Harding of Allenwood by Harold Bindloss

A week after his meeting with Beatrice Mowbray, Harding went out one morning to plow. He was in a thoughtful mood, but it was characteristic that he did not allow his reflections to interfere with his work. His house was unfinished, and the nights were getting cold; but neither Hester nor he placed personal comfort first, and there was a strip of land that must be broken before the frost set in.

It was a calm morning and bright sunshine poured down upon the grass that ran back, growing faintly blue in the distance, until it faded into the mellow haze that shut in the wide circle of prairie. Here and there the smooth expanse was broken by small, gleaming ponds and wavy lines of timber picked out in delicate shades of indigo and gray, but the foreground was steeped in strong color. Where the light struck it, the withered grass shone like silver; elsewhere it was streaked with yellow and cinnamon. The long furrows traced across it were a rich chocolate-brown, and the turned-back clods had patches of oily brightness on their faces. The leaves in a neighboring bluff formed spots of cadmium; and even the big breaker plow, painted crude green and vermilion, did not seem out of place. It was a new implement, the best that Harding could buy, and two brawny red oxen hauled it along.