four o'clock in
the morning
We can get along on biscuit an ' pancakes in place o ' meat , but we ca n't put anythin ' in the place o ' bread . If it looks favorable to-morrow , we 've got to make a break for Summit an ' see if we ca n't stock up . '' Early the next morning they brought out the shivering team and piled into the box all the quilts and robes they had , and bundling little Flaxen in , started across the trackless plain toward the low line of hills to the east , twenty-five or thirty miles . From four o'clock in the morning till nearly noon they toiled across the sod , now ploughing through the deep snow where the unburned grass had held it , now scraping across the bare , burned earth , now wandering up or down the swales , seeking the shallowest places , now shovelling a pathway through . The sun rose unobscured as usual , and shone down with unusual warmth , which afforded the men the satisfaction of seeing little Flaxen warm and merry . She chattered away in her own tongue , and clapped her little hands in glee at sight of the snowbirds running and fluttering about . As they approached the low hills the swales got deeper and more difficult to cross , but about eleven o'clock they came to Burdon 's Ranch , a sort of half-way haven between their own claim and Summit , the end of the railway .