the husband of my lovely mother, so long dead.

Here was the soldier of Waterloo, the adventurer into this Far West, the man who had died with some secret sorrow, or some sorrow for which he found no words or no confidant.

Above me was the blinding sun, before me the prairie, at my feet this hillock of clay, where weeds had already begun to sprout.
Mr.Brooks watched me; and seeing me move he started on; and I followed him through the broken gate to the buggy.
It was two miles to the log house which my father had built on his land.
We drove up and went in.

A tenant named Engle was living here with his wife and numerous children.

Some of them crowded around us; others ran and hid, afterwards peered around the corner, timid and wild.