When we rode away, our main body had already been on the road an hour or two - I speak of our camp equipage; but we didn't move off alone: when Cathy
blew the "advance" the Rangers cantered out in column of fours, and gave us escort, and were joined by White Cloud and Thunder -Bird in all their gaudy bravery, and by Buffalo Bill and four subordinate scouts.
I remembered my skiff, lying idle and accumulating barnacles at the boat-wharf; I remembered the wind that
blew every day on the bay, the sunrises and sunsets I never saw; the bite of the salt air in my nostrils, the bite of the salt water on my flesh when I plunged overside; I remembered all the beauty and the wonder and the sense-delights of the world denied me.
In another hour it had much increased, and the sky was more overcast, and
blew hard.