The two largest bedroom tents were made of bright awning cloth, one of red and white, the other of blue and white, both gaily decorated with braid. They were pitched under the same giant oak, and yet were nearly forty feet apart; that of the girls having a canvas floor. They were not quite willing to sleep on the ground, so they had brought empty bed-sacks with them, and Pancho’s first duty after his arrival had been to drive to a neighbouring ranch for a great load of straw. In a glorious tree near by was a ‘sky parlour,’ arranged by a few boards nailed high up in the leafy branches, and reached from below by a primitive ladder. This was the favourite sitting-room of the girls by day, and served for Pancho’s bedroom at night. It was beautiful enough to be fit shelter for all the woodland nymphs, with its festoons of mistletoe and wild grape-vines; but Pancho was rather an unappreciative tenant, even going so far as to snore in the sacred place! Just beyond was a card-room,—imagine it—in which a square board, nailed on a low stump, served for a table, where Dr. Paul and the boys played many a game of crib, backgammon, and checkers. Here, too, all Elsie’s letters were written and Bell’s nonsense verses, and here was the identical spot where Jack Howard, that mischievous knight of the brush, perpetrated those modern travesties on the ‘William Henry pictures,’ for Elsie’s delectation. The dressing-room was reached by a path cut through bushes to a charming little pool. Here were unmistakable evidences of feminine art: looking-glasses hanging to trees, snowy wash-cloths, each bearing its owner’s initials, adorning the shrubs, while numerous towels waved in the breeze. Between two trees a thin board was nailed, which appeared to be used, as nearly as the woodpeckers could make out, as a toothbrush rack. In this, Philip, the skilful carpenter, had bored the necessary number of holes, and each one contained a toothbrush tied with a gorgeous ribbon. In this secluded spot Bell was wont to marshal every morning the entire force of ‘the toothbrush brigade’; and, conducting the drill with much ingenuity, she would take her victims through a long series of military manœuvres arranged for the toothbrush. Oh, the gaspings, the chokings and stranglings, which occurred when she mounted a rock by the edge of the pool, and after calling in tones of thunder, ‘Brush, brothers, brush with care! Brush in the presence of the commandaire!’ ordered her unwilling privates to polish their innocent molars to the tune of ‘Hail, Columbia,’ or ‘Auld Lang Syne’! And if they became mutinous, it was Geoffrey who reduced them to submission, and ordered them to brush for three mornings to the tune of ‘Bluebells of Scotland’ as a sign of loyalty to their commander.