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Show 348 Early Western Travels [ VoL * 6 beginning to flit athwart the fancy, when, happily, a long, low, wavering cloud- like line was caught stretching itself upon the extremest verge of the misty horizon. My jaded animal was urged onward; and slowly, very slowly, the dim outline undulated upward, and the green forest rose gradually before the gladdened vision! A few miles, the path plunged into the green, fresh woods; crossed a deep creek, which betrayed its meandering by the grove along its banks, and the hungry traveller threw himself from his horse before a log cabin imbowered in the trees. The spot was one of those luxuriant copses in the heart of the prairie, comprising several hundred acres, so common in the northern sections of Illinois. " Victuals and drinkl" were, of course, the first demand from a female who showed herself at the door; and, " I judge79 was the laconic but cheering [ 101] reply. She stared with uncontrolled curiosity at her stranger- guest At the moment he must have looked a perfect incarnation of ferocity; a very genius of famine and starvation; but, all in good time, he was luxuriating over a huge fragment of swine's flesh, a bowl of honey, and a loaf of bread; and soon were his miseries over. What! honey and hog's flesh not a luxury! Say ye so, reader! Verily, then, were ye never half starved in the heart of a Western prairie! Salem, III. XXXI " No leave take I, for I win ride As far as land will let me." " The long sunny lapse of a summer's daylight." " What fool is this!" As You Like It. AMONG that novel variety of feature which the perspicacity of European tourists in America has enabled them |
