Straggling bits of forest--yellow pines, the driver called the trees--began
to encroach upon the burned-over and arid barren land. To Carley these
groves, by reason of contrast and proof of what once was, only rendered the
landscape more forlorn and dreary. Why had these miles and miles of forest
been cut? By money grubbers, she supposed, the same as were devastating the
Adirondacks. Presently, when the driver had to halt to repair or adjust
something wrong with the harness, Carley was grateful for a respite from
cold inaction. She got out and walked. Sleet began to fall, and when she
resumed her seat in the vehicle she asked the driver for the blanket to
cover her. The smell of this horse blanket was less endurable than the
cold. Carley huddled down into a state of apathetic misery. Already she had
enough of the West.

But the sleet storm passed, the clouds broke, the sun shone through,
greatly mitigating her discomfort. By and by the road led into a section of
real forest, unspoiled in any degree. Carley saw large gray squirrels with
tufted ears and white bushy tails. Presently the driver pointed out a flock
of huge birds, which Carley, on second glance, recognized as turkeys, only
these were sleek and glossy, with flecks of bronze and black and white,
quite different from turkeys back East. "There must be a farm near," said
Carley, gazing about.

"No, ma'am. Them's wild turkeys," replied the driver, "an' shore the best
eatin' you ever had in your life."

A little while afterwards, as they were emerging from the woodland into
more denuded country, he pointed out to Carley a herd of gray white-rumped
animals that she took to be sheep.

"An' them's antelope," he said. "Once this desert was overrun by antelope.