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Chapter 15
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Little Britches, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Fathers, Sons, and Growing Up
Honesty and Pride
Work and Society
Community, Resources, and Conflict
Home and the American West
Summary
Analysis
Freddie Sprague gets the mumps and school is canceled for a month. This month is still one of the best, even though the Moodys’ horse Bill dies, and Ralph’s mother still makes the children study. Fred offers to lend Ralph’s father his new horse for the winter if he “gentle-breaks” him, and Ralph’s father accepts. Fred drops the horse off the next day, and Ralph admires how beautiful he is. The next day Ralph and his father travel to Logan Town to trade with Mr. Green, the owner of the town’s only general store. They buy a huge number of groceries, and Mr. Green agrees to continuing trading beans—though not peas—with them going forward.
School is canceled for a month, and Ralph enjoys the time off, going on errands on with his father and studying at home under his mother’s instruction. Without school or serious work to be done on the farm, Ralph and his family experience a pleasant lull, the first in a long time since moving to Colorado. After the drama of the summer and early fall, everyone seems to enjoy the return to normalcy for the family.
Themes
After dinner, Ralph’s parents discuss finances while Ralph and Grace do their homework. Ralph’s parents realize they are wealthier than anticipated and look the happiest they’ve been since coming to Colorado. The next morning, Ralph’s mother takes the children to Englewood to buy clothes while Ralph helps Bessie Aultland pick apples. When he gets home, Ralph sees three dead, skinned pigs hanging in the barn. Noticing Ralph’s startled look, his father reassures him there is nothing to be afraid of. He explains that the pigs have completed their mission on earth, which is to get fat to be eaten, and that they did not feel any pain dying.
Discovering themselves to be better off than anticipated, Ralph’s parents experience a new lease on life, buying new clothes for their children and engaging in wholesome family activities. In a powerful bonding moment, Ralph’s father also explains his beliefs surrounding killing animals to Ralph, justifying their death by claiming their mission in life is to be consumed by humans.
Themes
The next day, everyone works to prepare and cook the pork. After that, Ralph and his father begin work on a cellar. Ralph’s mother is worried about the next time a big wind comes, and so Ralph and his father go to pick up poles from the canyon, breaking in the stubborn new colt in the process. After three day of hauling poles, they begin digging a hole for the cellar, pumping in water to soften the dirt. They finish building the cellar, and then they begin work on a corral using the poles from the canyon. When they finish, Ralph rides up the hill to look down at their house, reflecting how much it looks like a real ranch.
Taking advantage of their free time and new economic prosperity, Ralph and his father embark on several new construction projects. Upon completion, Ralph revisits the hill from which he first viewed their ranch, reflecting on its radical transformation. Though Ralph’s reflections are targeted at ranch, they draw a parallel to his own personal transformation. Much as ranch has finally come into its own, Ralph has also come into his own, exhibiting a newfound confidence in his identity and place in the world.
Themes
