The air was cool and fragrant, the earth moist as if a shower had just fallen.  He got up and slowly walked onward until near sunset, thinking of nothing but the beautiful people of the Mirage.  He had left the barren salt plain behind by now; the earth was covered with yellow grass, and he found and ate some sweet roots and berries.  Then feeling very tired, he stretched himself out on his back and began to wonder if what he had seen was nothing but a dream.  Yes, it was surely a dream, but then—­in his life dreams and realities were so mixed—­how was he always to know one from the other?  Which was most strange, the Mirage that glittered and quivered round him and flew mockingly before him, or the people of the Mirage he had seen?

If you are lying quite still with your eyes shut and some one comes softly up and stands over you, somehow you know it, and open your eyes to see who it is.  Just in that way Martin knew that some one had come and was standing over him.  Still he kept his eyes shut, feeling sure that it was one of those bright and beautiful beings he had lately seen, perhaps the Queen herself, and that the sight of her shining countenance would dazzle his eyes.  Then all at once he thought that it might be old Jacob, who would punish him for running away.  He opened his eyes very quickly then.  What do you think he saw?  An ostrich—­that same big ostrich he had seen and startled early in the day!  It was standing over him, staring down with its great vacant eyes.  Gradually its head came lower and lower down, until at last it made a sudden peck at a metal button on his jacket, and gave such a vigorous tug at it that Martin was almost lifted off the ground.  He screamed and gave a jump; but it was nothing to the jump the ostrich gave when he discovered that the button belonged to a living boy.  He jumped six feet high into the air and came down with a great flop; then feeling rather ashamed of himself for being frightened at such an insignificant thing as Martin, he stalked majestically away, glancing back, first over one shoulder then the other, and kicking up his heels behind him in a somewhat disdainful manner.

Martin laughed, and in the middle of his laugh he fell asleep.

CHAPTER VI

MARTIN MEETS WITH SAVAGES

When, on waking next morning, Martin took his first peep over the grass, there, directly before him, loomed the great blue hills, or Sierras as they are called in that country.  He had often seen them, long ago in his distant home on clear mornings, when they had appeared like a blue cloud on the horizon.  He had even wished to get to them, to tread their beautiful blue summits that looked as if they would be soft to his feet—­softer than the moist springy turf on the plain; but he wished it only as one wishes to get to some far-off impossible place—­a white cloud, for instance, or the blue sky itself.  Now all at once he unexpectedly found himself near