midnight
A drink of water from the brook , and about to breakfast . We gathered the cattle into a drove , and started them in a broken line across the hills toward the road , the huge black muleys strolling along , every fellow at his leisure . The sun peeping through his gateway in the east gilded the tops of the brown sedge and turned the grass into a sea of gold . Through this Eldorado the line of black cattle waded in deep grasses to the knee , -- curly-coated beasts from some kingdom of the midnight in mighty contrast to this golden country . I might have been the Merchant 's Son transported by some wicked fairy to a land of wonders , watching , with terror in his throat , the rebellious jins under some enchantment of King Solomon travelling eastward to the sun . Now a hungry fellow paused to gather a bunch of the good-tasting grass and was butted out of the path , and now some curly-shouldered belligerent roared his defiant bellow and it went rumbling through the hills . We drove the cattle through the open gate of the pasture and down a long lane to the scales .