It was very pleasant to loaf along a passable road mounted on a
light-footed horse, and Hazel enjoyed it if for no more than the
striking contrast to that terrible journey in and out of the Klappan.
Here were no heartbreaking mountains to scale. The scourge of flies
was well-nigh past. They took the road in easy stages,
well-provisioned, sleeping in a good bed at nights, camping as the
spirit moved when a likely trout stream crossed their trail, venison
and grouse all about them for variety of diet and the sport of hunting.
So they fared through the Telegraph Range, crossed the Blackwater, and
came to Fort George by way of a ferry over the Fraser.
"This country is getting civilized," Bill observed that evening. "They
tell me the G. T. P. has steel laid to a point three hundred miles east
of here. This bloomin' road'll be done in another year. They're
grading all along the line. I bought that hundred and sixty acres on
pure sentiment, but it looks like it may turn out a profitable business
transaction. That railroad is going to flood this country with
farmers, and settlement means a network of railroads and skyrocketing
ascension of land values."
The vanguard of the land hungry had already penetrated to Fort George.
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