VALLEYS, PLAINS, AND LOWLANDS 



243 



district isolated from the table-land family. 

 The Arizona and the Colorado countries are 

 very different from it, and neither of these 

 bears much likeness to the Asiatic table- 

 lands, like the steppes of Siberia or the great 

 plateau of Tibet. All of them are fine in 

 horizon and mountain lines, in skies, and in at- 

 mospheres. All of them again have picturesque 

 spots, where swales and basins fall into graceful 

 shapes, where water runs, and grass grows. And 

 again, all of them are stimulating in their wild- 

 ness and aloofness from civilization. These are 

 the primeval tracts, never subjugated by the 

 plough the free spaces of the world, where the 

 wind blows up and over the hills and ridges, 

 blowing toward No Man's Land. The feeling 

 of solitude, of being alone with nature, is omni- 

 present ; and there is enough of the savage in 

 everyone to feel pleasure in that sensation. We 

 may aspire to the stars mentally and spiritually, 

 but nature made our feet to tread the earth. 

 The animal in us cannot be wholly eradicated 

 by any course of ascetic training. I have seen 

 wild horses on a high ridge snorting with de- 

 light at the sun and the wind ; given the op- 

 portunity, the physical in man will assert itself 

 just as strongly. 



