“Oh, he says the scenery is fine, and the mean rain-fall is this, and the mean precipitation that, and that boarding-places can be had.  That is pretty much all.  So far as climate goes, it is the right place, but I presume the accommodations are poor enough.  The children must go prepared to rough it.  The town was only settled ten or eleven years ago; there hasn’t been time to make things comfortable,” remarked Dr. Carr, with a truly Eastern ignorance of the rapid way in which things march in the far West.

Clover’s feelings when the decision was announced to her it would be hard to explain in full.  She was both confused and exhilarated by the sudden weight of responsibility laid upon her.  To leave everybody and everything she had always been used to, and go away to such a distance alone with Phil, made her gasp with a sense of dismay, while at the same time the idea that for the first time in her life she was trusted with something really important, roused her energies, and made her feel braced and valiant, like a soldier to whom some difficult enterprise is intrusted on the day of battle.

Many consultations followed as to what the travellers should carry with them, by what route they would best go, and how prepare for the journey.  A great deal of contradictory advice was offered, as is usually the case when people are starting on a voyage or a long railway ride.  One friend wrote to recommend that they should provide themselves with a week’s provisions in advance, and enclosed a list of crackers, jam, potted meats, tea, fruit, and hardware, which would have made a heavy load for a donkey or mule to carry.  How were poor Clover and Phil to transport such a weight of things?  Another advised against umbrellas and water-proof cloaks,—­what was the use of such things where it never rained?—­while a second letter, received the same day, assured them that thunder and hail storms were things for which travellers in Colorado must live in a state of continual preparation.  “Who shall decide when doctors disagree?” In the end Clover concluded that it was best to follow the leadings of commonsense and rational precaution, do about a quarter of what people advised, and leave the rest undone; and she found that this worked very well.

As they knew so little of the resources of St. Helen’s, and there was such a strong impression prevailing in the family as to its being a rough sort of newly-settled place, Clover and Katy judged it wise to pack a large box of stores to go out by freight:  oatmeal and arrowroot and beef-extract and Albert biscuits,—­things which Philly ought to have, and which in a wild region might be hard to come by.  Debby filled all the corners with home-made dainties of various sorts; and Clover, besides a spirit-lamp and a tea-pot, put into her trunks various small decorations,—­Japanese fans and pictures, photographs, a vase or two, books and a sofa-pillow,—­things which took little room, and which she thought would make their quarters look more comfortable in case they were very bare and unfurnished.  People felt sorry for the probable hardships the brother and sister were to undergo; and they had as many little gifts and notes of sympathy and counsel as Katy herself when she was starting for Europe.