The wind drifted along the valley crisp with the breath of the harvest dawn. It blew gently over the prairies flowing in from the west. Speeding valleyward a horse and rider zigzagged in easy canter through the shrublands. They clung to the deep paths of the buffaloes, dug long years ago by countless droves threading their way to the stream in the great ravine.
It was the girl's delight to "trail" these grass-grown ruts through the dense groves hanging shaggily to the south banks. In a little they ran out on a high shoulder of The Qu'Appelle. Here the bare hill was ribbed with the parallel paths to the number of seven or eight that slipped over the ravine crest, disappearing a few paces below into a thick grove of stunted oak. Halting the eager broncho, the girl let her eyes rest on the valley.
It was a pretty gulf cleaving the prairie for a width of two or three miles and winding out of sight into the blue distance. There was visible the shine of lakes and their linking streams. Under the amber light of the autumnal sunrise the valley was pricked out into a landscape of gold. The bank upon which they stood swept away to the southeast in a forest crescent wonderful with the variegated leafage of the searing year. Paling greens, bright yellows, faint oranges mingled with browns and buffs and the brilliant wines and reds. the colourful forest was a charming Joseph's coat, but in the spacious distance its mottled glory blent into the russet-yellow of the prairie autumn.
The north bank rose beyond, walling the ravine in a billowy rank of great, rounded hills bald as the skull of the golden eagle and seamed with dark lines of wooded gulches. Here and there along the crests hung over the edges of the great, harvest blanket, strips of wheat fields studded with their nuggets of brown stooks. In the blue radiance above drifted a fleet of soft clouds with creamy breasts and fringes of amber fire. On the floor of the valley lay a lake spread out in a broad silver ribbon that rose to the skyline for miles into the west.
"You beautiful Qu'Appelle!" cried the girl softly. "We love you—Bobs and I."
For many minutes she revelled in the ecstasy of gleaming morning and golden valley, her cheeks bitten to roses by the tanging wind-drift. At length she granted release to her impatient horse and let him dash down into the trees. Under their branches she drew him to a walk and, leaving the selection of their trail to the petulant Bobs, abandoned herself to the alchemy of the harvest woods.
