haze, out of which Pilot Peak, thirty-eight miles away, rears its conical
head 2,500 feet above the level plain at its base.

Some riding is obtained at intervals along this unattractive stretch of
country, but there are no continuously ridable stretches, and the principal
incentive to mount at all is a feeling of disgust at so much compulsory
walking. A noticeable feature through the desert is the almost unquenchable
thirst that the dry saline air inflicts upon one. Reaching a railway
section-house, I find no one at home; but there is a small underground
cistern of imported water, in which "wrigglers " innumerable wriggle,
but which is otherwise good and cool. There is nothing to drink out of,
and the water is three feet from the surface; while leaning down to try
and drink, the wooden framework at the top gives way and precipitates
me head first into the water. Luckily, the tank is large enough to enable
me to turn round and reappear at the surface, head first, and with
considerable difficulty I scramble out again, with, of course, not a dry
thread on me.

At three in the afternoon I roll into Terrace, a small Mormon town. Here
a rather tough-looking citizen, noticing that my garments are damp,
suggests that 'cycling must be hard work to make a person perspire like
that in this dry climate. At the Matlin section-house I find accommodation
for the night with a whole-souled section-house foreman, who is keeping
bachelor's hall temporarily, as his wife is away on a visit at Ogden.
>From this house, which is situated on the table-land of the Bed Dome
Mountains, can be obtained a more comprehensive view of the Great American
Desert than when we last beheld it. It has all the appearance of being
the dry bed of an ancient salt lake or inland sea. A broad, level plain
of white alkali, which is easily mistaken in the dim distance for smooth,
still water, stretches away like a dead, motionless sea as far as human