BETTER times had surely come to the Almaida family. By July, the father was able to walk about without a cane; and the doctor, whom Antonio asked to come again, said that Senhor Almaida might begin work in September. The first crops of the year were the largest that the farm had ever raised. The early harvest of oats, rye, and wheat was piled high in the barn by the last of July, and the new crops were growing abundantly. "Another year we shall have twice as much of everything," Jose said, as he sat with his father and Antonio at the barn door in the summer twilight. The father looked smilingly into the little boy's eager face as he answered: "Yes, and we can keep two cows instead of one cow, and more chickens, perhaps another pig. We shall have more feed for them, and with our larger crops to sell, we can soon pay back to Antonio the money which he has spent for new farm implements and tools. It was good for us all that you went away, Antonio, and came back with the new ideas." There were other plans for the farm forming in Antonio's mind, but he was not yet quite ready to talk them over with his father. A few days later, as Antonio and Jose finished the work of watering the maize-fields for the second time that day, by means of the oxen's turning of the _nora_, Antonio said to Jose: "You know there is the good full stream which flows beyond the barn and along by the wood-lane? This autumn, when the farm-work grows lighter, we will put in pipes from that stream to the vineyard and garden, so that the crops can be watered by what is called irrigation, and without using the _nora_, which takes the oxen away from the other work. We will not tell this to the father until the time comes. He may think it too large a thing for us to do." In mid-August a party of students from Coimbra University came strolling through the village and up the hillside to the Almaidas' and other farms. They were on a vacation pilgrimage to Braga, one of the oldest cities in Portugal, known in Roman times as _Baraca Augusta_, and in more modern times as the home of the royal Braganza family, to which King Manuel II belonged. While these students, in long black coats buttoned close to the chin, ate the _brôa_ and the fresh fruits which the good mother set before them, Jose asked them many questions about the place from which they came. And they told the little boy about Coimbra University, famous for many centuries as the seat of learning for all Portugal, and about the great buildings of the University on the hill overlooking the town. "Like the old castle of Guimarães?" Jose asked. "Yes, have you ever seen that?" the leader of the students asked. Then Jose shyly described to them his holiday with Antonio at Guimarães. "There is Antonio off in the field now, and father is sitting with him, in the shade."