benson and the Little Doctor? Their teamsters have joined the stampede, and they can't drive oxen." ”

“ The sun was already an hour high. Numerous campers had struck their tents, and the teams were moving toward the farther West. He turned his gaze within the tent and regarded Wahnetta with a look and feeling of disgust. She had prepared his breakfast while he slept, and had fed their
ravenous brood,—all save the baby in its Indian basket, which was whining pitifully as it blinked its eyes in a helpless attempt to drive away the flies.
"Why don't you keep your young one quiet?" roared her husband, savagely. ”

“ You are a jewel of the first water!"
"We all try to keep mother in good spirits," replied Jean. "Dear soul! she's weak and nervous; and what seem trifles to us often appear like mountains to her. Never can I forget, to my dying day, the look of terror that came into her gentle eyes when we were crossing the Platte that day in the quicksands. ”

“ THE steamer in which the Ranger brothers embarked for San Francisco was an ancient and somewhat decrepit tub, as much unlike the floating palaces that plough the Pacific Ocean to-day as the long railway trains with their Pullman coaches, cushioned seats, and electric bells are unlike the prairie schooners which belabored oxen hauled across deserts and mountains when the oldest pioneer of to-day was young, and Captain Ranger was in his prime. ”

“ No, Jean. Marriage under right conditions is the world’s greatest blessing. All enlightened men and women prefer to live in pairs, and make each other and their children as happy as possible. I admit that I made a big mistake when I married; but your mother didn’t, because your father is one of God’s noblemen. The fault isn’t in marriage, but in the couple, one or both of whom make the trouble, when there is trouble. But the conditions between husbands and wives are not equal. Law and usage make the husband and wife one, and the husband that one. ”

“ Mountains clambered over mountains in the dimly lighted distance, and reaching to the red horizon, overlooked the Pacific seas.
"The antelope and elk are gone," she thought, "and we are lone watchers amid the eternal vastness. But the sage-hen, the lizard, the owl, and the jaybird linger; and yonder, among the everlasting rocks, are the homes of the Indian, the rattlesnake, the badger, and the wolf." ”