ACROSS THE NAVAJO DESERT 31 



On the other side of the plain, two or three miles 

 from a high wall of vermilion cliffs, we stopped 

 for the night at a little stone rest-house, built 

 as a station by a cow outfit. Here there were 

 big corrals, and a pool of water piped down by 

 the cow-men from a spring many miles distant. 

 On the sand grew the usual desert plants, and 

 on some of the ridges a sparse growth of grass, 

 sufficient for the night feed of the hardy horses. 

 The little stone house and the corrals stood 

 bare and desolate on the empty plain. Soon 

 after we reached them a sand-storm rose and 

 blew so violently that we took refuge inside the 

 house. Then the wind died down; and as the 

 sun sank toward the horizon we sauntered off 

 through the hot, still evening. There were 

 many sidewinder rattlesnakes. We killed several 

 of the gray, flat-headed, venomous things; as 

 we slept on the ground outside the house, un- 

 der the open sky, we were glad to kill as many 

 as possible, for they sometimes crawl into a 

 sleeper's blankets. Except this baleful life, there 

 was little save the sand and the harsh, scanty 

 vegetation. Across the lonely wastes the sun 

 went down. The sharply channelled cliffs turned 

 crimson in the dying light; all the heavens 

 flamed ruby red, and faded to a hundred dim 

 hues of opal, beryl and amber, pale turquoise 



