Grazing land

“ Vast waves of undulating meadow and farm land appear with fields of gleaming grain and clamps of elm, oak and maple to break its smoothly flowing billows. Farther away rise higher treeless ridges or wooded slopes, but all alike are smoothly flowing. ”

“ Here and there the farming land is broken by a lofty precipice rising a thousand feet or more directly out of luxuriant vegetation, just as an artist would put some bold figure into a picture to offer a contrast to the peaceful, cultivated slope. And the lofty mountain peaks look bolder and sterner because they rise so near the wheat fields, the gentle valleys dotted with white villages, and the sombre forests that are so thick and so green. ”

“ Unlike the flat monotony of the Grand Plains, here well wooded uplands, clothed with forest trees of every species, and picturesque dells, through which run clear bubbling streams belted with gay-blossomed shrubs, every where present themselves; whilst on the level meadow-land, topes of trees with spreading foliage afford a shelter to the game and cattle, and well-timbered knolls rise at intervals from the plain. ”

“ Then like gleams of fair morning will rise to view the prospects of the grass-land, the vistas of green bossy hills, the swirling swathes of young grass waltzing merrily with the gale, the flowing lines of boscage darkening the hollows, the receding view of uplifting and subsiding land waves rolling to the distance where the mountains loom in faint image through the undefined blue. ”

“ The meadow and the cornfield, the river, the mountain, and the woodland, the seashore, the very waste place by the roadside, each has sent its peculiar representatives, and glancing for the moment, at large, over the beds, noting their number and extent, remembering that the specimens are not in the mass but individual, the first conclusion is that our own country is the true Flowery Land. ”

“ At length we seemed to leave all human habitations behind; and in the majesty of loneliness we were crossing the desert, on a single track, in the midst of the lone prairie lands.
Those beautiful rolling plains—millions of acres, covered with the short, yellow buffalo grass—extend to the horizon in undulating lines, a wide, uninhabited, lifeless, uplifted solitude. The blue of the sky overhead and the dried-up grass are the only blending of colours. Monotonous as they are, there is the greatest fascination about the prairies. ”

“ Here, as in the Holy Land, winding ways pass out from olive-orchards, and on across dry reaches of upland broken by outcropping rocks and scattered trees and bushes and sparsely thatched with short dry grass. Through the silence will come now and then the tinkle of sheep-bells. Sometimes a flock will be seen, dimly in the starlight, feeding beside the road ”

“ Many clear streams dashing over their pebbly beds intersect the country, from which, in the noon-day's heat, the red-deer jump, shaking their wet sides, as the noise of approaching man disturbs them; and booming grouse rise from the tall luxuriant herbage at every step. Where the deep escarpments of the river banks exhibit the section of the earth, a rich alluvial soil of surpassing depth courts the cultivation of civilised man; and in every feature it is evident that here nature has worked with kindliest and most bountiful hand. ”

“ The observant traveller on the highways and byways of the northern provinces must have noticed on the banks of almost every stream many acres of marshy land producing merely reeds or coarse rank grass that no well-brought-up animal would look at. ”

“ But a great part is uncultivated prairie-land, grass, with sparse bushes and patches of brushwood and a few rare trees, and continual clumps of large golden daisies. Occasional rough black roads wind through the brush and into the towns, and die into grass tracks along the wire fences. ”

“ I had climbed the hill to look off across his own high-field pasture, where the white daisies, the purple fleabane, and the buttercups made a wild tangle of beauty among the tall herd's grass. Light airs moved billowing across the field, bobolinks and meadow larks were singing, and all about were the old fences, each with its wild hedgerow of choke cherry, young elms, and black raspberry bushes, and beyond, across miles and miles of sunny green countryside, the mysterious blue of the ever-changing hills. ”

“ THE WESTERN GRAZING-GROUNDS.grass is found only in the rare river bottoms where the soils of the different strata are mixed, and the few trees along the borders of streams—fertile lines of wadis, which laborious irrigation and coal mining [7] might convert into oases—are the cotton-wood and willow, to which the mezquite [10] may be added in the southern latitudes. The desert is mostly uninhabited, unendurable even to the wildest Indian. ”

“ The clearing of land in the progress of settlement had the same effect as the burning off of the forest—it virtually converted a wide area of primitive forest-covered country into prairie, though interspersed with tracts of woodland. Our pastures are in reality prairies so far, at least, as their faunal and floral features are concerned. ”

“ Following the showers there is a wonderful burst of life everywhere. Quick growing grasses cover the land with a carpet of green and fragrant blossoms fill the air with sweetness; but in a short time, except where the irrigation ditches reach the land, the entire region once more becomes a yellow, parched desert. ”

“ And when the chosen came, they found the earth ready to receive them—lifted above the baneful breath of river-bottom and marshland, drained by rivers full of fish, filled with woods full of game, and underlaid—all—with thick, blue, limestone strata that, like some divine agent working in the dark, kept crumbling—ever crumbling—to enrich the soil and give bone-building virtue to every drop of water and every blade of grass. ”

“ The surrounding plains are endless and verdureless. The scanty grasses were long ago turned into sun-cured hay by the fierce summer heats. There is neither tree nor bush, the sky is grey, the earth buff, the air blae and windy, and clouds of coarse granitic dust sweep across the prairie and smother the settlement. ”

“ The valleys were covered with a silvery, shimmering atmosphere, on which we traced the outlines of meadows, forests, and lakes, like the first sketching of an artist picture that ere long, under our good genius the automobile, would grow into reality. The road that wound among forest crowned hills was one of the most pleasant we remember. The air was filled with silvery haze, which made distance mysterious; and grain fields and the nearer hills, touched with the rarest delicacy of tone and softly blended color, were dreamy and full of suggestion of Indian summer. ”

“ The monkshood of our gardens, growing at a great height on the Alps, has a brighter hue than elsewhere. It is seen in tufts, that to my fancy presented fairy groves upon the green grass, and in rocky places, or under trees.
The storm over, we proceeded, still in the forest, which led us through different compartments of the vale, each of itself a little valley of the loveliest greenness, on all sides skirted with pine-trees, and often sprinkled with huts, the summer dwellings of the herdsmen. ”

“ In rural landscape scenes she is an important feature. Behold her grazing in the pastures and on the hillsides, or along banks of streams, or ruminating under wide-spreading trees, or standing belly-deep in the creek or pond, or lying upon the smooth places in the quiet summer afternoon, the day's grazing done, and waiting to be summoned home to be milked ”

“ Here was a valley stretching four miles east and west, and about eight miles north and south, left with the richest soil to its own wild growth of grass—which in civilization would have been a most valuable meadow for the rearing of cattle—invested as it was by dense forests, darkening the horizon at all points of the compass, and folded in by tree-clad ridges. ”

“ Nature works hard in these Western fields, conquering them from the forest, redeeming them from the swamp and tending the delicate grain amid the rank growth of prairie-grass; but when the last load is driven home and the last leaf has fallen, then she rests, and the hazy atmosphere and peculiar stillness mark her repose. ”

“ Two days later we altered our course again to the west, in order not to leave the mountains, which here enclosed large patches of grass-land. Crossing these low mountain spurs, we passed through many extensive valleys with excellent soil, firewood, especially oak, and abundant water, which assuredly ere long will be sought by civilization advancing from the East. In the West the mountains now rose higher, and raised their white peaks far above the clouds. ”

“ Valleys and cultivated fields, have each their characteristics of richness or of loveliness, but they have no beauty in comparison with that of woodland scenery. The wild thyme and moss, the short-cropped herbage, the tufts of fern and golden-blossomed gorse, that vary the ground on which we tread; the solemn depth of the lone forest, the noble groups of trees that diversify the open spaces, and the clear streams that flow silently through the deep soil, bordered with cowslips and wild marigolds, have all, and each, their own peculiar attractions. ”

“ Over these crags the hand of nature had spread a partial covering of moss and creeping plants; and many trees had grown up amongst them, striking their roots deeply into the crevices, and adorning their rough surfaces by their waving and pendant boughs. Through the rock-strewn valley, a narrow and intricate path had been worn by the feet of the wandering natives, and by the constant migrations of the herds of wild animals that inhabited the prairie, in search of water or of fresher herbage during the parching heat of an Indian summer. ”

“ At night I was cordially received by a farmer whose wife, though smart and neat in her appearance, was an inveterate smoker.
September 22. Hills becoming small, sparsely covered with soil. They are called "knob land" and are cultivated, or scratched, with a kind of one-tooth cultivator. Every rain robs them of their fertility, while the bottoms are of course correspondingly enriched. ”

“ The mild rays of the moon shining on the dewy grass, the red glare of the fire in parts illuminating the stems and foliage of the trees, but rendering the intervals of shadow deeper and more gloomy from the contrast, the painted figures of the natives, now brought into strong relief, now lost in the gloom of the forest, their uncouth gestures, and the wild and melancholy but not unpleasing cadence of their simple chant, combined to produce an effect which more ambitious displays often fail to realize. ”

“ Trees, hills, peaks and ravines stood out in the soft light, black and without detail. The floor of the winding valley took upon itself many shifting shades, a dark silver-gray here where there was a strip of sandy soil, a more somber splotch there where the willows followed a thin thread of a stream. ”

“ Much of the country we have denominated hilly is rich, fertile land, even to the summits of the hills. On all the streams are strips of rich alluvion [Pg 226] of exhaustless fertility. The interior, on the two White rivers and tributaries, is moderately undulating, tolerably rich soil, and much of it heavily timbered with oaks of various species, poplar, beech, sugar tree, walnuts, hickory, elm, and other varieties common to the West. There is much level, table land, between the streams. ”

“ There was little land that could be cultivated that was not under cultivation, but as yet the fields lay bare and baked in the burning sun, waiting the belated rain, as this part of the valley cannot be irrigated, owing to the lie of the land. ”

“ If you follow with your eyes this calm, reposeful river, now hiding itself beneath its protecting banks with their wealth of branching trees, tall cocoanut palms, and luxuriant undergrowth, now emerging like a huge blue serpent encrusted with diamonds, so brightly does the clear water sparkle in the sun, you note that it finally loses itself in a heavy, impenetrable mass of green forest. ”

“ Everywhere its deep verdure and profusion of beautiful flowers is in pleasing contrast with the sterile grandeur of the rock and the barrenness of the sandy plain, which, from the right bank of the river, sweeps up to the mountain range that forms its southern boundary. The great evaporation on the sandy soil of this elevated plain, and the saline efflorescences which whiten the ground, and shine like lakes reflecting in the sun, make a soil wholly unfit for cultivation. ”

“ That is not all; the top of the mountains is not the place where grass grows. There are bare, savage cliffs, from which every particle of soil has been washed by furious torrents, or the scanty vegetation has been burnt up by the fierce 'sunbeams like swords.' There the wild deer and the ravens live, the sheep feed down in the valleys. But 'their pasture shall be in all high places.' The literal rendering is even more emphatic: 'Their pasture shall be in all bare heights,' where a sudden verdure springs to feed them according to their need. ”

“ On a nearer approach, however, we could observe numerous patches of cultivated land, and the lower parts of the mountain covered with wood. Farther to the west, the plains are of greater extent, the country well wooded, and in a high state of cultivation ”

“ Nothing strikes the imagination more than the absolute aridity of the region now. Not a drop left in the bed of ancient lake or river, not a crystal thread trickling down the rock channelled by ancient cascades, and nevertheless abundance of greenery and luxuriant foliage everywhere! The waterless world of stone is not only a garden, but a green forest! ”