things that were in it, and his eyes popped out, and for a moment he
could hardly breathe, he was so excited, for they were Boots!

And when Whitey recovered a bit he rushed over and actually hugged his
father.

Perhaps you would like to know why a pair of boots would cause all this
feeling in Whitey. For one thing, it was because he never had owned any.
In New York all the boys wore shoes, and when Whitey had come to the
ranch he had worn them, too, until the soles of his feet had become hard
enough, like Injun's, for him to go barefoot, which he delighted in
doing.

But in the late fall, and the spring, when it was colder, he again
followed Injun's lead, and wore moccasins. Buckskin moccasins, with
little bead decorations. In the cold of winter, when the snow was deep,
and when the big thaws came, Whitey wore heavy, moccasin-like
muck-lucks, made of buckskin, which laced high, nearly to his knees, and
over the tops of which hung the tops of heavy, woolen socks.

These comprised Injun and Whitey's footwear for the seasons. But there
was one thing that Whitey envied the cowboys on the ranch their boots.
For you must know that there are two things on which a puncher spends
his money extravagantly--his boots and his saddle. Unless he happens to
be a Mexican--then he spends it on his hat, too.

So the dream of Whitey's life, the pinnacle of his ambition, the idea of
the tip-top of ecstatic happiness that lived in his brain
was--Boots. And now he had them. And they were beauties; with
tops of soft leather with fancy stitching, inlaid with white enameled