An outdoor life is often better than medicine
and is a panacea for the "ills that human flesh is heir to."
The ranchman, if he is in tune with his surroundings, finds a
never-failing spring of pleasure. If he is company for himself
he is well entertained and if he is a lover of nature he finds
interesting subjects for study upon every hand. His wants are
few and simple and the free life that he lives develops in him a
strong and sturdy manhood. He is the picture of health and is
happy and contented as the day is long.
However, such a life does not suit everyone, as individual tastes
differ. Prejudice also exerts an influence and is apt to
estimate all western life as crude and undesirable, being in a
transition state of change from savagery to civilization. Be it
even so; for, if the savage had never existed to furnish the
ancestry that civilized man boasts, civilization would not have
been possible. It is only natural that this should be so as, in
the order of nature, evolution begins at the bottom and works up.
There is perhaps no condition in life that can be called perfect,
yet of the two extremes we choose to believe that civilization is
preferable to barbarism; but an intermediate state has the
advantage over both extremes by avoiding native crudeness upon
the one hand and excessive refinement upon the other, both being
equally undesirable.
Happiness, which we all profess to seek, exists in some degree
everywhere but we are always striving to acquire something more.
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