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e Hudson Bay Company Post which stood at the confluence of the Buffalo and Red Rivers. Food and fresh horses were all we required, and after these requisites had been obtained the journey was prosecuted with renewed vigour. Forty miles had yet to be traversed before the point at which the Steamboat lay could be reached, and for that distance the track ran on the left or Dakota side of the Red River. As we journeyed along the Dakota prairies the last hour of daylight overtook us, bringing with it a Scene of magical beauty. The sun resting on the rim of the prairie cast over the vast expanse of grass a flood of light. On the east lay the darker green of the trees of the Red River. The whole western sky was full of wild-looking thunder-clouds, through which the rays of sunlight shot upward in great trembling shafts of glory. Being on horseback and alone, for my companion had trotted on in his waggon, I had time to watch and note this brilliant spectacle; but as soon as the sun had dipped beneath the sea of verdure an ominous sound caused me to gallop on with increasing haste. The pony seemed to know the significance of that sound much better than its rider. He no longer lagged, nor needed the spur or whip to urge him to faster exertion, for darker and denser than on the previous night there rose around us vast numbers of mosquitoes--choking masses of biting insects, no mere cloud thicker and denser in one place than in another, but one huge wall of never-ending insects filling nostrils, ears, and eyes. Where they came from I cannot tell; the prairie seemed too small to hold them; the air too limited to yield them space. I had seen many vast accumulations of insect life in lands old and new, but never any thing that approached to this mountain of mosquitoes on the prairies of Dakota. To say that they covered the coat of the horse I rode would be to give but a faint idea of their numbers; they were literally six or eight deep upon his skin, and with a single sweep of the hand one could crush myriads from his neck. Their hum seemed to be in all things around. To ride for it was the sole resource. Darkness came quickly down, but the track knew no turn, and for seven miles I kept the pony at a gallop; my face, neck, and hands cut and bleeding. At last in the gloom I saw, down in what appeared to be the bottom of a valley, a long white wooden building, with lights showing out through the windows. Riding quickly down this valley
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