The train now curved southward and entered a fertile valley lying like a bowl among the high mountains. They saw here fields that had been golden with wheat, ripe fruit yet hung from the trees, and the touch of green was still visible, although autumn had come. By the railway track a clear mountain stream flowed, sparkling in the thin, pure air, and there was more than one full-grown man in the candidate's party who, with memories of his youth before him, longed to pull off shoes and socks and wade in it with bare feet. The sight was most refreshing after so much mountain and arid expanse, and the tired travellers brightened up visibly. "One of the states has the motto, 'Here we rest'--I've forgotten which it is--but it ought to be Utah," said Hobart, "and now's the time." He was not disappointed. They came before noon to Belleville, the metropolis of the valley, the place where the candidate was going to speak, one of the prettiest little towns that ever built its nest in the Rocky Mountains. They were all enthusiastic over it, with its trim houses, its well-paved streets, the clear water flowing beside the curbs, and its air of completion. The people, too, had all the Western courage and energy, without its roughness and undue expression, and so the candidate and his party luxuriated. "You wouldn't think that this gem of a town was harried more by Indians in its infancy than perhaps any other place in the West, would you?" said Hobart to Harley. "Hobart, what a nuisance you are!" replied Harley; "you are always prowling around in search of useless facts. Now, I don't want to hear anything about bloodshed and massacre, when Belleville is the picture of neatness and comfort that it is to-day. Look at that little opera-house over there! You couldn't find anything handsomer in a city of fifty thousand in the East." "Harley," said Hobart, with emphasis, "I wouldn't have your lack of curiosity for anything in the world," and he wandered away in disgust to pour his ancient history into the ears of a more willing listener. At twilight they ate an admirable dinner, and then Harley, Hobart, who had returned from his explorations, Blaisdell, and two or three others, after their custom, filled in the interval between supper and the speeches with a stroll through the village, Mr. Plummer going along as a sort of mentor. The keeper of the hotel informed them that many of the Indians already were in town and were "tanking up." Harley found this to be true, and the red men failed to arouse in him either respect or admiration. If they had ever had any nobility of the wilderness, it was gone now, and they seemed to him a sodden, depressed, and repellent race. A half-dozen or so, in various stages of drunkenness, through whiskey surreptitiously obtained, increased the feeling of aversion.