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Frontier Stories
The Project Gutenberg EBook of Frontier Stories, by Bret Harte This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: Frontier Stories
Author: Bret Harte
Release Date: May 23, 2004 [EBook #12419]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FRONTIER STORIES ***
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[Illustration: _The woman ... stood before him_]
BRET HARTE'S WRITINGS
FRONTIER STORIES
CONTENTS:
FLIP: A CALIFORNIA ROMANCE
FOUND AT BLAZING STAR
IN THE CARQUINEZ WOODS
AT THE MISSION OF SAN CARMEL
A BLUE-GRASS PENELOPE
LEFT OUT ON LONE STAR MOUNTAIN
A SHIP OF '49
FLIP: A CALIFORNIA ROMANCE.
CHAPTER I.
Just where the red track of the Los Gatos road streams on and upward like the sinuous trail of a fiery rocket until it is extinguished in the blue shadows of the Coast Range, there is an embayed terrace near the summit, hedged by dwarf firs. At every bend of the heat-laden road the eye rested upon it wistfully; all along the flank of the mountain, which seemed to pant and quiver in the oven-like air, through rising dust, the slow creaking of dragging wheels, the monotonous cry of tired springs, and the muffled beat of plunging hoofs, it held out a promise of sheltered coolness and green silences beyond. Sunburned and anxious faces yearned toward it from the dizzy, swaying tops of stage-coaches, from lag