Several ranches lay along the western slope of this section.

Jean was informed that open parks and swales, and little valleys nestling among the foothills, wherever there was water and grass, had been settled by ranchers.

Every summer a few new families ventured in.
Blaisdell struck Jean as being a lionlike type of Texan, both in his broad, bold face, his huge head with its upstanding tawny hair like a mane, and in the speech and force that betokened the nature of his heart.

He was not as old as Jean's father.

He had a rolling voice, with the same drawling intonation characteristic of all Texans, and blue eyes that still held the fire of youth.