readers to disclose, here, all the secrets of that book.

So successful was the first summer which Nort and Dick spent at
their uncle's ranch, that they were allowed to repeat it the
following season. But this time there was a change. As related in
the second volume, "The Boy Ranchers in Camp," Mr. Merkel had, by
utilizing an ancient underground water-course beneath Snake
Mountain, and by making a dam in Pocut River, brought water to a
distant valley he owned.

This valley was originally called Buffalo Wallow, the source of
the name being obvious. But once water was brought through the
underground course, and piped to a reservoir, whence it could be
distributed to drinking troughs for the cattle, and also used to
irrigate the land, it enabled a fine crop of fodder to be grown.
With the bringing of the water to Buffalo Wallow, or Flume
Valley, as Bud called the place, it was possible to do what had
never been done before--raise cattle there. Bud's father let him
take this valley ranch as his own, and Nort and Dick were boy
partners associated with their western cousin, Mr. Shannon
putting up part of the needed capital to make the start for his
sons.

All would have gone well except for the mysterious stoppage of
the flow of water, which stoppage, if continued, would mean
disaster.

How the water fight at Diamond X Second (as the valley ranch was
sometimes called) ended, and how the strange mystery was solved,
is the story in the second volume, and I absolutely refuse to go