shrub, or object of any nature bigger than a jack-rabbit; yet no sight
was so gladsome to the eyes, no scenery (save the mark!) so beautiful as
the range when clothed in green, the grass heading out, the lakes filled
with water and the cattle fat, sleek and contented. Yet in after years,
when passing through this same country by the newly-built railway in
winter-time, it came as a wonder to me how one could have possibly
passed so many years of his life in such a dreary, desolate,
uninteresting-looking region. To-day the whole district, even my own old
and familiar ranch, is desecrated (in the cattleman's eyes) by little
nesters' (settlers) cottages, and fences so thick and close together as
to resemble a Boer entanglement. I had done a bit of farming and some
years raised good crops of Milo maize, Kafir corn, sorghum, rye, and
even Indian corn. But severe droughts come on, when, as a nester once
told me, for two years nothing was raised, not even umbrellas!

These plains are, it may be safely said, the windiest place on earth,
especially in early spring, when the measured velocity sometimes shows
eighty miles per hour. When the big circular tumble weeds are bounding
over the plains then is the time to look out for prairie fires; and woe
betide the man caught in a blizzard in these lonely regions.

Once when driving from a certain ranch to another, a distance of fifty
miles, my directions were to "follow the main road." Fifty miles was no
great distance and my team was a good one. I knew there were no houses
between the two points. After driving what long experience told me was
more than fifty miles, and still no ranch, I became a bit anxious; but
there was nothing for it but to keep going. Black clouds in the north
warned me of danger. I pushed the team along till they were wet with
sweat; some snow fell; it grew dark as night; and a regular blizzard set
in and I was in despair. I had a good bed in the buggy, so would myself
probably have got through the night all right, but my horses were bound
to freeze to death if staked out or tied up. As a last resource I threw
the reins down and left it to the team to go wherever they pleased. For
some time they kept on the road, but soon the jolting told me that they
had left it and we began to go down a hill; in a little while great was
my joy to see a light and to find ourselves soon in the hospitable
shelter of a Mexican sheep-herder's hut. The Mexican unhitched the team
an