Concerning them I made some remark, trivial yet enough to start Manning.
He told me of them, and of their peculiarities and virtues. He descanted
at length on their breeding, and whence came they and their fathers and
their fathers' fathers even unto the sixth generation. He left me at
last with the impression that this was probably the best team in the
valley, bar none. It was a good team, strong, spirited, gentle, and
enduring.

We swung out from the little town into a straight road. If it has seemed
that I have occupied you too exclusively with objects near at hand, the
matter could not be helped. There was nothing more to occupy you. A fog
held all the land.

It was a dense fog, and a very cold. Twenty feet ahead of the horses
showed only a wall of white. To right and left dim, ghostly bushes or
fence posts trooped by us at the ordered pace of our trot. An occasional
lone poplar tree developed in the mist as an object on a dry plate
develops. We splashed into puddles, crossed culverts, went through all
the business of proceeding along a road--and apparently got nowhere. The
mists opened grudgingly before us, and closed in behind. As far as
knowing what the country was like I might as well have been blindfolded.

From Manning I elicited piecemeal some few and vague ideas. This
meagreness was not due to a disinclination on Manning's part, but only
to the fact that he never quite grasped my interest in mere
surroundings. Yes, said he, it was a pretty flat country, and some
brush. Yes, there were mountains, some ways off, though. Not many trees,
but some--what you might call a few. And so on, until I gave it up.
Mountains, trees, brush, and flat land! One could construct any and all
landscapes with such building blocks as those.

Now, as has been hinted, I was dressed for southern California; and the
fog was very damp and chill. The light overcoat I wore failed utterly to
exclude it. At first I had been comfortable enough, but as mile
succeeded mile the cold of that winter land fog penetrated to the bone.
In answer to my comment Manning replied cheerfully in the words of an
old saw:

"_A winter's fog
Will freeze a dog_,"

said he.

I agreed with him. We continued to jog on. Manning detailed what I then
thought were hunting lies as to the abundance of game; but which I
afterward discovered were only sober truths. When too far gone in the
miseries of abject cold I remembered his former calling, and gla