On the fifth trial he had the satisfaction of driving a ball into that pond. It was not much of a drive, but it pleased him immensely.
"I got my money's worth out of those five balls," he declared as he climbed back into the car.
"See how the sun strikes the sail of that schooner!" exclaimed Miss Harding. "And how it glances from the brass work of those yachts at anchor! There goes an auto boat darting through a swarm of sail boats like a bird through fluttering butterflies. It is a glorious view from here!"
"It makes the Rhine look like counterfeit money," asserted Chilvers, whose similes usually are grotesque. "Any time you hear an American raving over the wonderful scenery of Europe you can place a bet that he has never seen that of his own country."
"That's right, Chilvers," said Harding. "We have all kinds of scenery out West that has never been used. It's a drug in the market, laying around out-of-doors for the first one that comes along."
We made the next ten miles at a rapid gait through one of the finest country-residence sections in this fair land of ours. Then we entered a sparsely settled agricultural district. We were opposite a meadow which recently had been mowed. It was a gentle slope with picturesque rocks flanking its sides, and near the road was a pond.
[Illustration: "It was not much of a drive">[
"Whoa there, Smith!" shouted Harding. I jammed on brakes and turned to see what was the matter.
"What is it, papa?" asked Miss Harding.
"This is just the place I've been looking for," he said, standing and surveying the meadow with the eye of an expert.