It was one of the “last days” at El Capitan. Jane and Judith were exchanging opinions on so many topics, that they called the occasion their mental cleaning period. True, the matter of the cowboys’ serenade, a musical event of importance in the ranch season, had not been satisfactorily disposed of, for the boys had really furnished a very creditable program with their ukes, banjoes, mouth organs, clippers and Dingo Joe’s concertina. Fedario acted as leader, and Judith declared New York could furnish no greater thrill, even on a roof garden, than that which she experienced when the cyclone of sound broke loose under her window. Then, when she and Jane (chaperoned by Aunt Mary) appeared on the rose-vined balcony in their silken robes, the only regret expressed was that the moonlight would not give enough glare for focussing a picture on Jane’s camera. It was midnight when the Jap “cleany yupped” after the spread furnished the serenaders, but no dance at its best, could have been more novel or enjoyable. The girls remained on their second floor balcony, while Mr. Allen descended to entertain in the big, roomy kitchen, but even from that distance Jane and Judith heard the “pieces spoke” and joined in the laughter following some of the ludicrous attempts at histrionic feats. “After all,” philosophized Mr. Allen, “living near to Nature makes children of us all, and our boys are mere kindergartners when it comes to home sports.” “I always feel like a leader in a Sunday school,” commented Aunt Mary, “when we entertain them. It is surely a good work, and they are so appreciative.” “And I always feel like—well, as if I belonged to the idle rich, when the boys pay us a visit. It is so narrow to have to make class distinction, and feed them in the kitchen,” Jane objected with a note of scorn in her voice. “Now, Janie,” insisted Judith, “didn’t Woo Nah say something about Bolshevism and the Girl? Your sentiments sound rather extreme. Can you imagine Dingo Joe among forks?” “Boy all samee too much grub,” objected Willie Wing the cook. “Likee big cow.” The above is an excerpt from the conversation that sifted through the Allen home on the morning following the “doin’s” catalogued as the Cowboys’ Serenade. Jane and Judith both made copious notes of the occasion in their diaries, but in spite of these records the real story was not to be told in mere words. It required the language of the boys themselves to give the affair its actual color. This was, however, plentifully supplied all over the ranch for at least a day after, and the consensus of opinion seemed to be, “that Miss Allen was a peach,” and her friend “some girl.” Also “that Chief Allen ought to be president of the United States, and the little sister woman would be all right for the first lady of the land.”