THE HAMILTON ASSOCIATION. 171 



below. In the summer we have the other extreme, except that our 

 nights are very cool. 



One of the first things I will mention will be the distance sound 

 travels. It is generally in the evening ; a peculiar stillness comes 

 over the prairie, a stillness that cannot be described. When the air 

 is in that condition we can distinctly hear every word spoken at over 

 a mile ; houses are far apart here, generally a mile apart, and I have 

 often heard my neighbor talking in the evenings. Sometimes it is 

 the same in the morning, and stays so till about noon. I remember 

 one day especially, it was a very foggy morning, — a rare thing out 

 here. I was plowing, and had got to the other end of my field, 

 when I heard a voice come out of the fog. It was a man speaking 

 to his team. He appeared to be only a few feet from me, and I 

 almost expected to see him any moment. I started back to the 

 south end again, that is half a mile, but seemed to get no nearer 

 the man and team. About noon however the fog got thinner, and 

 I saw it was a neighbor of mine plowing south of me, it was a little 

 over a mile and a half from the north end of my place to him, and 

 yet I heard him as distincdy as if he had been beside me. 



On another occasion, it was a moon -light night in the fall dur- 

 ing harvest. A neighbor^two miles away was cutting his wheat very 

 late at night, near ten o'clock, as the night was threatening frost. 

 Every sound of the binder was distinctly heard, and every word 

 he said when he turned the corner. He was over two miles away, 

 (when he was at the far end of his field) probably two-and-a-quarter 

 miles, yet we could hear the machine tie every sheaf and throw it 

 out. 



It would not do to be running down your neighbors on such 

 days as these. Mirages are common. The only wood visible from 

 here is some on the Indian reserve, but many days we see miles of 

 timber around us. Some of it must be a long distance off. Turtle 

 mountain, ninety miles away, is often brought very close. These 

 mirages are seen in winter ; in summer we see a different class, — 

 lakes and rivers that do not exist at all. I started home one day 

 from town, walking along the railroad, about a mile away appeared 

 a grand lake with rippling waves, and the houses on the opposite 

 shore reflected in it as natural as life. The track ran into the water 

 and disappeared, but came out on the other side. The lake ex- 



