They were riding at the edge of the immense sandy plain, patched with brown jaggled grass and parched brambles and prickly lignum vitae--nothing to break the barren monotony but clumps of stunted brigalow and gidia, a wind-mill marking the site of an empty well with the few hungry-looking cattle near it.
Now they dipped into a scrub of dismal gidia.
'This is the most depressing country I have ever ridden through,' he said.
'You don't know what a difference three inches of rain makes,' she answered.

'Then the grass is green, the creeks are running, and at this time the dead brambles are covered with white flowers.

But it doesn't rain.

There's the tragedy.' 'The tragedy is that you--you of all women should be wasting your youth and beauty in this wilderness.

How long is it going to last ?' She shrugged again, and for an instant turned her face up towards the sky.