The long, parched summer had drawn to its dusty close.

Much of it was already blown abroad and dissipated on trail and turnpike, or crackled in harsh, unelastic fibres on hillside and meadow.

Some of it had disappeared in the palpable smoke by day and fiery crests by night of burning forests.

The besieging fogs on the Coast Range daily thinned their hosts, and at last vanished.

The wind changed from northwest to southwest.