"When it's roundup time in Texas and the bloom is on the sage,
How I long to be in Texas, just a ridin' on the range.
I can smell the bacon fryin', hear it sizzlin' in the pan,
Hear the breakfast horn in the early morn, drinkin' coffee from a can."

     Looking at her appraisingly over his cup he smiled. "I'd say young Mr. Schmidt has got himself quite a wife: hard-working, good cook, handy with a shotgun-- and very pretty."
     "Well, thank you," she managed, eyes shining, cheeks very pink, and her breasts rising and falling rather quickly under the snug gingham dress.
     He had a feeling that compliments had been in short supply around the ranch lately.      (from TEJON TRAIL)

Thackeray is of course an excellent writer, and an insightful student of human nature; but he has a cold, cynical, somewhat bitter view of things, which often causes him to miss the actual truth about people and their actions. In VANITY FAIR, for example, he often makes a ridiculous observation in order to insert a negative comment about human beings, at least in the England he knew. 

 " ... The trials of the men who had murdered the Lester Mine Company scabs and gunmen had ended up convicting no one; and now, on top of that, the Ku Klux Klan and the Protestant churches were beginning to raise major hell about the road-house bootlegging and prostitution that were running wild around Herrin and Marion..... "   (EGYPT BURNING)

"All around the water tank, waitin' for a train; a thousand miles away from home, singin' in the rain ...."   (old song by Jimmie Rodgers)