Rulers of Kings by Gertrude Atherton

Fessenden drew his leg over his horse's neck and looked idly about him. The sun was directly overhead; he had forgotten his compass, and, apparently, he was lost in the very middle of the great plain of Hungary. But he had been lost many times before, and in far worse places than this green and smiling expanse; so flat and lying in an atmosphere of such clarity he could well believe the gentle Magyar boast that with the naked eye a man could be distinguished from a beast at a distance of fifteen miles. There appeared to be nothing whatever on the horizon; but an occasional small farm dotted the prairie, and here and there he saw a goose girl with her little flock, a shepherd in his native costume: a long white coat of spun wool, with panels of black embroidered at the edges; a garment as immaculate as if just from the loom, and swung carelessly about the shoulders, the sleeves evidently designed for ornament alone.

The little goose girls might have stood for a study in lonely childhood; as Fessenden turned his head one was the solitary figure in the vast expanse behind him; but when he passed her she had nodded brightly and seemed quite content with her lot.