By Right of Purchase by Harold Bindloss — Read

Dusk was creeping up from the eastwards across the great snow-sheeted plain when Leland pulled his horses up where a little by-track branched off from the beaten trail. Behind him the wilderness, losing its gleaming whiteness and fading into shades of soft blue-grey, ran level to the hard blueness on the northern horizon. In front of him there were rolling rises ridged with sinuous bands of birches, black in broken masses against the lingering light in the south and west. There was room for wheat enough to glut markets of the world on the leagues of rich black loam that undulated to the frozen waters of Lake Winnipeg. Already miles of it were banded together by belts of two-foot stubble; but as yet the plough had not invaded the land of bluff and ravine, creek and coulee, where the shaggy broncho and the wild steer ran.

Leland was wrapped to the eyes in an old fur coat, and his breath rose like steam into the dead still air. A cloud of thin vapour floated above the horses. It was exceptionally cold, and Gallwey, who sat half-frozen beneath the piled-up robes, wondered why his companion had pulled the team up there when they were within some twenty minutes' ride from shelter. Still he did not consider it advisable to inquire, for certain colts of a blooded sire had been missing, and Leland, who had shown signs of temper during the day, looked unusually grim. Flinging the reins to Gallwey, he stepped down stiffly from the sleigh.