a moment before had been like sapphire,
dulled with an indescribable grayness.

Then came a little singing afar off, as if
from a distant convocation of cicadæ, and
before Henderson could guess what it meant,
a cloud of dust was upon him, blinding and
bewildering, pricking with sharp particles
at eyes and nostrils. The pony was an ugly
fellow, and when Henderson felt him put his
forefeet together, he knew what that meant,
and braced himself for the struggle. But it
was useless; he had not yet acquired the
knack of staying on the back of a bucking
bronco, and the next moment he was on
the ground, and around him whirled that
saffron chaos of dust. The temperature
lowered every moment. Henderson in-
stinctively felt that this was but the begin-
ning of the storm. He picked himself up
without useless regrets for his pony, and
made his way on.

The saffron hue turned to blackness, and
then out of the murk shot a living green
ball of fire, and ploughed into the earth.
Then sheets of water, that seemed to come
simultaneously from earth and sky, swept
the prairie, and in the midst of it struggled
Henderson, weak as a little child, half bereft