The weather was glorious, and the sun poured down its cheering beams upon us from a clear sky. With jokes and anecdotes, our hearts filled with expectation of the marvels that lay before us, we trotted after the quick-footed piebald, who appeared as pleased as his master to leave the civilization of the pale faces behind him. It is true that the grassy plains over which we rode were not spangled with flower-beds of every hue as in spring or autumn; but for all that the illimitable bright-green expanse did our sight good, while we were greeted by a few budding flowers. Even though the coppices, rising every now and then from the prairie, were not clothed in the luxuriant dark foliage of other seasons, still they did not display that picture of utter death, which the traveller finds during winter in the forests of northern climes. The soil of the forests is at this season covered with wild oats, growing to a height of four feet. The scrub consists principally of evergreen bushes; above it rise many varieties of trees of moderate height, which never entirely lose their glistening leaves, and these again are crowned by the different families of the magnolia, which do not lose their ornament either. Evergreen creepers climb to the highest branches, and hang down from the airy height in long streamers, which serve as a plaything to the slightest breath of air. Four fine days we passed over these extensive plains, from whose lap higher and steeper hills gradually rise, until the latter form into a chain and impart to the landscape the character of mountainous scenery. We were among the spurs of the San Saba mountains, which do not run so far south here as they do farther west, and everywhere found water for ourselves and provender for our cattle. But now the stone-covered hills gradually became higher and the valleys narrower; we frequently crossed large ranges of table-land, on which the mosquito grass grows scantily; and as this is the only sort that remains green in winter, we could not let any opportunity slip to feed our cattle when we came across good pasturage. We need not be so anxious about water, as nearly all the valleys between these mountains are supplied with it in winter. [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER XIX. A BOLD TOUR.