ing a grisly spectral
light, even more horrible than that palpable night."_

At length the sensation of sudden stopping dizzied us momentarily. We
thrust out an oar and felt a slowly sloping bar. Driving the oar
half-way into the soft sand, we wrapped the boat's chain about it and
went to bed, flinging the tarp over us.

A raw dawn wind sprinkled a cheerless morning over us, and we got up
with our joints grinding rustily. We were in the midst of a desolate
waste of sand and water. The bar upon which we had lodged was utterly
bare. Drinking a can of condensed milk between us, we pushed on.

That day we found ourselves in the country of red barns. It was like
warming cold hands before an open grate to look upon them. At noon we
saw the first wheat-field of the trip--an undulating golden flood,
dimpled with the tripping feet of the wind. These were two joys--quite
enough for one day. But in the afternoon the third came--the first
golden-rod. My first impulse was to take off my hat to it, offer it my
hand.

That evening we pulled up to a great bank, black-veined with outcrops of
coal, and cooked supper over a civilized fire. For many miles along the
river in North Dakota, as well as along the Yellowstone in Montana,
these coal outcrops are in evidence. Doubtless, within another
generation, vast mining operations will be opened up in these
localities. Coal barges will be loaded at the mines and dropped down
stream to the nearest railroad point.

We were in the midst of an idyllic country--green, sloping, lawn-like
pastures, dotted sparsely with grotesque scrub oaks. Far over these the
distant hills lifted in filmy blue. The bluffs along the water's edge
were streaked with black and red and yellow, their colors deepened by
the recent rains. Lazy with a liberal supper, we drifted idly and gave
ourselves over for a few minutes to the spell of this twilight
dreamland. I stared hard upon this scene that would have delighted
Theocritus; and with little effort, I placed a half-naked shepherd boy
under the umbrella top of that scrub oak away up yonder on the lawny
slope. With his knees huddled to his chin, I saw him, his fresh cheeks
bulged with the breath of music. I heard his pipe--clear,
dream-softened--the silent music of my own heart. Dream flocks sprawled
tinkling up the hills.

With a wild burst of scarlet, the sunset flashed out. Black clouds
darkened the visible idyll. A chill gust swept across the stream,
showering