There was a sort of rough table-land--scrubby and stony and thick it was, but still the grass wasn't bad in summer, when the country below was all dried up.

There were wild horses in troops there, and a few wild cattle, so Jim and I knew the place well; but it was too far and too much of a journey for our own horses to go often.
'Do you see that sugar-loaf hill with the bald top, across the range ?' said father, riding up just then, as we were taking it easy a little.
'Don't let the cattle straggle, and make straight for that.' 'Why, it's miles away,' said Jim, looking rather dismal.

'We could never get 'em there.' 'We're not going there, stupid,' says father; 'that's only the line to keep.

I'll show you something about dinner-time that'll open your eyes a bit.' Poor Jim brightened up at the mention of dinner-time, for, boylike, he was getting very hungry, and as he wasn't done growing he had no end of an appetite.

I was hungry enough for the matter of that, but I wouldn't own to it.
'Well, we shall come to somewhere, I suppose,' says Jim, when father was gone.