"It's all well enough," said the farmer, "till the mosquitoes and the horse-flies come."
"And that fresh, velvety turf, against those dark pools!"
"Those puddles there? 'Tocsogo' as we call them."
Meanwhile, high above, sounded the sweet song of the lark.
"Ah, those larks; how wonderful, how splendid!"
"They're thin enough now, but wait till the wheat ripens," replied the farmer.
Slowly the light grew, the purple of the sky melted into gold; the morning star, herald of the sun, already twinkled above the now visible horizon, and a rainbow-like iridescence played over the dewy grass, keeping pace with the movements of the dark figures. The horses, four to each carriage, flew over the pathless green meadow-land, till, presently, something began to show dark on the horizon—a plantation, the first acacias on the hitherto treeless puszta, and some bluish knolls.
"Those are the Tartar hills of Zám," explained the Debreczin farmer to his companions. "There stood some village destroyed by the Tartars. The ruins of the church still peep out of the grass, and the dogs, when they dig holes, scrape out human bones."
"And there, what sort of a Golgotha is that?"
"That," said the farmer, "is no Golgotha, but the three poles of the cattle wells. We are close to the herd."