_June 3rd_, SOMEWHERE IN NEBRASKA. EIGHT _June 3rd. Somewhere in Nebraska._ At last I know the joys of domestic service. The pleasures of the “hired girl” and all the privileges and emoluments pertaining to her high estate have been mine. Our good friends, the train crew, who carried us out of Des Moines, dropped us off at the first little station east of Council Bluffs early in the morning of May 15th. We determined to cycle into town, get breakfast and look for work. We were making good time and had entered the suburbs when, as we spun around a corner and approached a large red house, surrounded by a tall hedge, a series of brain-piercing shrieks rent the air. My control of the wheel was none too steady that morning and the shock was too much for frayed nerves and stiffened muscles. The tandem took the bit in its teeth and in a jiffy had buried its nose in the thick branches at the base of the hedge. I landed on my feet, and through a break in the shrubbery saw the cause of the commotion. In an angle of the enclosure a red hen was flapping and squawking, her brood of downy chickens dashing hither and thither, pursued by a large mongrel dog. Within a high wire fence, evidently the chicken yard, a moon-faced woman stood like a marionette, her fat hands shooting into the air with a rhythmic precision which synchronised perfectly with the dropping of her lower jaw which opened widely with each vocal effort. As I stared, the dog captured a tiny chick and tossed it high in air. I dashed forward and seized the brute by the scruff of the neck and dragged it, growling and struggling, to the break in the hedge where Dan came to my assistance and sent the animal howling down the road. I turned back to the frightened brood and was joined by the female calliope. Together we gathered the cowering mites from their places of concealment among the grass and weeds and at last saw the mother safe in the coop, her decimated family huddled about her. “You know chickens, oh, you know,” the lady puffed. “These are prize birds—all, all prize stock—I paid an outrageous price for them—Tamas said it was very shortsighted to do so—but you know chickens.” “I couldn’t stand idly by while that hateful dog mangled the little things,” I interrupted. “Of course not, with prize stock like these. You know, oh, you know.” Dan approached with the tandem, the front tire of which was sadly flattened. “Got a puncture when you rammed the hedge. Guess we’ll have to camp here till I can patch the inner tube. Maybe you can buy a few eggs and cook breakfast. I’m nearly starved.”