lowed by the hounds, Duke, Queen, Timerosa, and others of forgotten name, to hunt coyotes, the constant menace to the sheep.
There were many other interesting men who worked at the ranches. There was always a Jose; I remember a romantic looking Romulo, and Miguel, who is now spending his last days a tenant of the old house. Over at Alamitos there was a jolly, fat vaquero with a heavy black beard and twinkling eyes, who was known as “Deefy”—I spell phonetically,—because scarlet fever at twelve had stolen his hearing. He remembered enough of language to speak, but did so in the most uncanny, guttural and squeaking sounds. He was a friendly soul and never so appalling as dignified Old Juan.
Then there were all sorts of other nationalities represented in one way or another; Parlin, a Maine man, always predicting disaster, and speaking only in a whisper; Roy, the Englishman, John “Portugee,” Henry and Charlie, young Americans getting a start, and the merry Irish John O’Connor who always had time for a joke with the children, and whose departure was mourned when he left the Cerritos to open a saloon on Commercial street in Los Angeles.
Just a few years ago at Uncle Jotham’s funeral in Long Beach I was touched to see a whole pewful of these men who had worked for him in the old days at the ranch, even John O’Connor among them.
I recall Sunday evenings at the Alamitos when Uncle John got out his fiddle, and men who had other instruments came into the parlor and we had a concert
