For which the speech of England has no name,
The prairies.... Lo! they stretch
In airy undulations far away,
As if the ocean, in his gentlest swell,
Stood still, with all his rounded billows, fix’d
And motionless forever.”—Bryant.
A railway ride over the beautiful prairies took Norman and his mother to their place of destination. How soft and gentle were those prairie swells, looking like English park scenery, relieved as is the vast expanse of meadow by scattered groves of trees. The fine unbroken horizon line tells you that you do not see a greater extent of country, only because your eye has no greater capabilities; that onward, and all around, the vast prairie lies in its verdure and beauty; that there, as here, the flowers are springing; that you may travel north, south, east, and west, hundreds of miles, and still that undulating prairie, in its “encircling vastness,” will lie around you like the sea.
At the station Norman found his uncle looking out anxiously for him, and he was soon pressed tenderly in his arms.
“Well, my boy,” said his uncle, “I feared we should be disappointed again to-day. How glad I am to see you once more, though you have so grown I would not have known you.”
“How is Aunt Ellen?” asked Norman.