The road was good, the vehicle comfortable, the air sweet and cool:
along the many ruts in the sand grew long rows of sunflowers, which
fill every trail on the plains for hundreds of miles, and give a
little color to the colorless scene. The season of flowers was nearly
over in that rainless country, but a few still lingered, and among
them was the familiar larkspur, growing wild. At first, the long low
hills seemed lonely as graves, but we soon found there was not a rod
of ground but had its inhabitants. Everywhere something was moving,
some little beast, bird or insect: larks sang and perked about on the
stones; prairie-birds twittered; gophers (pretty creatures with
feathery tails and leopard spots) slid rapidly to their holes;
prairie-dogs sat like sentinels upon their mounds and barked like
angry puppies; great pink-and-gray grasshoppers, so fat that they
could hardly waddle, indulged their voracity; and brown crickets and
butterflies were seen on every side. An antelope disappears in the
distance: a brigand-like horseman rides up and asks the way. He is a
suspicious-looking character, and pistols are cocked.
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