The contrast between the two descriptions of the prairie is essentially one between
Directions: The passage below is followed by a question based on its content. Answer the question on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage.
These passages present two perspectives of the prairie, the grasslands that covered much of the central plains of the United States during the nineteenth century.
Passage 1
We came upon the Prairie at sunset. It would be difficult to say why, or how – though it was possibly from having heard and read so much about it – but the effect on me was disappointment. Towards the setting sun, there lay stretched out before my view a vast expanse of level ground, unbroken (save by one thin line of trees, which scarcely amounted to a scratch upon the great blank) until it met the glowing sky, wherein it seemed to dip, mingling with its rich colors and mellowing in its distant blue. There it lay, a tranquil sea or lake without water, if such a simile be admissible, with the day going down upon it: a few birds wheeling here and there, solitude and silence reigning paramount around, but the grass was not yet high; there were bare–black patches on the ground and the wild flowers that the eye could see were poor and scanty. Great as the picture was, its very flatness and extent, which left nothing to the imagination, tamed it down and cramped its interest. I felt little of that sense of freedom and exhilaration that the open landscape of a Scottish moor, or even the rolling hills of our English downlands, inspires. It was lonely and wild, but oppressive in its barren monotony. I felt that in traversing the Prairies, I could never abandon myself to the scene, forgetful of all else, as I should instinctively were heather moorland beneath my feet. On the Prairie I should often glance towards the distant and frequently receding line of the horizon, and wish it gained and passed. It is not a scene to be forgotten, but it is scarcely one, I think (at all events, as I saw it), to remember with much pleasure or to covet the looking–on again, in after years.
Passage 2
In herding the cattle on horseback, we children came to know all the open prairie round about and found it very beautiful. On the uplands, a short, light–green grass grew, intermixed with various resinous weeds, while in the lowland grazing grounds luxuriant patches of blue joint, wild oats, and other tall forage plants waved in the wind. Along the streams, cattails and tiger lilies nodded above thick mats of wide–bladed marsh grass.
Almost without realizing it, I came to know the character of every weed, every flower, every living thing big enough to be seen from the back of a horse. Nothing could be more generous, more joyous, than these natural meadows in summer. The flash and ripple and glimmer of the tall sunflowers, the chirp and gurgle of red–winged blackbirds swaying on the willow, the meadow larks piping from grassy bogs, the peep of the prairie chick and the wailing call of plover on the flowery green slopes of the uplands made it all an ecstatic world to me. It was a wide world with a big, big sky that gave alluring hints of the still more glorious unknown wilderness beyond.
Sometimes we wandered away to the meadows along the creek, gathering bouquets of pinks, sweet williams, tiger lilies, and lady's slippers. The sun flamed across the splendid serial waves of the grasses and the perfumes of a hundred spicy plants rose in the shimmering midday air. At such times the mere joy of living filled our hearts with wordless satisfaction.
On a long ridge to the north and west, the soil, too wet and cold to cultivate easily, remained for several years. Scattered over these clay lands stood small wooded groves that we called "tow–heads." They stood out like islands in the waving seas of grasses. Against these dark green masses, breakers of blue joint radiantly rolled. To the east ran the river; plum trees and crab apples bloomed along its banks. In June, immense crops of wild strawberries appeared in the natural meadows. Their delicious odor rose to us as we rode our way, tempting us to dismount.
On the bare upland ridges lay huge antlers, bleached and bare, in countless numbers, telling of the herds of elk and bison that had once fed in these vast savannas. On sunny April days, the mother fox lay out with her young on southward sloping swells. Often we met a prairie wolf, finding in it the spirit of the wilderness. To us it seemed that just over the next long swell toward the sunset the shaggy brown bison still fed in myriads, and in our hearts was a longing to ride away into the "sunset regions" of our pioneer songs.