Then the clouds, losing their borrowed tints, closed in like a pall; the
low wail of the wind grew louder as it approached and swept them away to
the south, leaving night to settle down upon the dwellers of the prairie
city, starlit and calm, while the distant glow of the prairie fires rose
luridly against the eastern sky. But all night long the creaking moan of
the ox-carts went on, giving the prairie a yet closer resemblance to "an
inland sea."




CHAPTER V.

Summer Days--The English Cathedral--Icelandic
Emigrants--_Tableaux_--In chase of our Dinner--The Indian
Summer--Blocked up--Gigantic Vegetables--Fruitfulness of the
Country--Iceland Maidens--Rates of Wages--Society at
Winnipeg--Half-castes--Magic of the Red River Water--A Happy
Hunting-ground--Where is Manitoba?


The summer passed uneventfully. Day after day we watched for the
white-covered mail-waggon, pails dangling underneath it, dogs trotting
behind, rousing as they passed countless wild brethren from every quarter
of the prairie. At sight of the waggon, we put on our hats and went to the
post-office for letters from home; then drove across the prairie to Silver
Heights, or down to the English cathedral, which stood on the fairest
bend of the river, and in a pretty, wooded dell--but, alas, it was
encircled by a tangled, uncared-for churchyard, overgrown with weeds and